This article has been replaced by 11 websites for free illustrations for your articles.

This article replaces 7 Websites For Free Illustrations For Your Articles

Need a picture to illustrate your article? Well, you can just look through Google Images and use any that take your fancy, right? Wrong! Being viewable on Google does not necessarily equal free to use. And sometimes it’s hard to discern who owns the copyright, and what the terms of use are.

The following websites are much safer bets, but always check the licence offered and make sure you adhere to its conditions. Even if the licence is CC0, meaning that the picture is free to use and no attribution is required, I think it’s nice to give credit to the photographer or artist, where this is known.

Anyway, here are the sites to explore:

Creative Commons Search Engine (this is the original version, which in my opinion is less flaky and is able to be refined).

British Library — great for old illustrations that are free to use. The collection is being updated continually.

Freepik — this has vector drawings as well.

Pexels — beautiful, hi-res photos.

Pixabay — ditto.

RGB Stock Photos — ditto.

Unsplash — ditto.

Just added: PikWizard. This has a good selection of beautiful hi-res photos, free to use, with no attribution required (though I think we should credit the photographer wherever possible). There is also a very handy design wizard (illustrated above) which allows you to edit the photo before you download it, and even resize it automatically for posting on different social media platforms. Indeed, it is very much like Canva in this respect. (It’s available as a separate application too: Design Wizard.)There is a selection of background graphics too. Well worth checking out. There are premium photos as well, but you obviously have to pay to use them.