THE 50 BEST FREE IMAGES BANKS FOR YOUR BLOG (LEGAL!)

 

 

If you are a Community Manager, Blogger or simply work with social networks then surely you know that images are among the most shared content.

Flashy, didactic and aesthetic photos attract readers to articles and represent a pause at the beginning of a text. Given their importance in social media activities, at Postcron we decided to make this post to help you find free images in a legal way.

Nevertheless, before listing the image banks that we selected, we’ll go over some concepts that you should know before using them.

What free images can you use in your blog?

The majority of photographs and illustrations that you see on the net usually have all rights reserved. This circumstance complicates the situation when finding photos to use in your daily publications. Given this scenario, three possible solutions exist:

• use photos with rights granted
• create your own photographs
• or resort to image banks.

 

The first alternative is linked with the organization Creative Commons, which provides legal tools to authors in order to protect and share their works. Through this regulation photos can be distributed and used under limitations set by each owner. In general it usually permits the use of images with attribution required, which means that the credits of the photo (be it the name of the author) must be shown.

Let’s look at an example. The following photo by Tony Hisgett is protected under a Creative Commons License. Click here to see the exact details from the site.

After clicking you will be able to see the explanation about the license. It says that you can do the following:

 

You are free:

• to share– to copy, distribute and transmit work
• to remix– to adapt the work

 

Under the following conditions:

• attribution– you must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or person that has licensed it (but not in a way that suggests these people endorse you or your use of the work.

 

In some cases the transfer of rights is absolute, but they should not be confused with Creative Commons licenses which pertain to the realm of propriety with the notion of public domain. When a work is public domain it belongs to the entire community in the form of collective wealth, with no restrictions.

In image banks you can find pictures and illustrations of every class, ordered by categories and they’re generally equipped with a Creative Commons licenses. Relying on these is a good way of using legal content.

To ensure that the images on your page don’t infringe upon any laws, it is very important to check the type of policy that protects them. In turn, each website includes a section with their own terms and conditions that explain which attributes the published content must have.

Since checking these points is not an easy task, below we are sharing with you 50 free and legal image sources for your blog, so you can share content on social network with ease.

THE 50 BEST FREE IMAGE BANKS FOR YOUR BLOG

1. Free Images

The first alternative that we are sharing with you is Free Images. It is an enormous constantly growing gallery that already has more than 350 thousand photographs ordered by category. To download an image all you need to do is register on the site. Like the welcome message says, you can use the pictures freely for commercial, recreational, or artistic use.

2. Free Digital Photos

Free Digital Photos is an excellent royalty free image bank in which you can find all types of themes. The majority of the site’s collaborators are professional designers, photographers and illustrators; because of this the works have a notable quality.

3. Dreamstime

Dreamstime is among the image galleries most visited daily. It has a section of free pictures, much of which possess free licenses or request attribution. Additionally, it offers a search with numerous advanced options that considerably ease the task.

4. Openphoto

A very interesting possibility is Openphoto, which is presented as an alternative to Flickr. It provides users the option to upload and share all types of images whose condition for use is the attribution of the authors.

5. Free Photos Bank:

On Free Photos Bank you will find numerous categories of free images ready to download. Under each picture the author’s information and other interesting details are recorded; such as frame size, rating and number of times the file was shared.

6. FreePik

FreePik is a practical and aesthetic site with more than 1.5 million free images. By clicking on the picture to get it, the type of license it has is displayed and also the website of origin is indicated.

7. Photopin

The site Photopin is oriented towards people dedicated to creative works. It offers a large quantity of graphic files that are available for free. There are mostly Creative Commons licenses with requests for attribution.

8. 500px

500px has a constantly growing reservoir of photographs. The categories are separated into types of licenses and themes, so that it will be easier for you to find what you are looking for.

9. Viintage

One of the most interesting sites for downloading free images is Viintage. As its name indicates, it specializes in retro illustrations, pictures, and posters. One of the most important benefits of this site is that all the files are public domain.

10. Cepolina

Cepolina has photographs from all over the world. The snapshots are ordered by category themes and can be used for private and commercial purposes.

11. Amgmedia

Amgmedia is a good alternative for downloading free images in a legal way. It gives you numerous categories and only requests that the author is credited when using their photo.

12. Free Range Stock

Free Range Stock is a site that lets you get an endless amount of images for commercial use. Because of this, it requests users to register, which is very simple. The snapshots are high resolution and of great artistic quality.

13. IM Free

IM Free offers a substantial developed collection. This means that it offers select images, of high quality, intended exclusively for commercial use, and they’re completely free.

14. ImageFree

ImageFree puts and enormous gallery of free images in your hands that you can explore through categories. At the same time it also provides you a search with advanced options to make what you need easier.

15. Public Domain Pictures: a large source of free images

As its name indicates, on Public Domain Pictures you can find an indefinite number of free public domain images. The menu includes the option of seeing the most popular images and those that are filtered by periods.

16. Morguefile

An excellent reservoir of free images and of good quality is Morguefile. The site offers a large variety of options that you can find by clicking the Free Photos category on the menu.

17. Pixabay

On Pixabay you will find beautiful public domain photographs. There you can explore numerous categories and choose the size in which you would like to download the file.

18. Rgbstock:

Rgbstock is an image bank created by a team of photographers and illustrators. The project intends to become one of the most popular sites for free images and already has a good number of available files.

19. Stockvault

Stockvault offers you an intuitive search through which you can easily get the desired photo. After clicking on each image a panel is displayed with detailed information on each file.

20. Death to The Stock Photo

Death to The Stock Photo offers you attractive free and legal photos every month which are sent to your email. The only thing you have to do is subscribe to the site.

21. BigFoto

On BigFoto you can find all kinds of images to use in your blogs and social networks. You won’t have any inconveniences since it is a public domain photograph gallery.

22. Gratisography

Gratisography is a gallery of complimentary and royalty free images that allows you to directly download them without having to register. The collection is renewed every week and is managed by the artist Ryan McGuire.

23. Refe

Refe likewise offers you free and legal photos for your blog, only in this case they have a specific theme: people interacting with technology. If you work in this sector you will profit greatly from this site which allows you to do searches by packages or by keywords.

24. Ancestry Images, imágenes gratis históricas

Ancestry Images is an online historical image bank. It contains maps, illustrations and related publications that can be obtained through direct download.

25. FreeMediaGoo

FreeMediaGoo provides you free and public domain photos, textures and illustrations. It’s not necessary to register to be able to get the pictures.

26. Little Visuals

The proposal of Little Visuals is to send seven high resolution images to your email each week. To receive them you simply have to subscribe, then you will start to get the packets that you can use without legal inconveniences.

27. Hubspot

Hubspot provides the public a packet of free images through promotions. The themes are vacations and the collection includes high quality compositions. Registration is required.

28. PicJumbo

PicJumbo is an ideal ally when updating publications on your blog and social networks. Through clear categories it offers you thousands of free photographs to use without legal inconveniences.

29. Pickupimage

Through Pickupimage you can obtain photographs to use however you like and at no cost. The site offers sections for the most sought after snapshots and also allows you to carry out searches through key words or by categories.

30. New Old Stock

New Old Stock is an excellent gallery of public domain images. It has an historical archive with high resolution pictures and various themes ranging from technology issues to family portraits.

31. Superfamous

Superfamous is a platform that allows downloading photographs from the designer Folkert Gorter. The site indicates that the works have a license type of attribution 3.0, so there use should accredit the author.

32. Unsplash

Unsplash offers you shipments of high quality images to your email every ten days. The packets include ten high resolution images and the only requirement is that you subscribe to the page.

33. Wikimedia Commons:

On Wikimedia Commons you can find more than 21 million free use images. The files are organized in detail and each week new photos are added to the collection.

34. ImageTemple

ImageTemple functions as a search for all types of images. With the search filters you can check the Royalty Free box to obtain photos for free use.

35. DNS Fotografía Digital

DNS Fotografía Digital is a free image bank from Brazil. It’s in Portuguese but the design is intuitive and with a little help from Google Translate it should be easy enough to understand.

36. Wellcome Images

On Wellcome Images you will find a huge collection of images for free use. The site tackles cultures from all time periods as well as scientific and artistic themes, even magic rituals.

37. Light Matter

Light Matter is an image bank created by the author Aaron Logan. It offers a search and allows downloading free and diverse images. The license used is attribution 3.0

38. BajStock

The site BajStock offers you free images that you can use if credit is given to the photographer. To learn more details about a license you only have to go to the tab Terms of Use. The site is in French and English but has the assistance of Google Translator so you won’t be inconvenienced.

39. Compfight

Compfight permits you to find Flickr images for direct download. Among the search options you can choose the type of available licenses.

40. Pinterest

Pinterest is currently one of the most popular social networks; its activity is completely related to image exchange. To find free use photographs start your search with the phrase public domain.

41. Totally Free Images

Totally Free Images offers every class of image for free use. The gallery includes more than 500 thousand photos related to various themes.

42. Google Advanced Image Search

Google Advanced Image Search is a powerful tool from Google. In addition to being practical and effective, its search parameters allow entering the type of desired license.

43. Pics4Learning

Pics4Learning focuses on the educational field. For this reason it has plenty of free images about science, arts and other materials.

44. Unprofound

Unprofound provides you 2D and 3D illustrations without usage limitations. You don’t have to register to download images, and allows downloading them directly.

45. Public Domain Photos

Public Domain Photos is a free and complimentary image bank. The photos are presented in various sizes which can be selected based on the need.

46. Classroom Clipart

Classroom Clipart is free use image gallery geared towards educational purposes. For this reason the themes are materials such as history, biology or geography.

47. Picdrome

Picdrome permits you to download free photographs under the Creative Commons license. Each day new photos are added which can be used when crediting the author.

48. CC Search

CC Search is a search of images regulated by a Creative Commons license. The search works with more than 13 specialized sites and allows enabling the available for commercial use filter before every search.

49. Free Images UK

On Free Images UK you can find all types of photos in different categories. To select the type of desired license you should go to the Advanced Search menu.

50. 4Freephotos

Lastly, we recommend 4Freephotos to you as a good source of free images of usage for your blog and social networks. The site includes textures and renews its stock every month.