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Do you want to know where you can find the best free stock photos for your blog?
Well, stay tuned because I’m telling you about 6 of the best free stock photo sites that have amazing high-quality pictures you can use on your blog.
You want your blog to look nice, and the photos you choose can make or break you. Hubspot reported that Facebook pages with photos receive 53 percent more likes than typical posts. Think about the elements of a blog that you think make it attractive. What are some of those features of your favorite blogger’s website that makes it look incredible? It’s likely more than one thing, but attractive pictures probably make your shortlist.
The Best Stock Photo Sites Cost Tons of Money (Not True)
However, to find nice pictures for your blog, you’d better be prepared to pay for them, right? Not necessarily. Sure, using pictures that you pay for is often nicer and keeps you from have the same stock photos every other blogger has in their articles. But perhaps you can’t afford to pay for pictures right now.
Well, you’re in luck! There are many great websites with great gorgeous photos that you can use on your blog. Here are several of those.
1. Unsplash
Unsplash is one of my favorite places to find beautiful free photos for your blog. I stumbled across them when I was just starting my freelance writing career when I was looking for photos to use in my clients’ blogs.
I was clueless in general at that time, and it wasn’t until later that I started reading blogs suggesting Unsplash. This website has a huge variety of unique pictures that you can use on your blog, and while no credit is necessary, it is nice to give attribution to the photographer. I love that they have some more uncommon pictures that I don’t see on everyone else’s blogs, but you may not be able to find many niche or topic-specific pictures.
Related: 9 of the Best Free Blogging Courses to Help You Grow Your Blog and Make More Money
2. Skitterphoto
It’s only recently that I came across Skitterphoto, so I haven’t used them yet, but I think they are an excellent option to find photos for public use. The photos are free to use commercially or personally.
Skitterphoto has a variety of picture categories, so there are plenty of options available. Photographers are welcome to share photos with people who need them for media content such as your blog or website.
3. Pexels
Pexels is a very popular website to find free stock photos. They have a huge repository of a wide variety of pictures, all of which you can use for free. Like Unsplash, Pexels doesn’t require attribution, but it is appreciated.
You can be creative and edit the photos as you want, which is nice when you want to use them in social media graphics. Pexels can be used online for your website, blog, a template you plan to sell for money, an e-book, newsletter, or even an e-commerce store. The fact that you can use their photos on products you plan to sell for profit is awesome because sometimes it difficult to find good images for those products without paying for them.
4. Pixabay
Pixabay is usually the first website I hear other online entrepreneurs suggest to people looking for the best stock photo sites. You can use the free videos and images on anything for your business.
All videos and images are copyright free under the Pixabay license. If you like taking pictures, show some love by submitting them to Pixabay for people all around the world to use. You can easily search for vectors, videos, or images or look at some of the popular selections.
5. Flickr
This website has millions of stunning pictures of incredible quality. Flickr allows you to upload up to 1,000 of your own photos if you’re a photographer, but don’t let that chase you off.
For those of us that need inspiration, there are plenty of free pictures to search through. Most of their photos are not for public use, so be careful. Just make sure you search for those with a creative commons license.
6. FreeImages.com
FreeImages is another great place to find free pictures for your blog. It boasts well over 300,000 images and illustrations, all free for personal and commercial use. The pictures are beautiful, and the website offers a wide variety of categories such as outdoor activities, flowers and trees, business and finance, and so much more.
Additionally, they offer unique iStock photos as well, and you can download ten of those free, but then you must pay for more. You can sign up for an account for free without having to start a free trial that rolls into a paid plan.
These are just six of the most popular websites that offer free images that you can use in articles and on your blog. With these six sites alone, there are millions of pictures to choose from. If you want to find more unique photos, some of these sites offer paid subscriptions as well. There are many more sites online to get high-quality images from.
Legalities of Using Stock Photos
The important thing is to make sure that the pictures you use aren’t copyrighted images, or you could get in steep legal trouble. One website explains that they paid $4,000 for a $10 photo because of limited knowledge of copyright laws and that they learned their lesson the hard way.
No matter where you look for pictures for your website, make sure to check the legal rights to the photos you pick. Most websites have legal disclaimers about the proper usage of the photos on their websites, so make sure you do your due diligence.
Don’t use photos from Wikimedia Commons of Google Images because you can get in hot water if you use the wrong image. If you want to continue to get photos from these websites, there are some things you can do.
Make sure to understand the requirements for using the pictures, and if you’re in doubt at all, don’t use them. Also, give proper attribution if required no matter where you use the picture on your blog. The media file itself may contain an image and you could even be in trouble for that if you don’t provide proper attribution.