A Hand-Curated Directory of 80+ Stock Photo and Video Sites14 min read
Never run out of Stock photo content or video footage again! Here is our hand-picked list with the best places to find royalty-free stock video and photo content on the Internet. No matter whether you’re a marketer, entrepreneur, or designer: these sites are a true goldmine!
Never again! The days of terrible stock images are gone.
Here are some of our favorite use cases for stock photos or video footage:
- Background videos for your website
- Social Media content
- Photos for Social Media banners
- Graphics for flyers and promo materials
- Stock Footage to use as a basis for video content on Social Media
Want the downloadable list with over 80+ different sites? < CLICK HERE >
Photo Sites:
1. All Free Download
Free download resource for designers.
2. All the Free Stock
AllTheFreeStock.com is a curated list of free stock images, audio and videos. Find all the best free stock images and videos in one place.
3. AND CO & Death to Stock Deck Stack
Proposal template with included free stock images by Death to Stock.
4. Compfight
Compfight is an image search engine tailored to efficiently locate images for blogs, comps, inspiration, and research. They make good use of the Flickr API, but aren’t affiliated with Flickr.
5. Death to Stock
Death to the Stock Photo is a quality, unique, stock photo resource for creatives looking to stand out.
6. Dunnnk
Dunnnk offers beautiful product mockups. If you upload your design they’ll give you a high-resolution mockup in return.
7. Fiverr
You don’t have time to spend hours trying to find the right stock images you need for your next project? No worries. Just get them on Fiverr.
8. FindA.Photo
10000 completely free stock photos from Unsplash, Jay Mantri, and many more, to use for any purpose. Search and browse by keyword and color.
9. Gratisography
Free, use as you please, high-resolution stock photos for personal and commercial projects. This project was created by Ryan McGuire.
10. ISO Republic
ISO Republic is an independent website that provides CC0 stock photos for creative professionals. All images are free for personal and commercial use.
11. LibreStock
Free Stock Photo Search Engine: they scan and index the best free photos from the top stock sites. All photos are free for personal and commercial. No attribution required. CC0.
12. LifeOfPix
Free high-resolution photography. Share and download images freely. Search for pictures by color or format.
13. Negative Space
Beautiful, High-Resolution Free Stock Photos. For personal or commercial use, all of their CC0-licensed images are completely free to use!
14. New Old Stock
Vintage photos from the public archives. Free of known copyright restrictions. Recapturing History.
15. Pexels
Free stock photos you can use everywhere. ✓ Free for commercial use ✓ No attribution required.
16. Photo Pin
A free tool that helps bloggers and designers find beautiful photos with Creative Commons licensing.
17. Photocrops
Free media to use any way you choose. Free drone videos and free photos. Tools for creativity by CMYK Brand.
18. PicJumbo
Search and download beautiful free stock photos for personal and commercial use. Free image download of more than 1900+ free high resolution pictures.
19. Picography
Gorgeous high-resolution free photos. Our free stock photos can be used for any project. No attribution, all CC0 free images.
20. Pixabay
Pixabay.com is an international website for sharing high quality public domain photos, illustrations, vector graphics, and film footage. As of November 2017, Pixabay offers over 1,188,454 free photos, illustrations, and vectors and videos.
21. Pond5
Pond5 is a New York based online marketplace for royalty-free media. The company licenses stock footage, stock music, stock photography sound effects, after effects, images and 3-D models.
22. Raw Pixel
Safe to use images, PSD Mockups and Vectors.
23. RGB Stock
Uniquely free photos. Handpicked, non-stocky images. Yours to use as you wish.
24. Skitter Photo
A place to find, show and share public domain photos.
25. Splitshire
What would you do if you had amazing royalty free photos? Download free stock photos with no copyright restrictions and real look.
26. Startup Stock Photos
Free photos for startups, bloggers, publishers, websites, designers, developers, creators, & everyone else.
27. StockSnap.io
Beautiful free stock photos. Hundreds of high resolution images added weekly. Free from copyright restrictions.
28. StockUp
Stock Up gives users a way to search for free stock photography. They combine (with permission) the free stock photos from 25 different websites into one database.
29. Super Famous
The Superfamous Images are available under the conditions of a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license. This means that you can use the work for your own purposes if credit is provided.
30. The Pattern Library
The Pattern Library is a project by Tim Holman & Claudio Guglieri. The library is made up of tiles upon tiles of patterns which are free for you to use.
31. Ultra HD Wallpapers
HD Wallpapers: 4K backgrounds for desktop, macbook and iphone.
32. Unsplash
Beautiful high quality free images and photos you can download and use for any project. No attribution required.
33. Jay Mantri
Free pics. Do anything (CCO license) by photographer Jay Mantri.
34. Good Free Photos
A large Public Domain photo repository with high resolution free photos and vectors. All copyright free stock photos and royalty free photos, and CC0 Photos. 24500 free and public domain photos, images, clipart, pics and vectors and counting. To view/download a photo in high resolution, please click on the image.
35. MyStockPhotos
535+ awesome, unique & free Stock Images.
36. Visual Hunt
High quality, curated photos and image tools.
37. Reshot
Uniquely free photos. Handpicked, non-stocky images. Yours to use as you wish.
38. Stockio
Download thousands of free vectors, photos, icons.
39. Magdeleine
A free hi-resolution photo every day.
40. Flickr
Many Flickr users have chosen to offer their work under a Creative Commons license, and you can browse or search through content under each type of license.
41. Fancy Crave
Every day they handpick and give away two free authentic photos from real people. Each photo is licensed under CC0 and can be used commercially.
Video Sites:
1. Archive
While Archive is first and foremost a storage site for archived media, it also features content with Creative Commons Licenses, including videos. There is no special section for this type of content. Use the search function to find it. Once you click on a video of your choice, it will give you more information concerning the type of license.
2. BeachFront B-roll
A library of free stock video footage and animated backgrounds. Some of the available video categories are time-lapse, vj loops, and animations. There is also a dedicated section for free cinemagraphs.
3. Clip Canvas
Clipcanvas offers a wide variety of stock footages under more than 30 categories including “business”, “time-lapse”, “culture”, and “travel”. Free videos are limited (180 in total at the time of writing this article) and you need to register first to download them, but you can purchase video packages for perpetual use.
4. Coverr
offers copyright-free videos that are perfect for beautiful video backgrounds for websites. Before downloading a video, you have an option to check how that video would look when used in the website header. You can download any video that you want (mp4, webm, ogv formats), Coverr also gives you code snippets (html, css, javascript) to help you implement them on your website.
5. CuteStockFootage
Absolutely free videos in HD format. They offer different video formats such as vfx, sfx, footages, light leaks, textures, and clips for background use. Explore the site and download as much content as you need.
6. Dissolve
Offers 1 free high-quality HD clip each month and a library of over 1 million stock video clips.
7. Distill
Created by Create the Bridge team, this site gives you the freedom to download any stock HD videos which are filed under 8 categories. You can use these videos for both personal and commercial use. They offer free 10 stock videos every 10 days if you subscribe.
8. Dvids
Should you need free military footages, this site is the best place to go. All media types that you can download here are under a public domain license unless another copyright status is indicated. Media files are available if you become a registered user.
9. Epic Slow Mo
They offer free HD slow-motion video clips which are perfect for creating cinemagraphs! Epic Slow Mo adds new clips every Monday-Thursday. You can download clips, however, signing up is required. All clips can be used commercially, but you are not allowed to sell them.
10. Flickr
While we tend to only associate Flickr with images, they actually have some videos on the site as well. They even have a section reserved just for searching for Creative Commons works, both images, and video. Selecting a video, then “Additional info,” will show you what type of Creative Commons license it is reserved for.
11. Footage Crate
If you need action elements for your film project, this site is a good resource. Footage Crate offers a wide range of free VFX to choose from. You can access their free content if you register for an account. A pro account will give you unlimited daily downloads.
12. Free Videos on All the Free Stock
All the Free Stock is the ultimate collection fo stock images and videos. It’s like a search engine for royalty-free stock content.
13. Free Footage
Free Footage features content from various categories and allows you to use it however you like.
14. Getty Images
Find premium stock videos, from archival film to contemporary 4K and HD footage.
15. Ignite Motion
Videos and motion backgrounds in Quicktime and MP4 formats (compatible with most video editing software). You can use this high definition stock footage for commercial and personal use.
16. Life of Vids
Life of Vids provides footage videos, clips, and loops that are free of copyright restrictions. These videos can be downloaded from Vimeo in .mp4 format in UHD 4K, full HD (1920 × 1080), 720p HD (1280×720), Mobile SD (480×270) and SD (640×360).
17. Mazwai
Mazwai has a collection of HD video clips and footage that are free for use in commercial projects under Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY 3.0). On downloading the video, you receive a zip file with video in .mp4 and .webm formats. Mazwai has some unique time-lapse and slow-motion video footage. New videos are added on a regular basis and you can even send your video suggestions to them.
18. Motion Backgrounds
Download motion backgrounds and After Effects templates with no limitations from this site. The clips are 100%royalty-free, giving you the permission to use them in any project presentations. Signing up for an account is free, and you can simply log in with your Facebook or Google account.
19. Motion Elements
Collection of stock footage and After Effects project files.
20. Movie Tools
The movie tools library offers a great collection of video loops for video broadcasting or other animated projects. Most of these videos are royalty-free though there are a few that require purchasing if you wish to download them in HD.
21. NASA Image and Video Library
Which source could provide a more extensive image and video gallery of space explorations, astronomy pictures, latest space facilities etc. than NASA? Good news is that you can now download a good collection of their media content with their general permission which extends to personal web pages. If you want to use their content for commercial purposes though, we still highly recommend checking their media usage guidelines.
22. Orange HD
Signing up for an account is not required, so you can freely download any footage or video materials that you need. However, you can only use the footage and videos for non-commercial purposes.
23. Pexels Videos
is a video library that brings together Creative Commons, zero-licensed stock videos from different sources in one place. The videos are featured in different categories like rocks, night, street, sky, sun and many more for easy browsing.
24. Pixabay Videos
Pixabay has a huge library (1400 HD video clips and ~65 4K clips) of CC0 licensed HD and 4K videos contributed by videographers from around the world. These videos are royalty-free and can even be used for free in commercial projects. You will find video clips from various categories such as architecture, fashion, people, places, travel and with different effects including slow motion, time-lapse and animations. On downloading, you’ll get the videos in .mp4 format. (Note: They also have an extensive CC0 free stock photo collection.)
25. Pond 5 Public Domain
While Pond 5 charges for most of their footage, they offer 9,769 free clips categorized as “Public Domain Only.” Pond 5 does not offer warranties on these clips nor model releases, so consider licensing with caution. In particular, Pond 5 suggests that clips with recognizable images/voices of persons should be “editorial use only.” (AKA, no commercial use.)
26. Reddit Footage
Reddit is comprised of individual communities (subreddits) where members can submit direct links to media content. It is a reliable source of popular media contents or links. You can raw uncut videos on subreddit r/footage. All videos here should be under CC 3.0 license.
27. SpinXpress
SpinXpress will allow you to perform a search using a keyword, the type of media, and the Creative Commons license you’re looking for. You can also specify which media source you want it to search in, as long as it’s one of the sources they use, such as The Internet Archive, blip.tv, RSS feeds, etc.
28. SplashBase
SplashBase is a searchable directory of high-quality videos from different sources like Mazwai. You can browse their entire collection or search the videos.
29. Stock Footage Archive.org
has more than a thousand free stock videos. From a launching rocket, beautiful burning flames to New York City time lapse, you can all get it all here. The best part is that all video clips on the site are under CC 3.0 attribution license.
30. Stock Footage For Free
This site offers ~203 free clips to use for general commercial use. Note that the main purpose of this site is to up-sell you the VideoBlocks platform, so they will show you similar footage that is NOT free at the bottom of the screen.
31. Tanurix
Tanurix lets you browse and download free videos under the Free Film and Picture Stock categories. All these beautiful HD videos are under CC 3.0 license.
32, Videezy
All the videos are free to download and, depending on the license, free to use in your projects. It’s an online community of videographers sharing free HD clips (b-roll, backgrounds, and other video footage).
33. Videohive.net
ALL of the videos on this page are paid with the exception of the free clip of the month.
34. Videvo
Self-branded “the largest online resource dedicated to free HD stock footage and motion graphics,” they boast amazing variety with over 4000 clips. That said, you need to check the license on each video to see if it has a “Videvo Standard License” or a “Creative Commons 3.0 License.” The former allows use any commercial project without credit, but the latter requires credit be given to the artist and additional steps taken.
35. Vidlery
offers cute, animated video backgrounds that are CC0 licensed. They have a decent collection of free animations related to different events and activities including sunrise, hiking, cycling, traffic, rocket launch and many more. Like Coverr.co, they also provide you an option to check how a video would look when used in the website header before you download it. The videos are available in .mp4 and .webm formats.
36. Vidsplay
Free HD stock footages. Vidsplay adds new videos weekly. All the videos are free, and users are granted non-exclusive rights to use Vidsplay’s copyrighted video material without needing to pay royalties for each use. Some of the videos here were even used by well-known publishing brands like Forbes and TEDx which proves these stock videos are of top quality.
37. Vimeo
Vimeo offers Creative Commons-licensed videos. The site offers different types of licenses – Attribution, Attribution Share Alike, Attribution No Derivatives, Attribution Non-Commercial, Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike, and Attribution Noncommercial Noderivatives. If you’re unsure which license fits your need, there’s a handy explanation on the right side of the main page. Underneath each of the different licenses is a link to browse through all the videos of that type.
38. Vimeo Free HD Stock Footage Group
There is a great Vimeo group created by artist Phil Fried entitled “Free HD Stock Footage.” The group has posted 250 beautiful videos and you are allowed to “download the clip” and “use it in your all your video-projects.” Phil sells extended versions of many of these clips if you ever need.
39. Wedstill.io
10 Free HD videos every 10 days, curated by creatives for creatives.
40. Xstockvideo
Thousands of unique free clips for download.
41. YouTube
Again, just like with Vimeo, YouTube, another of our favorite sites for videos also offers Creative Commons-licensed videos. Unlike Vimeo, there is no easy link for you to access the list of creative commons videos, but you can append the word “, creativecommons” (including the comma) to the end of your search term. It will then show you the list of videos that you can use legally. If you see the option “Remix this video!” you will know that this video can be used.
42. Fiverr
Can’t find what you need? You can always hire a talented video-artist through Fiverr. Find top-rated Fiverr providers here.