Envira Gallery Blog
Digital Photography Tips, Tutorials and Resources
10+ Best Places to Sell Photos Online & Make Money
by Southie Williamson on Nov 29, 2023
Are you looking for the best places to sell photos online? Maybe you’re wondering which photo-selling websites are best for selling stock photos.
Photographers of all skill levels are in high demand for their work, and there are many ways to sell digital photos online. As a photographer, you can easily earn money on the side (or even start a new career!) once you know the best places to sell photos online.
However, with so many online marketplaces and websites claiming to be the best place to sell photography and stock videos, it can be hard to know where to begin. To help you out, we’ve compiled a list of the best ways to sell photos online so you can make money doing what you love.
- How Much Money Can You Make Selling Photos Online?
- What Kind of Photos Sell the Most?
- #1 Best Place to Sell Photos Online
- Top 10 Photo Selling Websites
How Much Money Can You Make Selling Photos Online?
The amount of money you can make selling photos online varies widely and depends on several factors. Firstly, the quality and uniqueness of your photos play a significant role. Exceptional, in-demand images tend to attract more buyers. And, the platform you choose matters – some marketplaces charge higher prices or offer better commissions.
Consistency and quantity can also contribute to earnings. Regularly uploading a range of appealing photos can increase your chances of making sales. Building a strong portfolio and engaging with your audience can lead to repeat customers and positive word-of-mouth, further boosting your income.
Ultimately, successfully selling pictures online requires dedication along with an understanding of your audience and market trends. While some photographers earn a modest supplementary income using a stock photography website, others turn online photo sales into a lucrative eCommerce business.
What Kind of Photos Sell the Most?
Large corporations, mom-and-pop shops, graphic designers, marketers, and more buy custom or stock photography for online use. Bloggers and website owners who run small to medium-sized businesses make up the largest buying base for stock images. Here are some of the types of photos they buy the most:
- People: Pictures of people of all ages are very popular. Currently, photos that feature people from different countries and cultures, active elderly citizens, and models who have imperfections and look more like regular people are high sellers.
- People working: These images are very popular with businesses. Folks working on laptops, writing, speaking at a meeting, etc. Just don’t make them so generic that they become a meme.
- Food: Various types of food photography, the stages of cooking, and even empty unwashed plates.
- DIY & Tools: Photos of DIY artwork, crafts, and home projects are popular as well as images of tools such as gears, hammers, nuts, bolts, and screws, which can convey a lot of things for potential buyers.
- Cities: Cityscapes, buildings, people commuting, and photos that show city motion and lights are very popular.
- Nature: This is a no-brainer. The beautiful outdoors never gets old to shoot and never goes out of style with buyers. Check out our list of the 15 best places to sell nature photography online.
- Travel: Landscape photos for sale and shots from around the world are always in high demand.
#1 Best Place to Sell Photos Online
Before we dive into our list of the best stock photo-selling sites, let’s talk about the #1 best place to sell photos online: your own website! The biggest reason to sell photographs on your own site is that it puts YOU in control. You can set your own prices, no one else takes a cut, you have 100% control over how to display your photos, and you can set your own terms and conditions.
Don’t have a website yet? It’s not hard to start one. The majority of professional photography sites online are created on WordPress. Check this simple guide on how to create a photography website in WordPress to get started.
After creating your website, you need to showcase your photos beautifully to attract visitors and convince them to buy your images. You’ll want to ensure that your images are displayed properly, your design is user-friendly, your photos are protected from theft, and your images are optimized for search engines. Plus, to make money selling photos, you’ll need an excellent eCommerce system to process payments and provide digital downloads.
Thankfully, all of that is actually pretty easy with Envira Gallery!
Envira Gallery is the best premium WordPress gallery plugin, allowing you to create beautiful image and video displays. A drag-and-drop builder and multiple layouts including including slideshow, fullscreen, masonry, lightbox display, and more make creating a stunning gallery effortless.
Plus, Envira Gallery provides native integration with Woo, which makes setting up eCommerce and selling your photos a breeze. You’ll have complete control. The Digital Downloads Addon allows users to download photos easily, and you can even allow users to print images directly from your WordPress gallery with the Printing Addon.
Check out some more of our most popular features:
- Client image proofing.
- Social sharing buttons on images, galleries, and albums.
- Filterable galleries and albums using tags.
- Supports video galleries.
- Albums to organize and manage galleries.
- Deeplinking for SEO-friendly galleries.
- Watermarking, image protection, and password-protected galleries.
- Built-in image compression.
- Adobe Lightroom integration.
- Integration with popular page builders like Elementor and Beaver Builder.
- And lots more…
Envira Gallery makes it easy to stand out from your competitors and create gorgeous, functional galleries without touching a single link of code. Head to our step-by-step tutorial and learn how to sell your photos on WordPress using Envira Gallery.
Get started with Envira Gallery today!
Want to learn more about creating your own site to sell pictures as stock images? Check out our articles on the Best WordPress Theme for Selling Photos and How to Sell Stock Photos with a WordPress Plugin or Theme.
Top 10 Photo Selling Websites
Although the best place to sell photos online is your own website, there are lots of other sites where you can list your photography for purchase. Let’s dive into our list of the top 10.
1. Adobe Stock
Adobe Stock is a stock photo site from the makers of the most popular photo editing software, including Photoshop and Lightroom. This photography eCommerce platform has been around for almost 20 years. It’s known to be among the very first online photo-selling marketplaces and is still considered one of the best stock photo websites to sell images on.
Adobe Stock is integrated with the Adobe Cloud Platform, which makes it particularly popular among photographers since you can upload albums directly from Lightroom. Moreover, Adobe has numerous products that are widely used around the world, which means your uploaded images have the potential to be seen by quite a large audience.
Check out more of the features that make Adobe Stock one of the best ways to make money selling photos:
- Supports a wide variety of assets including images, vector graphics, illustrations, and stock videos.
- Doesn’t require exclusive rights to your images, so you can sell on other platforms at the same time.
- Offers free access to Adobe Portfolio for contributors, which allows you to build a portfolio and showcase your best work.
All in all, Adobe Stock is an excellent choice for selling your photos online. It’s easy to use, free to sign up, offers great workflow integration, and provides huge reach to millions of buyers.
Pricing / Payout: Free signup. Contributors receive a 33% royalty share on images.
Get started with Adobe Stock today!
2. Shutterstock
Similar to Adobe Stock, Shutterstock has been a popular website to sell photos on ever since these type of platforms were invented. They have over 600 million images, videos, and music tracks and around 200 million contributors. That means they also have millions of purchasing customers.
Signing up for Shutterstock is free, and once you become a site contributor, you’ll start earning money every time someone purchases and downloads your content. Here are a few of the features that make it a great place to sell your stock images:
- Supports a wide variety of files including images, vector graphics, illustrations, and video.
- Doesn’t require exclusive selling rights to your images, so you can sell on other platforms at the same time.
- You can earn extra money by referring other photographers or artists to Shutterstock.
- Provides a personalized portfolio page and the ability to track earnings.
One thing to note about Shutterstock is that the competition is steep. As one of the largest stock photo and video sites on the internet, buyers have millions of images to choose from, including royalty-free ones. That said, you can still sell photos on Shutterstock and make good money in the long run if you focus on uploading a lot of images.
Pricing / Payout: Free signup and 6 separate earnings levels, ranging from 15% to 40% of the purchase price. The more downloads you get, the more money you earn.
Get started with Shutterstock today!
3. Alamy
Alamy is a British photography site that’s another great website to sell photos on. It offers fast and easy signup, an iPhone app (Stockimo) to capture and upload photos on the go, and competitive earnings – over $1 million paid to contributors every month.
Alamy handles all of the complicated licensing that comes with online selling and provides photographers with a straightforward contract. The platform doesn’t edit submissions, so you can be sure you have complete control over your work.
Signing up with Alamy is free, and it’s an especially great option for students. That’s because students receive a special 100% commission rate for 2 years! Here are a few of the features that make it one of the best websites to sell photos online:
- Supports a variety of assets including images, vector graphics, illustrations, and video.
- Analytics tools to track sales and help you see what type of photos sell best.
- Doesn’t require exclusive selling rights to your images, so you can sell on other platforms at the same time.
Although this photo-selling site may not have as many buyers as Shutterstock or Adobe Stock, it’s still a great contender for extra revenue. It’s also an excellent choice for students due to its 100% commission rate for 2 years.
Pricing / Payout: Free signup and three commission levels. Most contributors receive 40%, which requires you to meet a threshold of $250 or more in gross sales every year. Contributors who earn more than $25k in gross sales earn 50% commission.
4. Etsy
Etsy is best known as a marketplace to buy and sell handmade goods, custom products, vintage clothes, and more. So, you may be surprised to see it on our list of the top photo-selling websites. But, Etsy boasts millions of users every month and many photographers use it to sell their work.
The great thing about Etsy is that they have a larger audience than most stock photography sites and a specific demographic that you can cater to. Sellers often make money from images that target crafty young females.
Another big plus is that Etsy operates as your own eCommerce shop. Of course, you can sell digital images, but you can also sell prints or other items featuring your photography such as mugs or blankets to expand your photography business! Check out the pros of making money selling photos on Etsy:
- You can price your own photos and products, which provides high earnings potential.
- Full control over how you display your photos to buyers.
- Offers an Offsite Ads program where the platform will automatically advertise your products across the web (15% fee on sales for the service).
Just remember, if you’re selling prints or other items, you’ll have to handle manufacturing and factor in the cost of printing, packing, and shipping. If you want to create an online store to sell your photography but don’t want to make your own site, Etsy could be a great fit.
Pricing / Payout: You can sign up for free or pay a monthly fee of $10 for more perks. Etsy charges a listing fee (the first 40 are free, then $0.20 each), a transaction fee (6.5% of the sale price), and a processing fee if you choose to receive payments through the platform (3% + $0.25).
5. SmugMug
SmugMug is a well-known photo storage platform that allows you to protect, store, and share digital photos. However, it also offers a sales platform where you can sell photo prints and digital downloads. They claim the setup process only takes 15 minutes!
One of the cool things about SmugMug is that they partner with various print labs, so you can sell traditional prints or products. Images can be printed on just about anything including metal, glass, and keepsakes. Check out more of SmugMug’s features:
- Private galleries and client-friendly tools for proofing.
- Custom pricelists.
- Unlimited photo storage including managing RAW files.
- Pre-built website templates and personal event sites.
SmugMug is another reputable choice for photographers, and it’s particularly well-suited to users who want to provide more extensive product prints without having to deal with all the manufacturing details themselves. It’s also handy for photographers who need a robust storage solution.
Pricing / Payout: To access the selling features, plans start at $28 per month and contributors keep 85% of their profits.
Get started with SmugMug today!
6. 500px
500px is a photography website that’s targeted at professionals. It takes a different approach than many of the typical stock agencies. 500px is a community platform that allows you to host and share photos, connect with other creators, provide and receive feedback, and create a portfolio to sell photos online and earn money.
The main thing that sets 500px apart when it comes to selling photographs is its payment structure. Contributors pay a monthly subscription fee to access the platform’s features and sell photos. As long as you have a paid subscription, you’ll receive 100% commission on any sales (free plans receive 60%).
Check out the features that make 500px one of the best places to sell photos online:
- Analytics features give you insight into where your photo views are coming from, which images are most popular, how your images fare compared to those of your competitors, and more.
- Add your profile, portfolio, and resume to the available-for-hire directory and get discovered by potential clients (Pro plan).
- “Pulse algorithm” increases your exposure by adding your new uploads to a discovery page.
- Weekly photo challenges with prizes, called Quests.
500px puts a big emphasis on high-quality submissions. They review every photo and consider things like uniqueness, technical quality, overall aesthetic, production value, and commercial viability before approving your images and making them available for purchase.
If you’re a professional photographer with a high skill level, it can be a great way to get your work seen and ensure you’re not competing with lower-quality images in an oversaturated market. Plus, you’ll earn 100% commission and connect with the photography community. However, it’s not the most beginner-friendly option.
Pricing / Payout: Offers 3 membership plans ranging from free to $9.99 a month. Paid plans include unlimited photo uploads and 100% commission.
7. Snapped4u
Snapped4u makes selling your event photos and portraits a piece of cake. If you shoot weddings, parties, engagements, or other events, Snapped4u was designed to make your life easier.
After shooting an event or portrait session, you can make a new gallery, upload the images in JPEG format, and set photo prices. After that, clients are able to buy the photos and Snapped4u will immediately email them the files.
Each Snapped4u seller has their own gallery page, so customers who book you for multiple events can always find your images in the same place. And, you can give your personalized URL to anyone who may want to purchase your photos, like other event guests.
Check out the details of selling event photos online with Snapped4u:
- Set your own prices with a maximum photo price of $20.
- Get paid for all purchased photos on the 1st of the month in your PayPal account.
- Galleries are posted for 4 months, but they can be renewed after expiration.
Keep in mind, Snapped4u isn’t designed for stock photography. It’s solely for event and portrait photographers. It provides a simple, straightforward way for photographers to sell the images they took to the people who were photographed.
Pricing / Payout: There is a one-time $10 registration fee along with a commission fee. Snapped4u charges $0.50 on all photo sales under $5.00 and 10% on all others.
Get started with Snapped4u today!
8. PhotoShelter
PhotoShelter is a digital asset management system that offers services for brands and organizations as well as photographers. For photographers, the platform helps with portfolio creation, gallery organization, client proofing, and selling digital downloads or prints.
PhotoShelter allows you to build a portfolio website quickly, create galleries, add eCommerce functionality, and deliver purchased orders to customers easily. Here are a few of the features that make it a great choice for photography websites:
- Pre-built templates to build your photography site.
- Built-in eCommerce features and partnerships with professional print labs.
- Private galleries and client proofing.
- Mobile app to upload, price, and view your archive of photos on the go.
PhotoShelter is a good choice if you’re looking for an easy, hands-off way to create a photography site. The service is user-friendly and provides plenty of features for managing and selling photos online.
Pricing / Payout: 3 subscription plans are offered, which start at $10.00 per month. You’ll also pay an 8%-10% transaction fee on each photo sale.
Get started with Photoshelter today!
9. Fotomoto
Unlike most of the websites on our list, Fotomoto isn’t a marketplace to sell images online. Rather, it’s a widget that integrates with your website to help you sell digital photos and offer print-on-demand services.
After you set up a Fotomoto account and add the shopping widget to your site, visitors will be able to purchase the images. If you’re selling physical prints or canvases, you can fulfill orders yourself or let Fotomoto manage them. The service will handle the entire process including printing, packaging, and shipping.
Here are some of Fotomoto’s top features for selling photographs:
- Integrates with numerous platforms including WordPress, Joomla, Flickr, and Squarespace.
- The widget itself is customizable. You can adjust the widget’s settings to display your own branding and logo.
- User-friendly dashboard for customization and tracking.
Whether you’re a hobbyist photographer, a professional photographer, or a graphic designer, Fotomoto has some great features that will work seamlessly with your existing website. It’s a solid option if you’re looking for a simple way to sell physical prints online.
Pricing / Payout: Offers 3 subscription plans ranging from a free plan with a 22% transaction fee to $10 a month with a 10% transaction fee.
Get started with Fotomoto today!
10. TourPhotos
TourPhotos is a hub for tourists and activity photographers across the globe. In fact, many travel agencies and tour companies use it to upload photos of their adventure trips for attendees to purchase.
You can create galleries for each activity and upload high-resolution images or videos for clients to purchase. The platform uses a calendar-like store. That way, buyers can easily find their photos by clicking on the date of their activity. Check out more of TourPhotos standout features:
- Set individual prices or bulk packages and generate discount codes.
- Automatic branding will apply your logo to each photo.
- Customers can share purchased photos directly to social media.
If you’re an activity photographer who often shoots tours or other events, TourPhotos is a perfect solution for providing photos to your clients easily. Plus, the service includes staff management features where collaborators can upload photos and earn a % of sales.
Pricing / Payout: It offers a transaction-based plan where TourPhotos keeps a 20%-25% commission. Or, pay a monthly fee and use the service to provide free photos to clients.
Get started with TourPhotos today!
Which Website Is Best for Selling Photos?
The best site to sell photos online is your own website. It’s easy to create your WordPress photography site and sell images with Envira Gallery, and you won’t pay any commission fees. However, since most of the stock agency sites and platforms on our list don’t require exclusive selling rights, you can have your own site while earning passive income from other photo-selling websites!
Adobe Stock and Shutterstock are both popular options that provide a huge audience reach and are also suitable for beginners. If you’re a seasoned photographer with high-quality images, 500px is another excellent option.
Still looking for options? Here are a few more of the best image-selling websites that we didn’t cover on our main list:
- iStock Photo by Getty Images – Non-exclusive microstock site that pays 15%-45% royalties.
- Dreamstime – Stock website that allows you to curate your galleries and pays 25%-45% commission for non-exclusive images.
- Fine Art America – Print-on-demand service that handles all order aspects. They focus on fine art and pay a 35% commission, but you set your own prices.
- Stocksy – Somewhat niche with a focus on artsy, high-quality photos. It requires selling exclusivity and pays contributors 50%-75% of the purchase price.
That’s it for now! We hope this guide helped you find the best place to sell photos online so you can start making money with photography!
Not using Envira Gallery? Get started today!
If you enjoyed this article, be sure to check out our list of the 17 Best Photo Editing Software for Photographers.
Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and X (Twitter) for the best photography tips, resources, and WordPress tutorials.
Using WordPress and want to get Envira Gallery free?
Envira Gallery helps photographers create beautiful photo and video galleries in just a few clicks so that they can showcase and sell their work.
Hi Envira Gallery,
I saw you tweeting about make money online and I thought I’d check out your website. I really like it. Looks like Envira Gallery has come a long way!
Building a mailing list like you are is so important too, I think people would really like to be signed up to what you have to share.
Good job on the social buttons, social media is so powerful these days
Good job with the Yoast plugin SEO is so important these days.
Thank you, Kevin. 🙂
Hello is is possible to upload the same photos to every single platform u have on the list?
Hi Jodie!
You can upload the same photo to multiple agencies. However, you will need to read the requirements and terms for each site to be certain. In general, however, yes you can sell the same photo on several stock photo/agency sites.
Unfortunately, when I typed in best or top place to sell photo’s online. There’s a vast difference in opinions. I want to know, how you come up with this list?
The list reflects the best places based on several factors. So, not every site listed here will be the “best” for each type of photographer or each type of businessperson, but it is our hope by including a variety of high-quality sites here, at least one will appeal to every photographer’s specific needs. Hopefully, that helps!
I just want know if it is possible to use this site if you are in Africa
Jim—what are you hearing as far as other or different sites? Different order of preference?
Iam kenyan citizen and interested in photo selling but I doubt if at all you accept from Africa?
how can i get payments?
I would like to sell my photos
Good article.
I went to Shuttersotck full of hope. I register, confirm my mail, and then ask me for my address which is was kind of weird to me, but I agreed. But then ask me for a picture of my passport or ID,… that was all my relationship with them.
I know they may have many reason to request for that but they also are a private site and a passport or ID are really sensitive information. If I have a PayPal account or any other account for received the payment I think thus should be enough.
The worst part is they ask for a fully detailed picture of the passport not only the name or the age.
Finally what is bother the most is they don’t ask for that data in the first step. You have to register, then give your address and finally when probably most people don’t agree to that ask for your passport picture, when they allready have plenty of info about you. For the ones who agreed to that, hope they don’t request blood type or something like that in the steep 4.
If I have abstract images, do I have special sites or the same sites listed?
There is a reason – people try to post pictures that they have stolen or that infringe copyright – so they want to make sure you are who you say you are – if you get banned it is then less likely that you can just re-register. They are protecting themselves and your pictures too.
I just left Pond5 over this issue. It’s ridiculous!!!
Muje photographer banana he. plz help me any one
Ek DSLR lelo aur gar se bhag niklo.
Hahah right bruh
Hi Waseem Abbas, such a great list of sites to sell the photograph for money. I hope this post will help many photographers to earn money also in online. Thanks for sharing this post with us.
Thank you so much for this info.!
Hi guys, I am a single mom and working from home to earn money to support my baby girl. i mostly use YouTube to showcase my work in photography. My channel has started gaining some good audience and i am hoping to start earning enough from it to make it my permanent job. The only issue i have faced so far is how to get affiliate material for my videos and how to monetize my social media channels. Registering with affiliate networks is a tedious and difficult job. My offers were rejected many times before it got accepted. Now i have found a website name revglue which can monetize your website, blog or any social media channel so that you can earn money from it. They handle all the affiliate related work for me so i focus more on my social media promotion. you can also find details about them here at revglue(.)com/blog-detail/24-monetise-your-youtube-channels-and-reviews-with-revsocial . i have to pay a small amount of my revenue to them for there services but considering the alternative i say that i got the better deal. I had also worked with shutterstock in the past but YouTube pays you more for your effort.
This comment was super helpful! How do you use YouTube exactly to display photography? Do you watermark it and then do a slideshow??
Amazing list of resources.
However PhotoShelter is too expensive for a photographer whose starting out. The same functionalities are offered by other platforms like Pixpa. I’ve had an e-commerce store for selling prints with Pixpa since almost a year, the sales are not regular but its an excellent source of side income.
Thanks, great suggestions you have mentioned here. These ideas are really worth a lot for a website. I will definitely follow these tricks to my website and hope for better outcomes.
awsome
Have any one got the money from any of the websites? How do we know that how many audience downloaded our photo? is there any way to track this information.
Plenty of websites are offering money for uploading the images to their website as the pictures which have creativity getting more popularity and money according to that it is decided the price of the photo. Some of the trusted website in which you can trust blindly is Shutterstock as it is most trusted site from my view.
Hi
I read the article
But still need your help
I have so easy plant and nature’s photos
And I need a start
Will you help me to sell them
Add Dreamstime to the list, please!
Hey,
Thanks for sharing an Article full of Useful information.
After reading all the information,comments and responses, I like to give a try. Im interested. I’m new to this business. Where and how do I start? If I start how am I gonna be paid?
Please need assistance.
How would I get paid
Just take Nature
MY IMAGES ARE OFTEN ART IMAGES. I START WITH PHOTOGRAPHS THEN PROCESS THEM USING VARIOUS SOFTWARE SUCH AS GLIFTIC AND GET STUNNING RESULTS WHICH WOULD BE GREAT AS PICTURES ON WALLS, OR AS PATTERNS FOR FABRICS.
WHICH PLATFORMS WOULD BE BEST FOR THESE KINDS OF IMAGES?
ALSO WHERE IS DEVIANT ART PLACED IN THESE PLATFORMS. IT ALSO CAN BE A PLACE THAT ONE CAN SELL FROM AS A PHOTOGRAPHER.
PLEASE – I REALLY WOULD VALUE SOME GUIDANCE ABOUT THIS
THANK YOU
Take a look at pixels.com or Fine Art America, same company. I’ve been using them for approx 10 yrs. $30 year fee, unlimited photos. You set the fee for each photo. They do everything else. Metal, Canvas, Cups, Sheets, Shower Curtains the list goes on. Little effort to use and it’s free for 30 days.
Thank You Chuck! Good info!
I just joined Shutterstock and it is very particular. I submitted a photo of a sundog and it was rejected because the sun was out of focus!! Out of 103 submissions, 71 were rejected, some for dumb reasons such as needed to be in english, even tho it is, or the title didn’t match the photo, even tho it does. People in bleachers all need model releases, even if they are wearing sunglasses and are not identifiable. Just be aware if you go here. They said a dog needed a model release!!!
With a site as reputable as shutterstock you can’t just go take a bunch of random pictures on your walk through the park and expect them to approve them. The pictures need to be of good quality and and have simple titles as described by their starter faq. As for people on bleachers and dogs needing model releases of course. Model releases are their to protect not only the person/animal being photographed but it also protects the “artist” and shutterstock. If ANYTHING should happen during or after the life of someone or something you photographed they could bring your stock image up in court and cost the company thousands of dollars and could easily bankrupt you. They’ve been doing this for 15+ years to my understanding. They know what they are doing because they’ve seen and done it all before.
am in love with this project
I use EyeEm. It’s a great app where you can buy (and sell) photos. Check out @isaacK0 on the app
Agreed, the overall market is definitely saturated. That is why realistically it is only possible to make a living from photography if you can establish a clear niche, or point-of-difference.
It’s true. The market is saturated and people take their own pictures these days. It’s difficult if not impossible to make a living or any money at all selling pictures. Most people will find it more profitable to do any minimum wage job. Unless you have a special niche and are extremely aggressive at marketing.
i AM a Kenyans
i would also wish to be part of People Who sells There Photos and earn alot
I like to sell my photos online. I have good collection of nature. As I am new for this want to know how do I start, what is the best site and how do I get paid.
I loved what you shared about everything about selling photos online
I will start to do this. Thanks for the list. 🙂
I’ve sold images through Shutterstock, Twenty20, and Abobe Stock, and tried plenty of other sites including Alamy, EyeM, 123RF and Dreamstime
Alamy are the most picky. What’s more, they literally ban you from uploading for weeks if you upload something they don’t like.
Beware of Dreamstime – you cannot leave! You can delete all your content but they will continue to sell it. Very dubious practises.
Twenty20 and EyeM have, by far, the easiest Model Release methods, and they pay out immediately rather than having to reach a threshold. They also have regular and free missions to encourage you to upload your best on topic images – more sites should do this.
Shutterstock and Abobe – you don’t get much per image, so you have to have sold a lot before they pay out.
123RF – They often don’t review your images for weeks. When you poke them about it, you suddenly find the last 20 were unacceptable. Very slap dash.
In summary, Twenty20 and EyeM are recommended. Shutterstock and Adobe also recommended if you in it for the long game.
Child is power of main roots in future
Hello, I have pics of people that were at public areas.. Without their permission.. (Cultures like india,africa and more).
Can I sell it? Or not?
Thank you
I’ll start to selling…
I have a numbered photograph by Nils Jorgensen with COA.
Never framed it, stored in sleeve it came in. Where would be best to value it or possibly sell?
Hello , my photography subject ni animal .. that is my represent capture in Bangladesh..
Its really amazing and i love photography. My camera is my everything.
I enjoy seeing beautiful photos that are taken by talented individuals.
All your suggestions are very useful. Just drop by to say thanks a lot.
It’s great article. Thank you for inspiring me.
thanks a lot ,but I will love to ask ,can sell photos from Africa on these above mentioned sites
Thanks for a great collection photo selling sites
muje meri khichi tasvir bech ni he to pls koe kharidar ho joaap jante ho to unka no pls send krana pls
If I’m not mistaken, you can sell from any part of the world.
I have a few alerts about some of these websites for people who are just starting:
AdobeStock – Great site. Pays well. Does not accept editorial content.
Shutterstock – Rarely will you get more than $0.25 for a download.
Alamy – Extremely easy to upload. Good information form to fill out for each photo. The downside is that even after being a collaborator for over a year, I haven’t got one download yet. Even though on many of the other websites, I have multiple downloads. Doesn’t let you create collections.
Crestock – I made an account over 6 months ago and uploaded 9 photos for review. They never got reviewed.
500px – Seems like a good website. The only problem is that the watermark they put on the photos is very small. Anyone that wants their photos for web use, can get it directly from the site without paying. This also happens with Stocksy, which I really wanted to collaborate with, since they payout 50% to the photographers.
Hi, I would like to major in art photography and trade which is the best market place for me? An based in Africa, Zambia to be specific.
I would like to sale to supply to any magazine producers of China my line of photography is, art and trade
Great content, I’m in Africa(South Sudan to be specific). I don’t know if they allow us too, to sell photos online.
your BLOG is literally the best community anywhere, i read it everyday, and i’m also so grateful i found it helped me and also to have a source of income, hope it helps some others!
I loved what you shared, I will combine it with what I am doing to improve my income.
Thank you.
very nice content about making money by selling the image
Very informative article. I would like to recommend to sell photo item on Shutterstock marketplace as a vendor. It’s a huge marketplace and there has many visitors. In the last 6 months, their visit was over 72 million. Really it is huge. Adobe Stock also good but personally I’m not interested in their marketing policy.
Thank you very much such a great article.
Hi, Very useful information – does it make a difference if the photos are taken by a normal, professional or even phone camera? Also, are there any rules/terms regarding the editing/effects of the photos uploaded?
Last questions, which I am sure is very broad, what is the average price of photos taken by phone cameras?
Loved the Post.
Hi Enviragallery ,
Loves all that you shared.
And Please have a look to this website which Can help others for more related information.
I really enjoyed this pieces regarding online sales of photos. I will key in to the business – I have great passion in Photo making.
O Nice Thank You for Sharing Information I am trying to Sell Images and Earn Money
Adobe stock is bullshit!
Zero accountability and fa for a sale
I’m a hobby photographer shooting with a Nikon D5500. The only site I’ve tried to sell my work on is Shutterstock. Out of ~50 photos uploaded ~20 were approved. Some were rejected for being ‘overprocessed’ when I purposely post processed them for my desired effect. So if you’re a Pink Floyd fan Shutterstock is probably not going to be good for you. Others were rejected for ‘subject is not in focus’. These were vast landscape photographs, where it’s impossible to have everything in perfect focus. Some of these I resubmitted and the new reviewer approved them. This proves inconsistencies in their review process. It just depends on what employee reviews your work and what mood they were in at that time.
Out of the 20 photos that were approved, I have a total of 5 sales over almost 2 years, paid out at $0.25 each. Not counting the time and expenses of going out to take these photos (I don’t count these expenses because I’m not a pro and I was just doing something that I enjoy) I spent 4-5 hours over the course of several days to register, process my photos, upload my material, and resubmit. Now almost 2 years later I have $1.25 from my efforts. Since uploading on Shutterstock, I’ve learned that the older your content gets the lower it goes on search results. Eventually nobody will ever see your work here, unless you keep uploading (current work will only be seen). So much for passive income.
My advice is don’t waste your time with Shutterstock unless you have time and are willing to put energy into constantly uploading, resubmitting, and doing your own marketing, and in the end they will make 10x more than you from your work. If you’re willing to do all that you might as well start your own web site.
Fun fact, making 2.5 sales per year at $0.25 per sale, I will have to wait 2,000 years to make minimum wage for the photos I’ve had accepted at Shutterstock. Oh and you have to hit $75 before you can cash out, so maybe in 100 years I’ll get my $75 if I haven’t been dead for 60 years (which is likely). This is probably what they’re counting on for 95% of their content providers.
Then if I want to cover my field session time and expenses and sales are steady, I’ll be in the black in about 200,000 years. Cheers!
It’s a great business
I would love to join it
Selling pictures making money
I’m a student
I’m trying to sell my photos with lot many website but most of them doesn’t approve your photo, don’t know why so it takes huge time and waste of effort and money.
i love these sites they really helped me a lot on bettering my photos
i tried a lot of photo selling websites and none really picked my interest but these sites here so thank you
Thanks for providing here such best suggestions. These all are very good and practical.
Thank you very much for all this information.
Good guide lines. I am a journalist and have hundreds of photos of Indan culture. Some of them were shut by oppo phone. Shall we make money with these images.
Seems Kenyans are many here so let me also comment. You forgot free sites like pixabay, good for promoting yourself as photographer and maybe get someone serious clients off of it who are willing to engage you in a big project.
What a great advice! This is the best page to sell your photos.
Shutterstock on this list? What a joke! They lowered the photographer revenue to 10c per photo sale. Who wants to sell their photos for 10c?
I want to sell some of photo of the nature.
Honestly, I am not a professional. If you liked you can buy.I want just suggest you that,please test some of my photo.?
Interesting article and subject!
Making money with photography sounds like the stuff of dreams, doesn’t it? Especially if you’ve loved picking up a camera and getting creative for as long as you can remember.
You’d get to indulge in one of your true passions on a daily basis, finely tune your skills, learn more about humans and what makes them tick, create beautiful pieces of art and still manage to pay your bills at the same time.
You could wave goodbye to your unfulfilling 9-5, stop having to answer to your boss and start living life on your own terms.
It’s not going to be easy, of course.
Hope we can all make some more money online and especially with photography.
Cheers!
Franklin
Thank you so much for this post. I am really passionate about photography and travel. I had the same question ”How do I sell my photos online?”. I wish I had found this article earlier. It was really an eye-opener.
I hope it helps someone and thank you for another great article 🙂
Having your own website is the best solution for me if you want to make money with photography ! Be your own BOSS… and sale your photos.
Completely agree with R’s comment above. Shutterstock should not be on this list!! Their new lowered fee structure of paying photographers 10c per photo sale is an absolute insult.
Don’t waste your time with Shutterstock!
Thank you very much for the recommendations. I have used several of them and some of them count more impressions, others pay better, in short each one has its own.
before launching you must first know ho buy the images.
Usually it is newspapers and professionals in advertising and the packaging industry.
they need generally illustrations to define a commercial product.
for example a baby diaper maker needs images that target moms. it is the mother who buy does not the dad
cooking dishes if you are a good cook.
I have earned 150 USD in one day. You will be able to earn these money enjoy.
Very informative blog post.Much thanks again. Awesome. Alton Vangorder
I think this is a real great blog.Really thank you! Cool. Simon Cozzone
It’s really a great and helpful piece off info. I am glad that youu simply shared this
useful info with us. Please keep us informed like this. Thaank you for sharing.
Thanks for the wonderful article. I have been try making my passive income like create blogs, affiliate marketing, youtube content creator. It take lots of time and research, and hard work.
I strive to post only unique content on my site, and this applies not only to articles, but also to photographs. For a long time I could not figure out where to get high-quality photos for my site. I took some photos myself, but I have no special skills and a professional camera. Your article helped me figure out my problem. Thank you for helping me make my site better!
Regarding Alamy the article is outdated. From July 2021 Alamy has a new pricing policy for contributors, cutting down the fee to 20 % for all contributors whose annual sale does not reach US$250. The fee for contributors who fall into the annual sales range from US$250 to US$25,000 is 40 % (since 2019), not 50 %. The fee of 50 % is only for contributors who exceed the US$25,000 limit.
Personally, I believe that giving control to the third-party website is not a good strategy and staying in control of your price and transactions is ultimately a better strategy.
Nice use of cyan in this concept 🙂
yes
I am so grateful for your article.Thanks Again. Will read on
Howdy! I use and love Envira Gallery Pro and wanted to pass along another great place to sell your photos: Photo Art Pavilion
I just started with them at the end of November and have sold 5 photos so far. They handle everything once you upload your images – packing, shipping, matting, frames and so on. And take a look at my photos 🙂
Shutterstock was a waste of time. Also, making only 20 – 30% on my work that costs them very little to keep on site, its not worth it.
Hello,
I have been wanting to make people computer\phone backgrounds\wallpapers..
though idk where to post them.. if anyone would like to let me know where I can post these things please let me know..
* How do you feel about using things Instagram to promote your photos? Is it a good way to get brand exposure, or is it a bad idea because of the possibility of theft??
If you really want to be much closer to someone just keep distance to him or her because that this type of feeling harmful for you and they distroy to you inside.?
I must admit, this post is really good. In fact, it’s one of the best I’ve seen in a long time.