7 Cheap and Free Resources for Stock Photography

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Imagery can enhance your website or web marketing campaign in a big way. It can show an emotion, exhibit an action, showcase a product, and much more. It’s true what they say: a picture is worth 1,000 words.

The problem is…not every small business owner has the money in their budget to hire a professional photographer to capture all the right shots.

Even stock photography can be pricey, but there are plenty of tricks. Shop around and you’ll get a great deal. Buy smaller photos and you’ll save rather than buying the larger versions. Give credit (where credit is due) and you might get your photos for free.

So expensive stock photography shouldn’t stop you. There are plenty of websites out there that offer free and inexpensive stock photography options. Here are just a few.

7 Free & Low Cost Options for Stock Photography

1. Bigstock Photo

Bigstock Photo offers a number of great stock photography options. While subscriptions cost $79 – $99 per month, you can get one month free (10 images per day for 7 days). Just make sure you cancel before your 7th day!

2. Dollar Photo Club

The idea behind Dollar Photo Club is simple: they offer royalty-free stock photos and vectors for $1 apiece.

3. Flickr

While you can’t just take whatever you want from Flickr, you can certainly use the Creative Commons section to your advantage for free. Creative Commons offers a number of submissions from users. Keep in mind, however, that many images can be used and shared, but the photographer must be given appropriate credit.

4. Fotosearch

Similar to BigStock Photo, Fotosearch offers monthly subscriptions where you can get images for as little as $0.33 each.

5. IM Creator

Traditionally a website development platform, IM Creator offers a free area for templates, stock photos, and more.

6. picjumbo

picjumbo offers free photos for commercial and personal work. Donations can be made to support the cause and you can also receive premium access for as little as $6 per month.

7. pixaby

pixaby is another free stock photography option. You’ll always be offered paid shutterstock photos first, but then you have your pick of (semi-limited) free options.

5 Cheap Options for Stock Photography

1. Canva

One of my favorite tools of all time, this all-in-one design (for the non-designer) and stock photography resource is perfect for any online marketing effort for your business.

2. depositphotos

Another royalty-free image website, depositphotos offers plenty of low priced photography. While they typically aren’t free, you’ll be able to snag a deal or two from this site.

3. gettyimages

gettyimages is one that you’ll see a lot on online magazines. Like the others, if you choose proper attribution or hunt around, you’ll find a deal or two. However, this tends to be on the more expensive side; although you’ll get a lot more variety here as well.

4. iStock Photo

Historically more expensive, iStock Photo does offer royalty-free image deals if you look hard for them.

5. shutterstock

Another more expensive option, shutterstock offers its customers the additional bonus of vectors, videos, and music tracks in addition to photos.