{"id":11426,"date":"2019-04-12T12:00:34","date_gmt":"2019-04-12T12:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.apogeephoto.com\/?p=11426"},"modified":"2019-04-03T19:40:12","modified_gmt":"2019-04-03T19:40:12","slug":"best-photo-hosting-websites","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.apogeephoto.com\/best-photo-hosting-websites\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Photo Hosting Websites"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"bestAs digital photographers it\u2019s all too easy to shoot, shoot, and shoot some more, and find yourself suddenly having to organize dozens if not hundreds of images. They all need to go somewhere; otherwise, your storage cards will be quickly overwhelmed. <\/span><\/p>\n

Hard drive space on your computer is the first choice for many people. As long as your storage capacity is high enough, it\u2019s also the most convenient and easiest choice. You aren\u2019t limited by internet connectivity and don\u2019t have to hunt around for and connect an external drive. <\/span><\/p>\n

Laptop users might prefer to preserve what little hard drive space they have in favor of an external drive. The only real disadvantage to this is having an extra piece of hardware to track when you\u2019re already trying to minimize what you\u2019re carrying with you. <\/span><\/p>\n

Online photo storage is one of the best ways to keep your images securely backed up and organized. The chances of your work being lost after being uploaded are minuscule. And you\u2019ll always be able to access it without it sitting around taking up space on hard drives when not in use. <\/span><\/p>\n

Like just about everything nowadays, there are dozens of options for hosting your images online. So which website best meets your needs as a photographer? It does depend on you, but we can first break down features to keep an eye out for.<\/span><\/p>\n

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What should I look for in a Photo Hosting site?<\/b><\/h2>\n

Maximum File Size & Storage Capacity<\/b><\/h3>\n

One primary consideration is what type of online photo storage you\u2019re looking for. Sites like Flickr and Imgur are great for getting large numbers of images backed up, regardless of image quality. While Imgur has limits on the megapixel counts, Flickr and 500px will take even your highest resolution DSLR or mirrorless camera photographs. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

How much storage you need is just as important as how much you get. While unlimited storage is attractive over \u201conly\u201d 1 terabyte of storage (Flickr), keep in mind a terabyte is 1000 GB. Do you have enough work to fill a terabyte now or anytime soon? <\/span><\/p>\n

If not, then unlimited storage does nothing for you, and you should consider the site\u2019s other features. Some free sites only offer 1-2 GB, which is far more limiting if you have a large number of high-resolution images to upload.<\/span><\/p>\n

Extras<\/b><\/h3>\n

Do you need on-site image editing? Google Photos and several others have this baked in. Zenfolio offers a blog linked to your account. If you already have a WordPress account or don\u2019t care to blog, then this has less value. But if you want to create content that keeps people coming back to visit, then this has considerable value.<\/span><\/p>\n

What sort of domain name do you get for the paid version? With SmugMug, you get a less than appealing username.smugmug.com. SmugMug is many things but is not a name you\u2019ll be proud to have on your business cards. <\/span><\/p>\n

If you want to make sales, 500px, SmugMug, Zenfolio, and others all offer marketplace features. 500px is oriented towards stock and assignments from businesses while the others focus on fine art sales and objects like calendars, greeting cards and more printed with your work.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pricing<\/b><\/h3>\n

If you\u2019re creating more of a portfolio or gallery for your finest images, you\u2019ll be looking at paid options which include site customization, custom URLs, and other options to help your work stand out from the pack. These sites often include access to print shops so visitors can create and purchase physical prints and wall art from your galleries.<\/span><\/p>\n

Another consideration for pricing is whether you get a free trial period. SmugMug offers a 14-day trial with full access to its professional-level features. That\u2019s full access to the site to feel out whether you\u2019ll be comfortable dropping significant amounts of money into their platform.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Best Free Image Hosting Websites<\/b><\/h2>\n

Imgur<\/b><\/h3>\n

\"imagur<\/a><\/p>\n

www.imagur.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Imgur is immensely popular for many reasons. One of the foremost is the fact that you don\u2019t need an account to use its basic function. Somehow, very few websites have capitalized on this simple truth. Especially those pages nowadays that demand you create an account even to view the content. <\/span><\/p>\n

Like the others, Imgur also has a social media aspect in the form of upvotes, commentary, and view counts. It does go hand in hand with Reddit usage. Users can also add tags to images for easy indexing. But overall Imgur is more of a quick sharing platform than a true photo hosting site.<\/span><\/p>\n

One notable limitation to Imgur is that it can\u2019t host or display RAW files. Nor can it host image files over 20MB. Video files are limited to 30 seconds and can\u2019t be over 200MB in size. If your video is larger than 2MB, then Imgur strips away the audio content and converts it to a GIFV. <\/span><\/p>\n

In short, Imgur is not a great choice if you have a professional workflow. But when it comes to instant sharing of JPEG, PNG, GIF, and other common formats, Imgur is a great choice.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Flickr<\/b><\/h3>\n

\"flickr<\/a><\/p>\n

www.flickr.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Flickr has been somewhat on the decline for a while, but is still a site worth looking into for free image hosting. Flickr does have some attractive features. It comes with 1 TB of storage as well as basic photo editing tools. And there are tons of communities with themes such as Macro Photography, Textures, and even brand and gear specific like \u201cphotos taken with the Vivitar Series 1 90mm f\/2.5 Macro.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Flickr is a great place to go if you\u2019re looking for photo hosting with a bit of discussion and the ability to comment on the work of others. The cheesy awards can get a bit tedious at times. But if you aren\u2019t into the commentary and discussion, then the storage capacity and having an organized album are all that matter. <\/span><\/p>\n

While it does have a paid option, Flickr is best considered a free hosting website. The Pro version is extremely underwhelming as it only includes advanced statistics (views, SEO, etc.) for your images, a desktop tool for instant uploading, and a collection of discounts for bundles software like Adobe\u2019s Creative Cloud and a Portfoliobox Pro website. There\u2019s very little change to the basic functionality of the site.<\/span><\/p>\n

Landscape photographers will love the fact that photos shot with cameras with a GPS chip often have GPS metadata built into the EXIF data. This added information lets your viewers see precisely where and when an image was taken using a map that pops up automatically on the image\u2019s Flickr page. Here\u2019s an example of a <\/span>geotagged image<\/span><\/a> with an included map.<\/span><\/p>\n

SmugMug purchased Flickr in 2018. While SmugMug hasn\u2019t said they intended to merge the platforms or make sweeping changes to how Flickr works, there\u2019s a good chance Flickr will have new life breathed into it. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Google Photos<\/b><\/h3>\n

\"google<\/a><\/p>\n

www.google.com\/photos<\/a><\/p>\n

Like all Google products, Google Photos syncs beautifully across devices and platforms. Every photo you take can be instantly backed up to folders pre-organized by you. <\/span><\/p>\n

The facial recognition software is also quite handy for event photographers and makes organization and sharing even easier. Google\u2019s software is intelligent enough to auto-curate some of your work by pre-applying edits and organizational tasks if you do them often enough.<\/span><\/p>\n

Google Photos also has built-in editing software that includes creative filters to give your photos a bit more flair. Palma, Metro, Vogue, and ten other filters can be applied, each ranging from subtle to somewhat garish, depending on your taste. <\/span><\/p>\n

The sharing function allows you to send albums or individual images to people with customized access. Users can either view only or also have the ability to edit and download images. One notable downside is that it only offers unlimited storage for smartphone and 16-megapixel or less images. Higher quality images require users to purchase extra storage. <\/span><\/p>\n

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500px<\/b><\/h3>\n

\"500px<\/a><\/p>\n

www.500px.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Like Flickr, 500px is meant to be your one-stop shop for image storage, display, and community discussion. People can comment, follow your work, save images as favorites, and view regular articles written by photographers.<\/span><\/p>\n

The 500px Marketplace allows photographers to make a bit of income from their work. You can find assignments for shoots if you\u2019ve built up a bit of a portfolio for companies to browse. And you can submit images as stock photographs for use by magazines, advertisers, and other companies looking for images to use with their work. <\/span><\/p>\n

While the payout per image is low stock photographers make money through volume sales. Also, you retain full rights to your images, despite having licensed them for sale.<\/span><\/p>\n

With 500px, you have Shutterstock and Flickr-lite in one website, and these features are included with even the free membership. Even so, 500px\u2019s free membership is severely limiting for prolific photographers as you\u2019re limited to 20 image uploads per week. But that can also be something of an advantage because Flickr\u2019s communities tend to be swamped with just as much poor quality work as good. <\/span><\/p>\n

500px is similar to Flickr, yet it caters to an intermediate to a professional audience. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Pixabay<\/b><\/h3>\n

\"pixabay<\/a><\/p>\n

www.pixabay.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Pixabay takes a unique approach to the image hosting game by placing every image uploaded under a Creative Commons CC0 license. This means <\/span>anyone<\/span> can download and use your images for articles, advertisements, and more. <\/span><\/p>\n

If you upload videos, the same also applies for videographers looking for content. Users also have the option to say thank you with a PayPal donation button that appears after each download.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pixabay continues to grow and encourages users to submit quality images and video by placing no limits on the number of images you can submit. While Pixabay functions relatively well for photo storage, it has a very basic interface that\u2019s meant purely for display and for users to download your work. <\/span><\/p>\n

Users can comment, like, and favorite your work but there\u2019s no real community aspect. But if you need high-quality images for your projects and want to submit your work to the Creative Commons, then Pixabay may be exactly what you need.<\/span><\/p>\n