14 Best Stock Photography Sites | Earn Money in 2023
A guide to the 14 best stock photography sites in 2023. Discover which option is best for you to earn more money from your images.
Business Guides | Learn | Stock Photography | By Polina Raynova | Last Updated: October 18, 2023
The thought of making money from your photos while putting your photography skills into practice is surely tempting for everyone.
Ever since stock sites arrived on the global market, this offer has been on the table.
Although they truly give you the opportunity to earn a passive income, there are quite a few things to consider before diving into the big stock photo world.
One of the most important decisions to make is choosing which stock photo websites to upload your content to.
There are a number of platforms out there, and they all have different terms and conditions.
So let’s answer the question: Which stock site is the best for you and how much can you earn from your images?
Table of Contents
Stock Photography Sites | Sell Your Photos in 2023
In this roundup, you’ll find all you need to know about stock photo businesses. I’ve covered everything from the largest stock image library to the highest-paying stock photo sites and even the cheapest stock photo site.
Most of these sites also have smartphone apps to sell photos online.
1. Vecteezy
If you’re looking for the best stock photography sites of the year to earn a bit of extra income from your photos, vectors or videos, Vecteezy is a name you’re sure to come across.
Vecteezy is one of the biggest stock photo companies with a huge library of assets.
As a contributor, your photos will be available to a worldwide audience of millions – by creating popular stock images, you can earn money for every download.
To apply, you’ll need to send in some of your best work to the Vecteezy team to review. Then, if you’re accepted, you can start uploading your best stock images into the marketplace for the public to purchase and download.
The Vecteezy contributor platform is non-exclusive, meaning that you can continue to share your creative assets on many of the other best stock photo sites mentioned in this guide.
Having a wide variety of high-quality photos and videos displayed on Vecteezy is the first step to earning a steady passive income from your work.
How much can you earn?
The Pro program uses a Subscriber Share Model where earnings are calculated at a 50% revenue split.
There’s also a Free program for free images, free stock photos, videos and vectors, where you can earn $5.00 per 1,000 downloads for vectors and photos, and $10.00 per 1,000 downloads for video.
2. Getty Images
Getty Images is undoubtedly a beast on the contemporary stock photography market, with an astonishing number of assets in its gallery: more than 200 million. Among the stock photography websites, Getty Images is one of the most widely known. It’s also one of the oldest and the largest stock photo sites, operating since 1995.
They offer 125 million high-quality royalty-free images to their clients, covering a wide variety of topics, including editorial imagery.
With their solid reputation and the largest stock image library,, Getty Images attracts a significant amount of traffic to their site, increasing your chance of selling your work.
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How much can you earn?
Getty sells images in different sizes: small for $150, medium for $350 and large for $499. This makes it one of the best stock photo sites for photographers wanting to earn extra on the side.
This price list does sound quite tempting, but keep in mind that the agency puts a heavy price on your potential earnings: 80% of each sale goes to Getty and only 20% t0 you.
3. Depositphotos
Depositphotos has been on the stock photography market since 2009 when it was founded by Dmitry Sergeev. For 10 years the company has grown significantly and it’s continuing to expand its collection rapidly.
At the moment Depositphotos is the home of over 100 million high-quality royalty-free images which are divided into the following categories: Photos, Illustrations, Vector Art, Backgrounds, Editorial & News images. It also includes the option of uploading and selling HD videos.
Although this company is based in Florida it has offices literally all over the world and remarkably offers customer support in 20 different languages.
It also frequently publishes guides to the best-selling stock photos, which can help contributors make more sales.
How much can you earn?
If you’re willing to become a contributor for Depositphotos you have to pass a brief examination test first. If you get accepted the most important thing you should be aware of is the level system that they use.
The level is determined by the number of sales the particular contributor has made on their website. There are five levels: green up to 499 downloads; bronze 500 – 4,999 downloads; silver 5,000 – 24,999 downloads; gold 25,000 – 149,999 downloads and platinum 150,000+ downloads.
Depending on the level that you’re at, you can get between 34% and 42% royalties from each file sold.
The average cost of Depositphotos images is lower than some of the bigger stock sites, which means your per-image margin would be lesser than other sites despite a decent percentage share.
You’ll definitely need to make a lot of sales in order to reach the top tiers, but still, 34% is already a decent start!
4. iStock
iStock is another popular name in the stock photography industry. As such, it can provide a good platform for displaying your images (and of course a better chance of selling).
iStock used to be an independent player, but in 2006 it was acquired by Getty for $50 million.
When compared with Getty, there’s one significant difference between these two sites: iStock is categorized as a “microstock” agency, referring to low-cost stock photography.
How much can you earn?
This is one of the best sites for stock photo contributors. The commission for the contributors varies between 15% and 45%, depending on the options the photographer chooses when submitting new visual content.
iStockphoto sell your photos with two licensing options: exclusive and non-exclusive.
If the contributor chooses the non-exclusive option, it means that the photographer can upload the images not only to iStock, but to other stock sites as well.
In this case the photographer gets a flat commission of 15%.
If the photographer goes for the first option – submitting exclusive content – the commission can reach 45%, depending on the number of downloads.
The more downloads you have, the bigger the percentage, and it’s in these upper tiers when you can really start to make money from stock photography.
5. Dreamstime
Dreamstime is definitely a platform that sets high standards of quality for its contributors.
It covers quite a few categories: Abstract, Animals, Holidays, Arts and Architecture, and many others. The company was founded 15 years ago, making it one of the oldest stock agencies out there.
Dreamstime is a microstock provider, and its direct rivals on the market nowadays are iStock and Shutterstock.
It’s considered by many contributors to be one of the best places for photographers to sell their work.
How much can you earn?
The commission you get from each image sold varies from 25% to 50%. How do they determine the rate?
It’s a very similar scheme to the other stock sites: it depends directly on whether the uploaded content is exclusive or non-exclusive. Exclusive images enjoy a higher earning percentage.
It also depends on how many times the photo has been downloaded, or in other words, if the image ranks as popular.
6. Stocksy
Stocksy is a new star on the stock photography scene. It was only founded 8 years ago, but it has already made a big difference with its alternative approach. Slowly it is proving to b e one of the best stock image websites available.
Stocksy focuses on authentic, atypical stock imagery, and it really excels in this. Just one look at the curated gallery is enough to see that you’re dealing with top-tier photographers.
The only setback is that it’s really hard to get in. I’ve tried twice in the last three years but was rejected.
I also know at least a dozen good photographers who submitted portfolios and couldn’t become part of the team. I’m planning on one last try soon.
The third time’s a charm, right? ;-)
How much can you earn?
Stocksy is definitely generous when it comes to paying contributors – it pays out 50% commission on standard licenses and and 75% on extended licenses, which is a really fair deal.
In addition to the financial aspect, you also get to be a part of a community of very talented people. That’s a benefit that can’t be overestimated.
The photos there are divided into 4 categories according to their file size: $15 for a small image, $30 for medium, $75 for large and $125 for extra-large.
There are also options for extended licenses, which hit the sweet spot with prices of $300 and $500 depending on the purpose of use.
Stocksy is one of the best paid stock photo websites, but at the same time, they’re highly selective about choosing contributing photographers.
7. Westend61
Westend61 is a German stock agency which has been on the European market since 2003. It’s both a stock photo producer and a distributing picture agency.
They sell directly in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and distribute imagery to partner agencies all over the world.
Westend61 focuses on images which are highly relevant to corporate, advertising and editorial customers and it maintains a high-quality photo collection.
How much can you earn?
This agency really values its contributors and it treats them with respect.
With every new submission the photographer decides whether the photos will be used exclusively by Westend61 or if the agency is authorized to distribute them to their international partners.
Depending on which of those options the photographer chooses, commission varies between 40% and 60% of the profits.
Westend61 can also offer a very tempting add-on: they’ll not only sell your stock photos, but they can also mediate commissions from their clients.
In this case, since they’re just connecting two parties, you get 85% of the profits and the fee for them is 15%. Pretty sweet deal!
8. Shutterstock
Shutterstock is another popular name in the world of stock photography. It offers an impressive 270 million royalty-free images to its clients. This makes it one of the best stock photo sites for contributors for many years now.
The site is visited by thousands of people daily, which increases the chance of your work getting noticed and purchased.
Ironically, the downside is also connected to the fact that this agency gets a lot of attention – it means that you as a contributor will have significant competition, too.
How much can you earn?
Since this is a microstock site (just like iStock by Getty and Fotolia) the individual image price is quite low.
The most popular plan they offer is a monthly subscription for clients for the price of $169, with the client receiving 350 images.
This brings down the value of a single photograph to $0.48, which can be quite discouraging from a psychological point of view if you’re a professional photographer. Despite this, there are still many who sign up to become a Shutterstock contributor.
The commission rates for contributors to Shutterstock start at 25% for an image sold.
9. Cavan Images
Here’s a relative newcomer among the stock image sites.
Cavan Images is a great new entry on the market and it supports the idea that every good story begins with a strong image.
Cavan focuses on high-quality, authentic photographs that are both bold and vibrant.
They understand the importance of building a creative community of contributors. They currently have 2600 members from more than 80 countries around the globe.
It’s been almost a year since I opened an account with them, and I can really see that Cavan is striving to make its members feel valuable.
However, there are a couple of things that are not so positive. One is the time it takes for the editors to review your submissions. It can easily take more than 2 weeks, which is far too long.
Secondly, they used to have a team that was responsible for keywording, which in my personal opinion is quite time-consuming and annoying.
Now, they have a new submission platform and each user has to keyword his/her photos individually.
How much can you earn?
They offer great pricing – small images start from $50 and large, full-resolution images can go up to $500. The contributors get a respectable 50% from each photograph sold.
The only downside here is that the site is still not very popular, so it doesn’t get a lot of daily traffic. That means it’s not guaranteed that clients will have the chance to stumble upon your work.
Another important thing to keep in mind is that all the imagery you upload to Cavan is exclusive to them – you don’t have the right to distribute the same images to other agencies.
10. Offset
Offset was created by Shutterstock in September 2013, and it prioritizes high-end images from more experienced photographers.
This agency is quite different from Shutterstock itself and from any other microstock site. It targets clients who are all about great imagery and are not very concerned about prices.
Similar to Stocksy, Offset is notorious for being difficult to get in. They’d rather find you and invite you than accept your application as a contributor, though you can submit a portfolio.
How much can you earn?
The images listed on this site have quite attractive pricing. It’s $249 for a small image at 72dpi and $499 for full resolution.
They also offer packages of 5 or 10 images which could be a cost-effective option for some buyers.
11. Pond5
Pond5 is definitely not one of the most famous stock photography hubs but it’s still worth mentioning.
It was founded back in 2006, and it started out as an agency to help video producers license content to third parties.
Pond5 is based in New York and it’s a marketplace for royalty-free media. Aside from photos, they also offer stock footage, music tracks, sound effects, 3D objects and After Effects templates.
How much can you earn?
That’s literally up to you; Pond5 really trusts their community of artists and lets them set their own prices!
As a contributor you get to decide on the price for each file, and every time it sells, you get 50% of the revenue.
There are four file sizes available for clients: Small, Medium, Large and Extra Large. You’ll see prices varying from $15 to $500 for full-resolution images.
12. Fotolia
Fotolia is a first-class agency in the stock photography world nowadays. It used to be an independent player on the market, but this year it was acquired by Adobe Stock.
In Fotolia you can find more than 50 million royalty-free images, videos, 3D photography assets and templates. It can offer you unparalleled exposure as a Fotolia contributor.
How much can you earn?
This agency offers a competitive royalty of 33% on photos and 35% on video footage.
By uploading to Fotolia you also get the chance to be featured in their premium collection, which is hand-curated and contains high-quality images that are absolute eye candy.
13. Creative Market
Creative Market is another site you may not have heard of before, but checking it out most definitely won’t be a waste of time.
This platform has a significant number of artists who are part of the community: 29,434 independent creators!
It offers not only stock images, but also graphics, templates, web themes, font add-ons and 3D assets.
How much can you earn?
If you open a shop in Creative Market, there are quite a few perks.
The contributors are allowed to set their own prices and earn 70% of each sale (which is honestly quite a lot, keeping in mind that commissions on most other stock sites vary from 15% to 50%).
Another advantage that is not to be underestimated is that with this platform you can get your photos in front of over 5 million members. That will help you gain a lot of exposure!
14. Yay Images
Yay Images provides over 12 million stock images, vectors, and videos, sourced directly from 18,000 photographers from over 145+ countries. It offers text space search, in-browser editor, celebrity images and more.
As for affordability, Yay Images offers a range of plans from single images to credit packs up to 200 a month. There’s also a free tier which includes access to 2 million+ photos and vectors, standard license and unlimited downloads. If you do choose to go for a credit pack plan, you’re allowed to roll-over unused images.
How much can you earn?
For those wanting to sell their images to Yay Images, you can expect fair licensing plus 50% commission on each file sold, making it an easy way to earn money via your work. This is why it is one of the most rewarding among the stock photos websites.
Final Words
I hope you’ve enjoyed the list of photography stock sites I’ve put on your radar. Some of the names are undoubtedly popular, but there are also others which are lesser-known.
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If you have experience with any of these stock sites, please share your thoughts in the comments below.
Also be sure to check out this insightful article about stock photography agencies from our friends at Pixsy, examining what rights lie with you and what lie with the agency.
Let’s help each other decide if it’s worth exploring all these fantastic opportunities!
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s best: Depositphotos vs Yayphotos?
Here’s a quick comparison:
Earning Potential: In terms of commission, YayImages offers a better rate compared to Depositphotos. With Depositphotos, you can make up to 44% if you’re in the top tier, whereas YayImages offers a flat rate of 50% regardless of your level as a contributor.
Acceptance: In this regard, Depositphotos is the better of the two. It works with a tiered system, allowing a higher acceptance rate. However, YayImages is more selective in accepting new contributors.
Popularity: Success at selling stock photos depends greatly on the customer base of the stock image service you plan to work with. In this case, Depositphotos is a more popular service compared to YayImages, which can mean more earning opportunities.
Payment Options: You can get a payout with popular services like Paypal or via wire transfer with both sites. However, with Depositphotos, you get more payment options like Payoneer, Skrill, Wise etc., which can be useful for photographers in countries where PayPal and Wire Transfer are either too expensive or unavailable.
What’s best, Shutterstock vs Adobe Stock?
Here’s a quick comparison:
Earning Potential: Shutterstock offers a royalty rate of 15% to 40% depending on the contributor level that’s based on the number of assets sold. On the other hand, Adobe Stock offers a fixed rate of 35%.
Acceptance: Even though both Shutterstock and Adobe Stock have rigid guidelines for accepting new photographers. But Adobe Stock is comparatively lenient, which makes it easier for new photographers to start earning sooner.
Popularity: Shutterstock has a larger customer base compared to Adobe Stock. However, Adobe Stock would likely catch up soon and gain a similar following.
Payment Options: Both stock photo websites offer payment with Paypal and Wire Transfer; however, Shutterstock also offers Payoneer, Wise, Skrill and even physical cheque payments.
Which are the best microstock sites for beginners?
Here are a few of the best microstock options for beginners:
- Shutterstock
- Adobe Stock
- iStock
- Depositphotos
Which are some of the cheap stock photo sites?
I you are looking for free stock photo agencies, you’re in luck. Below is a list of a few cheap stock photo websites:
- Freepik
- Unsplash
- Pixabay
- 123rf
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Hi there! I’m Polina, a freelance photographer, always on the look out for creating simple images with powerful impact.
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I’ve been doing this for many years now and I can tell you with certainty that stock photography is not worth the time for 99% of people. You used to make a decent amount but now you have these websites giving your work away for free…
Finding high-quality, visually appealing images to use for design projects, social media posts, or blog articles can be a challenge, but thankfully there are many stock photo sites out there that can help. Some of the best stock photo sites include Shutterstock, Getty Images, iStock, Adobe Stock, and Unsplash.
Hi everybody, there is a large list of stock photos and daily curated feeds you can reach from Designer Daily Report chrome extension. I know its important to be up-to-date. By the way it is such a tool that puts everything together with related fields . Enjoy it have a nice day :)
Loved your article. I’m currently uploading to 3 sites and do it as a hobby. Like with everything it requires hard work due to competition. But I’m seeing the opportunity and with hard work this could become one of my revenue streams in early retirement. Currently I have about 180 images uploaded and about 25% have been sold, one image has been downloaded 120 times. Therefore I am seeing the opportunity. Realistically I feel at least 5000 images across various platforms is the way to go. Thanks again
Hi Polina, Michael, can you please include 123rf into the mix? It’s top 5, but it’s missing from the list here.
Thanks for this article, it was clear and helpful. I often search for advice about stock sites for contributors, and also among the most recent content I can find different opinions about the variety of possibilities that photographers can look for. It is not easy for beginners, however a targeted description as yours really helps.
Thanks again!
I found this article very informative as a photographer. I think Shutterstock is the best among them. I got most of the sells from this site.
Scrolling through the most recent comments, (Scootros, from December 13, 2020, at 3:10 pm), is spot on regarding how Shutterstock and Getty now reimburse photographers. Getty has even done away with Licensed Managed rights, which is where the money used to be in stock when you could still earn a respectable dollar amount per licensed image. Now, everything is RF, I’m sure in an effort to compete with other stock micro sites and keep more for themselves. I started shooting for Black Star and then switched to Gamma-Liaison, which bought Tony Stone, and then Gamma was bought by Getty. Back then, you actually could make decent money shooting stock (before photographers, like myself, helped contribute to the stock photo craze by contributing images, which lowered each images’ value and drove prices down, that, along with the onset of Photoshop, digital and the constant fight over rights/usage). I had a commercial business at the time so stock was just another income stream. I had very few images in circulation at Gamma in the late ’80s and early ’90s, literally 20-30 images, and was receiving monthly royalty payments ranging from $150.00 (USD) to $2,400, kid you not. I could actually call my photo editor in New York and have a 30-minute phone conversation, honest to God, true! The relationship was the same at Black Star. That seems like science fiction these days when you have to communicate through “ticket” submissions and 2-3 day delayed email exchanges with non-editors (Shutterstock), but longtime shooters making points for themselves by responding to photographers’ inquiries. And their advice is usually useless. Not to mention the more recent first-pass AI editing system at some agencies, which is responsible for an onslaught of irate complaints by photographers, and rightly so, for having perfectly good images rejected because they are not being seen by real eyeballs.
Now I have about 800 images (I know this is miniscule compared to the thousands of images that some photographers have in their catalogs, but I don’t shoot fulltime anymore and stock doesn’t pay what it used to, so time is of the essence), on file with Dreamstime, istock, Shutterstock, Adobe/Folotila and used to work with Alamy, but they didn’t get a lot of action, and, like every other photographer on these same sites, I’m making pennies on the dollar and spending hundreds of hours to barely earn a $50.00 monthly royalty payment. It’s ridiculous. I don’t shoot commercial any more, just fine art and occasional assignment work, so I simply shoot stock to keep my hand in it, but still, time is time, and a lot of it is being wasted shooting stock. I’m rethinking the whole process.
In order to make a “living” at stock, you need thoooouuusands of images in circulation, and ideally, have a one-on-one relationship with one of the agency’s art directors to work with you to help produce shoots, which, frankly, I don’t know if they even do that anymore, but they did.
I may try exploring a couple of the other stock sites mentioned, but the result will likely be that. Sure, the royalty might be higher, but they are lesser known sites with fewer sales so it all evens out in the end. You’re not really earning any more money than you are now, but you may be saving a lot of shooting and editing time to get the same financial reward. Maybe that’s the way to go, I don’t know. I do know that I haven’t uploaded an image to any of the sites I’m on in at least two months because it’s become so discouraging.
I totally agree my friend!! I gave up, was useless!!
This looks like paid content. GettyImages might have a lot of customers, but you will never have a $150 sale for a photo. Most will be subscription downloads, that will earn you around $.05 per download. And if you ever want to delete a photo from your collection, they make it really hard for you to do so. I recently did that, and I had to send them a message to delete some files. Not only that, but they said that in the future, they would only delete photos if there was a legal problem with them, like they OWN my photos.
Shutterstock was paying around $.30 for download, and last year they brought it down to $.10.
Depositphotos also brought their earnings down.
Unless you have thousands of photos in your portfolio, your earnings on these sites will be pretty low.
I can assure you this isn’t paid content, Henry. While we have affiliate links across the site, nothing on here has been sponsored, nor is it biased. The content of this article has been thoroughly researched, although we do appreciate your feedback!
I used to love Shutterstock as a designer but am increasingly displeased with them as a contributor. I shoot stock just for the love of shooting. I recently had my storage drive totally blow up and when I requested access to download my own images I was told I had to buy a subscription as a contributor, pay the subscription price but let them know I was downloading my own content so that it was not counted as income. I haven’t uploaded a single image since.
Nice List. At the moment I am also looking for video stock sites. At the moment you have the big sites like Shutterstock etc. also offering videos, but I am sure there will be a lot of smaller “boutique like” stock sites in the future.
Hi Polina,
Thanks for this article. Interestingly, there’s another new kid on the block, Libertipix, which is a start up, they do authentic stock LGBTQ+ images, check it out. Great quality of image.
Cheers,
Nic
“Last updated on 26 April 2020” according to the header for this article.
News flash for you: Fotalia was swallowed up by Adobe in 2015 and the name was discontinued in November 2019 – seven months ago.
We’ll refer to it as Fotalia until the URL of the site changes, but thanks for the heads up and healthy does of sarcasm, Scootros!
Ok, I’ll reel it back in a little. Sorry mate. These are my views, based on personal experiences with both Getty and Shutterstock.
Shutterstock now gives contributors 0.10c per image. It’s not much use talking percentages like they do because , Shutterstock refuse to tell contributors how much an image actually sold for.
Yes, contributors can work towards “higher levels” according to the number of their images sold. These ‘levels’ see them earning into the thirty-cents-per-image-sold bracket. However, all contributors, no matter how long they have been a contributor and no matter how hard they work, get their levels reset to the base 10 cents per image sold on 1 January each and every year. Happy New Year. As an aside, the CEO of Shutterstock received a record bonus this past financial year. What a surprise.
On the subject of Getty, and like Shutterstock, they also refuse to reveal the selling price of images. You’ve indicated “$150 for a small image sold” and then mention the contributing photographer gets 20%. However, you didn’t mention in the Getty section that most all buyers buy using the subscription model, allowing them to pay well under $1 for each image. Therefore this supports my experience and those voicing their disgust on many forums, that the yield from Getty is one of the worse at, as low as, 0.03c per image. Getty also contractually bind contributors to be “exclusive” so no chance of improving sales on the same images elsewhere.
checkout https://www.rawpixel.com
Seems like another decent one – thanks Delta.
Interesting you forget to mention a lot of the stock agencies sell subscriptions to their customers. So a subscription for a couple of hundred Euros / Dollars gets the customer several hundreds of downloads. Getty, for example, takes a high percentage of the sale value (now at under one dollar / euro), leaving the photographer a mere 15c.
Without providing such clear information in your article, you are making readers think they can earn a living from Stock Photography. 99% of photographers cannot make anything near a living these days.
Hey there,
Subscription models weren’t intentionally left behind, so I’m glad you brought this up – it’s something that can certainly be added as a piece of information, it’s just really hard to keep up with them as they’re often changing. In my opinion, earning a living with stock photography is still possible in case you’re willing to invest a lot of time and devotion doing it – otherwise it could be a side income.
Best,
Polly
That’s because their mediocre photos can’t compete anymore with new real professionals on the agencies.
I’m a member of Alamy. You don’t mention them. They are quite big. And also have a quality demand for photographers getting accepted.
I don’t sell very much but it’s up to me to put more photos in there.
Still might try some of your advices. Thank you!
@boel in Sweden.
Hi Polina,
New to the stock photography world and have ben researching some of these sites before I read your article. I’m looking forward to trying a few know and not so known sites. Thanks for the read.
Hey there,
thank you for this really helpful and interesting article. I am wondering if you have any thoughts on the Website Twenty20?
Cheers,
Lenja
Hey Lenja!
Unfortunately I’m not familiar with this one and I don’t have any friends who sell photos there – maybe you can search for opinions of other contributors, that’s what I do when I’m looking for honest thoughts :)
Appreciate the photographer income info given for most agencies, but would like to know what that is for Offset. You only gave their selling prices, not the photog’s share. It is not available on their website.
It’s indeed strange that they don’t have it listed on their website, but maybe you can shoot them an email and ask? They’re at least pretty responsive :)
Some of the photographers with an online presence say they’ve lost an income stream of nearly $50k a year when Google Images went up. What has changed since then to make stock photography worthwhile?
It’s made the industry more competitive, but the quality is also better for it – there’s a big difference in quality between free images and ones shot purposely for stock.
Hi Orlando,
Glad to hear the article was useful to you!
I also have a couple of fellow photographers who got accepted in Stocksy, but that was more than 5-6 years ago. One of them was a travel photographer and the other one was focusing on interior photography. In recent days it’s becoming more and more difficult to get inside and I know many good photographers who have tried but they were rejected.
I’ve heard about this “quiet approach” that you’re mentioning and I think it’s not just a rumour – not sure if they still have the same approach at the moment.
Direct outreach is something which I haven’t considered up to now but it definitely makes a lot of sense – thanks for bringing this to the table!
Hi Polina,
this is one of the better and useful roundup posts on Stock Photography sites. Finding niche stock sites is not always easy.
Thank you.
An old mate of mine got into Stocksy a few years ago when it was invite only. From what I heard the Stocksy scouts would look at photographers profiles online and make a quiet approach. All you could do then was get on their radar. Things may/would be different now.
One stock site I liked was Image Brief, an Aussie start-up in 2014. They had a different approach to most. After raising $3.4m they disappointingly no longer exist that I know of.
One way photographers can sell photo licences is by doing their own outreach directly to high photo consuming websites…
Cheers
Orlando Sydney