Indian Stock Photography Sites | Sell Your Mobile Photos & Earn Money

If you’re looking for some Indian stock photography sites which you can trust and get some real and high money return then you’re at the right place.

Photography is a growing industry. It is progressing day by day. There are many ways to make money in the field of photography.

It can be by being a professional photographer, editor, and selling your photographs. 

The is a great need for photographs today. People use photographs in many ways.

Some use the photographs in presentations, portfolios, brochures, and countless other places. 

• checkout my portfolio 😀

And the good point is ( if you’re a photographer) that by selling your photographs you can earn a decent amount of passive income.

This passive flow of income can help with your daily expenses and also help you buy new and improved pieces of equipment. 

You can use this money to support yourself, To become successful at selling photos online requires discipline and strategy. 

so today in this article I’m going to share some of the best and most trusted Indian Stock Photography Sites with their details like rules and regulations, the commission they take, etc…

Table Of Content

• Top Indian Stock Photography Sites
• How to sell photos Online?
• Stock Photography QNA

before we start, let’s find out the very popular question, which many photographers ask me whenever I talk about stock photography stuff…

Why do people sell their photographs?

Photo by Emily Morter on Unsplash

The simplest reason why photographer sells their photographs is ‘Demand and Supply.’

Professionals sell their photographs because there is a demand for them. 

Today most businesses are communicating across mediums and need images to convey their messages more efficiently.

Not all businesses can afford to hire professional photographers to work exclusively for them. 

This is one of the major reasons why selling one’s photographs is becoming popular as it enables businesses to access generic stock images at a fraction of the cost, which profits them more. 

Top Indian Stock Photography Sites To Sell Your Photos Online

There are more than a dozen Indian Stock Photography Sites or photo-sharing platforms available.

All of them have the almost same interface and everything.

The only difference between all these platforms is that they all have different amounts of photographs. Some get traffic some don’t. 

Some of the most famous and preferred Stock photo platforms in India are mentioned below…  

Alamy

Alamy is a great platform to sell stock photos.

This website does not have any hard and fast rules. You can upload your photos to Alamy without any copyright or licensing issues. 

On Alamy photographers earn 50%, Distributors earn 70%, Novel Use earns 50%. Payments are deposited monthly to your respective bank accounts. 

This website has a large database of photos available for the consumer to buy.

Alamy is also considered competitive. The website has also made millions in payouts. 

This website is said to have the world’s most diverse stock photo collection.

115  photographs with fresh inspirations are added daily here. 

Foap

Foap is a unique stock photo app. It has been featured on ABC News for being a profitable app for photo selling.

Here you can make 50% of the profits by just selling one of your single photos.

It is unique because it is particularly interesting as compared to other indian stock photography websites.

On this app, the photographers can compete in something known as Missions. 

In these Missions, Photographers submit a photo or video. It is the easiest way to make the most.

All that is to be done is to produce a photo that matches the described mission. 

With missions, just one photograph can make a thousand. 

Getty Images

Getty Images are one of the most reputed names in the stock photo industry.

To upload your images on Getty first you need to fill out the application available on their mobile app.

Then you will need to submit 3-6 samples of your work.

The application will be reviewed. You will be notified about your acceptance a few days later. 

It has over 1.5 million customers in over 200 countries. This provides a large audience.

This app offers between 15% to 20% for royalty-free photos.

Snapped4u

Snapped4u is the app that makes stock photography look like a child’s play.

You can upload your photographs to the gallery and set a price for your photos.

From there on everything is done all by itself. 

Snapped4u sells your images as jpeg files and emails them right to your buyers.

Then you receive the money via Paypal on the first of the month. 

Snapped4u gives the biggest profit share on each sale.

EyeEm

EyeEm is considered more focused on commercial photography.

It focuses more on advertising stock photography. 

This makes it one of the most suitable places to sell your photos if you are looking to move forward in commercial photography. 

They provide a 50% commission on the sale on the sales of your photographs. 

iStock Photo

iStock Photo is owned and operated by Getty Images, iStock has a great reputation in the market.

It is generally used by businesses and companies looking for professional stock photography. 

The commission here starts from 15% but it can even raise to 45%.

This depends on the popularity of your work and profile on the website. 

If a customer purchases one of your images as a part of their subscription you only receive 15% of the sale. 

How to Sell Photos Online?

Stock photos are merely photographs that a photographer has made available for sale for commercial purposes and are subject to a usage license.

Generally, stock photos are sold through photos websites.

These websites have a large database that is loaded with photographs and images that clients can look through when they need a picture for a blog post, a social media post, a magazine article, a pamphlet, a book cover, or anything else.

These stock photo websites have rules and regulations of their own.

You need to follow these rules to upload your photographs and eventually sell them.

Some of the different factors you need to consider when determining how to sell stock photos are written below. 

Why Licensing Of Your Photograph Is Important?

Photo by Umberto on Unsplash

Stock Photos are generally licensed to customers for particular, limited uses.

There are various types of licensing on these websites. 

There are two main types of licenses used in stock photographs.

One is Rights Managed and another one is Royalty-Free (Like Unsplash).

A Rights Managed license gives the user permission to use an image for a specific purpose only and the price charged relates to this usage.

A Royalty-Free license gives the user the right to use any image for any purpose and the price relates to the particular size of file that is purchased.

Another confusion based on licensing is whether stock photographs are for commercial or editorial uses.

The images that are used for informational purposes in newspapers, magazines, books, and blogs are generally considered for editorial use.

Whereas commercial uses involve profit-seeking ventures such as advertisements, products, and product packaging.

You should have some knowledge about licenses so that you don’t face any problems in the future. 

Right Keywords to target for better sell

Professionals use many strategies to make their pictures easily.

You should focus on creating images with high commercial value.

You should upload tons of pictures in general. And you should focus on a specific niche or niches in terms of the subject matter.

try to use some keywords, Using keywords is the primary way that your photos will be seen.

These keywords will make your photographs unique and stand out from other photographs. This can help you improve your sales. 

You can add tags such as happiness, joy, childhood, playtime, and similar tags that describe the character, emotions, and activity being depicted in the photo.

This can also make your photo pop up. 

Keyword research and effective tagging are significant for making your stock images highly searchable and easily available.

You should avoid spammy tags. You should not use tags unnecessarily if your photo does not fit in well with them.

Sometimes adding spammy tags can result in penalizing your account by the stock photo agencies. 

Quality Over Quantity

The quality of photographs depends more on when you intend to sell them.

The photographs should have high resolution. 

The files should be large photo files so buyers can adapt them to all standard photo sizes.

Some platforms also have some regulations regarding their photo sizes and formats as well.

Some support JPG while some support JPEG. 

You should carefully read the terms and conditions mentioned on the platform before joining it.

The best-selling images are those with real commercial value and skill shots.

Today, the market is full of professionals and very high-value digital photos, so your work has to be top-notch to be competitive to stand out. 

Editing Is the Golden Key

Image editing is essentially considered the last step before uploading the photographs.

Photo by Mylene Tremoyet on Unsplash

Post-processing is an important part of the whole process. 

Editing can help you get rid of imperfections such as noise and sharpness.

You can also help you enhance other features of the photograph. You can increase the colors, sharpness, etc.

This can increase the appeal of the photograph. 

To get the more perfect results it is always advised to use professional editing apps or platforms.

Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop are some preferred editing apps used by professionals. 

These professional platforms provide workflow advantages, such as editing presets that help to achieve a professional finish and also do batch editing of multiple images at once.

The only disadvantage of using this professional-grade editing software is that they require a learning curve (and some of them are paid :D).

To master any editing software requires a certain amount of time.

Editing can help you increase the sales of your photographs as well. 

Stock Photography QNA

Here are some common questions asked by many photographers before selling their photographs…

Q1. How much money can you make selling photos online?

There is no limit to how much you can earn by selling your photos online.

Today there is a lot of competition in stock photos as well. Initially, you can earn thousands (in USD maybe :D).

This number is flexible and can grow. This completely depends on the quality of your photographs as well as your wish to improve.

You get to learn a lot every time one of your photographs is sold. 

Q2. How do I start selling photos?

To start selling your photos you first need to start by choosing which platform you find fits you perfectly.

Then carefully read the terms and conditions of the respective platform. 

After that, you can register in the website’s contributor area and submit sample images for approval.

Once approved, you can start uploading images to their catalog right away and sell your picture.

Q3. What type of photos sells best?

The answer to this question is never the same as earlier, As the saying goes ‘Change is the only constant’.

The world of photography keeps on changing. But in general cases, the photos with models involved sell more. 

The photographs of people are an all-time best-seller, and the realistic, honest, authentic style has been the hottest for several years, with no sign of declining.

Q4. How much do hand pics sell for?

People make a great amount of money for hand photos.

It may come as a surprise to you but people earn more than 2000 per day just by selling their hand pics for money.

You can earn up to 60% royalties. But if your photograph is exclusive then you can earn up to 30% royalties. It is an easy way to make money.

Q5. How much does a photographer earn in India?

Photography as a career has grown so much in recent years, especially in India.

A Photographer’s salary in India ranges from 2 lakhs to 7.2 lakhs with an average annual salary of 3 lakhs.

An average photographer in India can earn 80 thousand to 1 lakh (INR) a month. 

The amount of money you get paid depends on the quality of your photographs as well as your experience. 

Final Words

Today everyone has a smartphone. Most people like to capture pictures with their smartphones daily. You can earn money by selling these photos now.

You can sell the photographs that are captured by your smartphone or a camera.

Photography has grown as a career. Now photography is seen as a thrilling career option for the Indian youth.

Many courses are being introduced in the field of photography. 

Stock photography can be considered as an outlet for images that you have shot without any specific purpose, or images shot for client assignments that were not used and you have the rights for.

There are many platforms to sell your photographs and make money.

To be more comfortable with the process you can always ask other photographers who sell their work on these platforms for their opinion. 

Every app or site for selling stock photos has a huge database with a large number of photographs.

Your photographs should stand out from all those photographs so that you can make money.

You can sell your photos on the platforms mentioned in the above article.

All Stock Photography Sites mentioned in this article are all tried and tested.

They all have great customer reviews. They are also preferred by many professional photographers. 

Some tips to help your photos stand out are also mentioned in the above article. 

So which one is your “Proved” method to earn money by selling photos as a photographer?

or share one of your best or trusted stock photography sites in the comment below 🙂