Check out our list of the 6 best free and paid image banks.
For a marketing professional’s routine, knowing the best image banks on the internet, whether free or paid, is essential to ensure high-quality graphic materials suitable for your blog and social media strategies.
More than that, an image bank is essential to ensure photographs, vectors, and other original pieces with an appropriate usage license. Not everything on the internet is free to use at will. By using a free or paid image bank, you are legally backed and avoid hassles from using images without the copyright holder’s authorization, that is, illegally.
That’s why we prepared this article especially to help you decide on the ideal platform for your projects. Check below a list with 6 recommendations.
Best free image banks
If a free image bank is your choice, know that there are several that provide the best images safely, without you having to worry about a license to use in your projects. Below we list three Pixabay, Unsplash and Pexels..
1 Pixabay
One of the most popular free image banks on the internet, Pixabay offers more than one million photos, illustrations, vectors, and videos for you to use in your social media or blog content.
There are several categories through which you can navigate to find the perfect images for your projects. You can also filter by vertical or horizontal orientation, size, and colors.
Moreover, according to the platform itself, all content released under the Pixabay’s use license is safe to use without the need to request permission or attribute credit to the author.
2 Unsplash
Another site that deserves to be on our list of the best image banks is Unsplash. The platform has more than two million free and high-quality photos.
In total, more than 200,000 photographers are part of the community and contribute to the bank. The goal is that by accessing images with the Unsplash license, you have an easier time developing creativity to produce your posts.
3 Pexels
To conclude our list of the best free image banks, we recommend Pexels. There you can download high-quality photos and videos from various categories, sizes, and colors.
According to the site, to keep its license as simple as possible for users, credit citation is not required, although it is appreciated, and images can be used and edited for all your projects, whether they are for social media, blogs, or printed materials.
Best paid image banks
Now, if your goal is to have even more variety of photos, videos, and vectors to advance in your creations, a good paid image bank can be an excellent option. Below we present three of the best available on the internet. iStock, Shutterstock and Adobe Stock.
1 iStock
The iStock is one of the most well-known and used image banks in Brazil. With a subscription, you have access to exclusive photos, videos, illustrations, and vectors with the most diverse themes and without concerns about licensing.
The platform offers two plans, the Basic Subscription only with images from the Essentials collection, and the Premium Subscription with the Essentials and Signature collections, with prices starting at R 149.00 for the annual option or R 199.00 for the monthly option.
The packages allow downloading from 10 to 750 images per month. The good news is that if you don’t use any of the downloads, you can carry them over to the next month.
2 Shutterstock
The Shutterstock also stands out when it comes to paid image banks. With the platform, you have access to photos, videos, vectors, illustrations, and even royalty-free music for almost all purposes.
With more than 350 million images, with 107,000 added daily to the site, you can choose from various plans.
- Subscription for single users starting from 29.00 and downloading 10 images.
- On-demand packages starting from 49.00 and downloading 5 images.
- Team subscription starting from 379.00 and 2 users.
- Enterprise account with customized services for large enterprises.
To figure out if this is the ideal bank for your projects, you can do a free trial with the right to download 10 images.
3 Adobe Stock
The Adobe Stock could not be left out of our list of the best paid image banks. The site has a wide range of photos, videos, vectors, illustrations, music, and templates for editing directly in Photoshop, Illustrator, or InDesign.
One of the great advantages of the platform is indeed this integration with Creative Cloud which simplifies the workflow, allowing you to search, preview, and license images within Adobe apps.
The subscription is available from R 124.00/month in the annual plan or R 215.00 in the monthly plan for 10 downloads. Additionally, it’s also possible to purchase plans for teams and large companies.
Did you like our list of the 6 best image banks to help with your creations for blogs and social media? Then be sure to check out our article with Attribution models in Google Ads: practical guide!
