Where to find free images for your designs

Whether you're putting together a portfolio piece, a client mockup, or social content, you'll need photography you can actually use. The good news: there's a lot of high quality, genuinely free imagery out there. The catch: not every site labeled "free" uses the same license, and a handful of overused photos appear on so many sites that your design ends up looking like everyone else's.

This is the list of free image sites I send my students to, plus a few tips for finding photos that don't show up in every other Pinterest mood board.

Read the license first (yes, even on free sites)

Most free stock photo sites fall into one of three license patterns:

• No attribution required (Unsplash, Pexels, Pixabay): use the photo for personal or commercial work without crediting the photographer. Some sites still ask politely.
• Attribution required: free to use, but you must credit the photographer somewhere visible. Fine for portfolios, riskier on paid client work depending on the deliverable.
• Personal use only: free for your own projects, but not for client work, products you sell, or anything monetized.

Always check the license linked from the photo's download page before you use it on something published or paid.

The big three

Unsplash

unsplash.com · The best known and best curated of the free sites. Modern, lifestyle, landscape, and editorial style photography. Free for personal and commercial use, no attribution required (though appreciated). Great for hero images, clean backgrounds, and lifestyle shots.

Pexels

pexels.com · Strong overlap with Unsplash but a different community of contributors, so it's worth a second search here when you've already worked Unsplash and want fresh options. Also has a video library if you ever need free stock footage.

Kaboompics

kaboompics.com · The work of a single photographer (Karolina Grabowska). The aesthetic is curated and consistent: flat lays, food, beauty, lifestyle, with thoughtful color palettes. If you need a unified set of photos for a brand or campaign, this is one of the best places to start.

Other places to look

Pixabay

pixabay.com · Massive library that includes photos, illustrations, vectors, and music. Free for commercial use, no attribution required. Quality varies, but the size of the library means you can usually find something even for niche subjects.

Burst by Shopify

burst.shopify.com · Built for online stores, so it's especially strong for product, retail, and commerce friendly imagery. Free for commercial use, no attribution required.

StockSnap

stocksnap.io · A curated collection updated regularly. Search is fast and licensing is straightforward (free for personal and commercial use).

Picjumbo

picjumbo.com · Generous free section and a reasonably priced premium tier if you find a photographer whose style you love.

Gratisography

gratisography.com · Quirky, surreal, and humorous photos. Great when you need something that breaks the "perfect lifestyle photo" pattern.

Life of Pix

lifeofpix.com · Editorial and lifestyle, leaning artistic. A good source when you want something that feels like a magazine spread.

Reshot

reshot.com · More candid and more diverse than the bigger sites. Worth a look when you want imagery that doesn't read as "stock photo".

New Old Stock

nos.twnsnd.co · Vintage public domain photographs. If you need something with character, age, or history (think product packaging, editorial layouts, mood boards), this is a small treasure.

Bonus: free illustrations and icons

Sometimes a photo isn't right and an illustration is. A few quick recommendations:

• unDraw · clean, recolorable SVG illustrations
• Storyset · editable and animated illustrations
• The Noun Project · icons, free with attribution or paid for unattributed
• Heroicons · clean, MIT licensed UI icons

Before you place that image

A few habits that will save you headaches later:

1. Download the largest size available. Many sites offer multiple resolutions. Cropping a small photo and then scaling it up will look pixelated. It's much easier to scale down than up.
2. Check resolution if you're printing. Print needs at least 300 DPI at the final print size. A 1500 pixel JPEG looks crisp on the web but will blur on a postcard.
3. Watch for recognizable people, logos, and buildings. Photos featuring those can technically need additional model or property releases for commercial use, even if the photo itself is free. This rarely matters for portfolio work, but it matters a lot for paid client work.
4. Avoid the "famous five". A handful of Unsplash photos show up everywhere. If you've already seen the photo a hundred times, your audience has too. Try less popular keywords or a smaller site for fresher options.
5. Save your sources. Drop a sources.txt file in your project folder with the URL of every image you used. Future you will be grateful.

Want help integrating images into your designs?

Choosing the right photo for a layout, balancing color, masking subjects out, or building a cohesive visual system from a set of free photos: these are exactly the skills we work on in tutoring. Book a session and bring a project you're working on.