Making money from photography isn’t easy. If anything, it’s getting more difficult. As the supply increases, prices drop, meaning photographers have to keep diversifying to keep earning money. Whether photography accounts for 100% of your income or it’s a side-hustle, you should consider stock photography.

The market for stock photography is massive, so whatever your niche, there’s likely demand for it. As long as your photography is of a high quality it will likely be accepted into stock libraries. As trends change in marketing, so does the demand for certain genres and styles, but it isn’t hard to stay on top of what’s selling well. There will also be certain categories that will always sell well, such as travel photography.

Is Selling Stock Right For You?

Stock isn’t right for every photographer. You need to weigh up the pros and cons and test the waters a little first. It’s easy, passive income that you can spend a little time updating and watch the dollars roll in. Don’t quit your job just yet, though. Royalties can be pretty poor (as low as 25c per sale). It takes quite a bit of time to build up a library large enough to start seeing payments coming in. You also need to remember that you need written consent from any recognizable person in your photos.

The Best Stock Photo Sites

I’ve been uploading and selling my photography through stock libraries for a few years now. I haven’t always been consistent, so I’ve sometimes had to spend a lot of time adding photos from quite a few months back. I haven’t made a lot of money this way, but it’s been a nice passive income in the background. I’ve used many different agencies over the years, most of which I’ve given up on. I’ve tested more than a dozen, but now these are the five I consider to be the best stock photo sites for selling your photography.

royalties best stock photo sites for making money selling photography

Shutterstock

shutterstock best stock photography sites for making money

The big one. Shutterstock dominates the stock marketplace, and for good reason. It has a monstrous library of stock images and video. Most of the photographers I’ve spoken to who sell stock will tell you that Shutterstock is consistently their best seller. It definitely has been for me, although that’s changed in the last six months.

Shutterstock’s contributor tools are easy to use, and I’ve always had a great acceptance rate. Although royalties are often as low as 25c, the sheer volume of image buyers is so big that it’s still worth using in my opinion. Many 25c sales add up to many dollars. Shutterstock made up 24% of my stock photography earnings in the first half of this year.

Adobe Stock

adobe stock best stock photography sites for making money

Adobe Stock is a relatively new player, having bought out one of the previous big boys, Fotolia. I’ve been using Adobe Stock for close to a year, and so far I’m pretty impressed. They have a unique corner of the market given that a significant proportion of visual creatives use Adobe software. Adobe has capitalized on this brilliantly by allowing images to be sold and bought from right within their applications.

Earnings are in a similar ballpark to Shutterstock, but again, its strength is in their numbers. The Adobe Stock user face is simple to use, and I love being able to upload directly from Lightroom. My image acceptance rate is almost 100%, which is pretty awesome. Adobe Stock made up 11% of my stock photography earnings for the first half of this year.

Alamy

alamy best stock photography sites for making money

While most stock agencies are technically “microstock”, Alamy is one of the traditional agencies. It’s been around for a long time, right back to the days before you could buy stock online. Alamy seems to have much higher standards, making it harder to get accepted as a contributor and build up a decent archive.

It’s worth the effort, though. Royalties are much higher than the microstock agencies. My earnings from sales on Alamy are sometimes over $50 per sale. The platform isn’t as user-friendly as some of the other agencies, but could be worse. Alamy made up 53% of my stock photography earnings in the first half of this year.

iStock/Getty

istock getty best stock photography sites for making money

iStock was one of the first stock agencies that I signed up with, and has continued to offer a great service. They’ve since combined with Getty, which is one of the traditional stock agencies, much like Alamy. This seems to have worked out well, as any images submitted through their awesome submission tool are potentially available to licence on either library. Exactly how they decide where to put images I’m not sure, but my sales have certainly increased as a result.

Earnings from iStock fluctuate quite a bit, but that seems to be a common issue for many contributors. Still, iStock made up 10% of my stock photography earnings in the first half of this year, so I’m happy to keep offering my images through the service.

Dreamstime

dreamstime best stock photography sites for making money

A lot of photographers have had great results from Dreamstime, but my earnings have dropped off significantly in recent months. Certain images seem to do well, but nowhere near as well as my other stock libraries. Dreamstime’s submission tool is also painful to use. It’s slow and requires a lot of unnecessary repetition. It’s seriously in need of an update.

This may be one you want to experiment with, but I will likely be jumping ship if things continue as they have recently. Dreamstime only accounted for 1% of my stock photography earnings in the first half of this year.

The Changing World of Stock

As the industry continues to change, so will the stock agencies. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it means you need to keep on top of those changes and experiment with what’s working and what isn’t.

Although not an in-depth comparison, these are the stock agencies that I use and recommend. I will continue to experiment with what works and keep this article updated regularly, so check back from time to time. I’m currently testing out one of the newer stock agencies to see if it lives up to the hype. I’ll keep you posted on that one.

the best stock photo sites from photographers to sell
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