To save you from this, we here are https://theEarthMode.com/ has come up with our own favorite list of website where you can download absolutely free to use and modify pictures.
Before we jump directly into the list, I would like to discuss types of licenses, and which one is your friend and which one you should stay away from.
To generalize there are basically four types of image reuse licenses:
- Reuse with modification.
- Reuse only.
- Non-commercial Reuse with modification.
- Non-commercial Reuse.
We at https://theEarthMode.com/ stick to CC0 or Public Domain Mark 1.0 license types. CC0 means “No Rights Reserved” whereas Public Domain Mark 1.0 means “No Copyright” what so ever, making them safest images to reuse if you are unable to take your own pictures.
Top 10 Websites to download free Photos.
Lets jump into the list of website where you can download photos that are free to use & commercialize.
This is one of our favorites. Flickr has lots an lots of photos that are free. But, get ready to spend some amount of time looking & searching for photos. Flickr also has both good & bad quality photos. We recommend you to find bunch of photos in one sitting and to use it over time.
Flickr shows the license & download button under right side of the image.
Pexels is one of our another favorite website to get free photos. Its an easy to use website and has very clear license page that explains what can people do with the photos downloaded from Pexels. Basically photos download from Pexels are free to use, does not require attribution, and can be modified & edited without permissions. This licensing opens lots of opportunities to use and personalized photos downloaded from Pexels.
Pexels search is easy and provides you with autocomplete as well as Collections & Trending Topics.
We found Unsplash very similar to Pexels. Its intuitive web design, infinite scroll on search results make finding perfect photo a breeze. All photos published on Unsplash can be used for free. You can use them for commercial and noncommercial purposes. You do not need to ask permission from or provide credit to the photographer or Unsplash.
RGB Stock provides lots of free pictures. If you are looking for free stock photos for personal use of commercial work, RGBstock has more than 100,000 free stock photos online. This website however needs free registration. We do recommend you to always pay attention to picture level license to make sure there are no strings attached. RGB Stock also allows creators to create their own gallery and give away their content for free.
Who doesn’t love Wikipedia! Wikimedia is a sibling to Wikipedia but for media contents like photos, videos & audios. Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone. The repository is created and maintained not by paid archivists, but by volunteers. At the time of writing this blog, Wikimedia Commons currently contains 58,580,994 files and 57,513,042 media collections. Wikimedia however may not be the easiest to use website, however you might find images that you were not able to find it elsewhere.
We rely on Pixabay for Stunning free images & royalty free stock photos. Pixabay at the time of writing this blog has over 1 million+ high quality stock images and videos shared by our talented community. Alongside images, PixaBay also provide vectors & illustrations.
Pixabay FAQ clearly mentions this: “You can copy, modify, distribute, and use the images, even for commercial purposes, all without asking for permission or giving credits to the artist. However, depicted content may still be protected by trademarks, publicity or privacy rights.” So we recommend you check the picture details on licensing before downloading it.
When I first came to know about Morgue File, first thing that came in my mind was the name of the website, I was wondering what it means. Apparently, A morgue file is a place to keep post production materials for use of reference — an inactive job file. This term was popular with newspapers to describe the file that held past issues flats. Although it has also been used by illustrators, comic book artist, designers and teachers as well. Most of the photos found in the site are free to use commercially and modify. However do check at the image level, some creators would ask for back link to them.
Stock Vault is an easy to use website with new photos, textures & illustrations added every day. As many other Stock sites, this will allow creators to share their work by uploading to the website. They also have large number of categories which will make finding perfect photo a breeze. Although all images in Stock Vault are free, the usage depends on the image license. Contributing photographers can select one of 3 types of license to share their photos; Non-Commercial, Commercial and Public Domain (CC0). Please check license mentioned in the email, before using it.
FreeImages This is another great site for free images. Images are free as long as you stick to the rules in the Image license Agreement. Also, in some cases you may need to notify the artists about using the images and sometimes you need to give credit to them. You can see these restrictions under the image previews, right next to the Download button.
Google is got to be the easiest way to find free to use photos & images. Just search on Google, hit the image tab and choose the license type under settings and bang! Google shows you all the free to use images for you search criteria. Check following GIF for how to.
