The best income agency is www.storyblocks.com.

i was kind of ignoring the super selective ones (stocksy, storyblocks) as they don't let many folks (prob like me) in

I have some friends making some big money on a company called Freepix. I submitted to them but failed their test. The take only the best of the best.

I heard some are making truck loads of cash on Picfair too. Can anyone confirm this? I hear the selection process is tough tho.

Best Agencies for pictures :
Shutterstock
Adobe Stock
iStock
Dreamstime
Alamy
123rf

Best Agencies for videos :
Shutterstock
Adobe Stock

Until a few months ago, I would have added Pond5 to the video list. But not anymore. I had 60% less income in 2023 than in the previous year. It looks like there are going to be big changes at Pond5.

iStock sells a lot of videos for 6 cents. I've read that, but it's not my experience.

I only have portfolios with three agencies: SS, AS and Pond5. And since this year I only upload to SS and AS.

judging by the poll the main agencies are adobe, shutter and istock.  if those were the 3 you were contributing to would you consider adding any more?  personally i contributed some to pond5 and alamy and have exactly $0 to show for it so i gave up on those two.  wondering if any of the smaller ones are gaining any traction to maybe try to diversify and see what happens.

Looking for gold on a sandy beach? Maybe you are thinking there's some undiscovered oasis in the desert of Microstock? Depending on if you make video, and there are good answers from others, for photo only, you've got it. Adobe, SS, and IS.

The only other that might be of interest, in my experience and opinion, is DT. They are reasonable about what they accept, the reviews are reliable and fast. You're going to need thousands of images to make any consistent level of downloads. Like others, most of mine are 35¢ subs. Minimum payout is $100 which seems to make it a long time.

That's the only agency I'd suggest to someone looking for more income. I wouldn't add P5, Alamy, DP, or 123RF. Maybe years ago, but now, they are Microscopic Stock.  If you do video, see what others have written.

I would leave 123RF off any list of best agencies unless you are asking about 5 or more years ago.

Alamy still sells ok for me, although down last year, and what they have been doing isn't very encouraging.

DT remains steady, and they haven't screwed contributors in a long time, but they are also pretty small compared to AS, SS, and IS. Almost all sales there are .35 subs.

Did you mean DP?  Seems they have the history of shady deals and nasty tricks. Yes, Alamy has gone from interesting money, into to more sales, less money.

Quote from: Findura on January 09, 2024, 07:03

It looks like there are going to be big changes at Pond5.

Would you care to elaborate or just speculation?

Just look at the sales discussion thread on pond5. There are people with 20-40k files who report weeks of no sales. That should simply be impossible. And much of that is exclusive content.

Producers are afraid that the business is slowly being shifted to Shutterstock.

There used to be a lot of public interaction with the team. They would get into the forum and talk about fresh plans and ideas. That hasn't happened in ages.

They respond quickly and well when you write to support though. One of the most friendly teams in the industry.

Video is nowhere near exhausted, literally everything is still missing. I think it is 60 million videos compared to 1 billion photos? In the entire stock industry.

There should be a lot of room for growth with steady uploads. Especially with good quality content.

Quote from: yuriy on January 06, 2024, 23:19

judging by the poll the main agencies are adobe, shutter and istock.  if those were the 3 you were contributing to would you consider adding any more?  personally i contributed some to pond5 and alamy and have exactly $0 to show for it so i gave up on those two.  wondering if any of the smaller ones are gaining any traction to maybe try to diversify and see what happens.

Looking for gold on a sandy beach? Maybe you are thinking there's some undiscovered oasis in the desert of Microstock? Depending on if you make video, and there are good answers from others, for photo only, you've got it. Adobe, SS, and IS.

The only other that might be of interest, in my experience and opinion, is DT. They are reasonable about what they accept, the reviews are reliable and fast. You're going to need thousands of images to make any consistent level of downloads. Like others, most of mine are 35¢ subs. Minimum payout is $100 which seems to make it a long time.

That's the only agency I'd suggest to someone looking for more income. I wouldn't add P5, Alamy, DP, or 123RF. Maybe years ago, but now, they are Microscopic Stock.  If you do video, see what others have written.

Quote from: pancaketom on January 09, 2024, 11:52

I would leave 123RF off any list of best agencies unless you are asking about 5 or more years ago.

Alamy still sells ok for me, although down last year, and what they have been doing isn't very encouraging.

DT remains steady, and they haven't screwed contributors in a long time, but they are also pretty small compared to AS, SS, and IS. Almost all sales there are .35 subs.

Did you mean DP?  Seems they have the history of shady deals and nasty tricks. Yes, Alamy has gone from interesting money, into to more sales, less money.

I guess what I'm looking for is one more website to constantly reload the contributor summary page on.  Seems to me it's pretty clearly AS in first place, istock in a distant 2nd and SS is trying to win the race for last place (for photo and a little video).  If I'm going to waste time submitting to SS maybe I can waste a little more at dreamstime or depositphoto or something?  Seems dreamstime is the consensus 4th least worst?  Correct me if I'm wrong.

I guess what I'm looking for is one more website to constantly reload the contributor summary page on.  Seems to me it's pretty clearly AS in first place, istock in a distant 2nd and SS is trying to win the race for last place (for photo and a little video).  If I'm going to waste time submitting to SS maybe I can waste a little more at dreamstime or depositphoto or something?  Seems dreamstime is the consensus 4th least worst?  Correct me if I'm wrong.

Nope you're not wrong. The problem comes down to, what are your images and how many? Then how much time will you have to spend to drop those images into a black hole?  Yes, DT is probably the next best after the three, and maybe DP is next after that.

If there was a 4th I'd want to know that too.

My point of view is, there are only 3 right now. Yes I have a DT account, I'm trying to make it to $100 so I can close it. BUT... I have a friend or two that make payout there, every few months. I think there are others here who say they like the returns from DP. And there are people who have dropped SS when the reset and 10c commissions came in.

In the end, you'll have to try and see or depending on what your images are, see what your personal results are. Mine say, AS, SS and IS. All the rest that I hang on to, are dying or dead.

what is the best agencies for vectors ?

best for submitting:  ...DT only allows 1 image at a time

Please explain? One image at a time? They have copy keywords and a kind of batch thing. I don't use it, because mostly nothing I do is the same, but there's some kind of populate from previous image. Or did you mean something else.

DT is the easiest for me to upload, especially vectors, where I upload the JPG and then the "additional". They match them, include the data and, it's done. Automatic categories. Worst part of DT is, yes I get accepted, no I don't sell much.

what is the best agencies for vectors ?

Good question, I wonder if I'm missing something by only working SS, AS, DT? IS I get some DLs but uploading is such torture that I stopped. I wonder if there is another that might be better for vectors than for photos?

Quote from: Wilm on January 26, 2024, 06:49

Images only - no videos - all time income - SS set to 100

SS = 100 (1349 images, RPD 0.68)
AS = 92.7 (1554 images, RPD 1.19)
iS = 38.2 (956 images, RPD 0.71)
123 = 16 (1540 images, RPD 0.86)
DT = 8 (1393 images, RPD 1.25)
DP = 6 (1185 images, RPD 0.44)

closed accounts
CS = 4
BS = 2

Its interesting that there are a handful people in the forum reporting SS as their #1.  I'm sure it has something to do with what subjects they photograph and I'm guessing it's due to small numbers of large sales.  For what its worth here's my estimate of my own agencies (multiply everything by 3.3333 if you'd like SS as 100  ):

AS: 100
Istock: 60
SS: 30
Alamy: 0
P5: 0

Did just sign up to DT so I'll report back if I feel like it was worth it.  Will prob slowly shove like 30% of my better images in there and see how it does.  Is Canva invite only or closed to new contributors?  Not sure that one's worth it but I can try a small batch and see.

As I wrote, the data is based on my all-time income. The picture has changed in recent years. But there were indeed good times for me at shutterstock. At the very beginning, 3 downloads per file per month on average was no problem at shutterstock.

In the past.

SS was a great earner and a clear #1 for me until 2018 or so. I expect most who have been at this for a long time either has IS or SS as their #1 all time.

Maybe for Europeans the Fotolia / AS combo is higher.