Free stock media has got good enough that many projects never need a paid library. The catch is that “free” covers several different licences, and the details matter once a client is paying.

Every library below says it can be used commercially, but terms change and individual files can carry their own conditions. Read the licence page of the site you download from, and keep a note of where each file came from.

Photographs

Unsplash and Pexels cover most everyday needs; Pixabay adds illustrations and vectors. Openverse searches openly licensed images across many collections at once, which helps when you need something specific, but check each result’s licence, since some ask for a credit.

Video

Short clips for a background, a transition or a hero loop. Coverr is made for website backgrounds; Mixkit and Pexels have larger general libraries.

Music

Music is where licences differ most. Some tracks are free for anything, some ask for a credit in the description, and some platforms limit where a track can be used. Free Music Archive lists the licence on every track; Uppbeat and Bensound have free tiers with conditions, and paid plans that lift them.

The habit

Keep a small text file in each project listing every file you used, the page it came from and its licence. It takes a minute per file and answers every question a client or a platform can ask later.