Grab a newspaper and flip to any page. What’s the first thing you noticed?
I bet you it was an image. The visual interest immediately grabs your attention and keeps you looking at the page longer.
The same thing happens when someone visits your website. People prefer pictures over text and images help grab their attention and keep them on your site longer.
Two problems:
- It’s hard to find non-sucky free images online.
- People keep using the same, generic stock photos all over the web.
Here are 20 places to find free images for your website. I’ve included some options that are a little off the beaten path so that your website doesn’t drown in the sea of sameness.
1. Pixabay
2. StockSnap
3. Pexels
4. Startup Stock Photos
5. Gratisography
6. Unsplash
7. Negative Space
8. Splitshire
9. Picjumbo
10. Life of Pix
11. Cupcake
12. Stokpic
13. Jay Mantri
14. Magdeleine
15. Minimography
16. New Old Stock
17. FoodiesFeed
18. Raumrot
19. BucketListly
20. Get Refe
Tip: When you download images from these sites, they are going to be H U G E. Edit the images and reduce their size before uploading them to WordPress. Otherwise, those mega images are going to slow down your site, which is bad for your website visitors and search engine rankings.
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Great resources Julia. Another one that I find very useful is http://search.creativecommons.org/. That will allow you to search Flikr, Google and others for work that’s marked as free to use.
Great tip, Sam! Thanks for sharing. The more resources, the better.
Hi, Julia! Thanks so much for this list!
I wanted to ask you a question about morgueFile. I thought attribution wasn’t needed to use its photos. Am I wrong?
Hi Tara. You’re right, MorgueFile does not require attribution. They used to ask for photos to be attributed when possible, I assume as a common courtesy to the photographers who upload their photos for free use, but it was never required. I don’t see that mentioned on the site any more, so I’ve taken that bit out of the article.
Phew! Thanks, Julia. And thanks for this awesome blog of yours. You’re amazing!
Thanks, Tara. You’re pretty awesome, yourself. 🙂