Despite the adage to not judge a book by its cover, the truth is that readers do judge book cover images when determining what they might want to read next. Without book cover art that stands out from the rest of the books on a shelf (virtual or otherwise), your book is much less likely to garner attention or readers.
Whether you’re a designer creating book covers for self-published authors or an author who wants to try their hand at designing their own book cover art, finding good images to work with is key. Stock photo sites are an affordable way to find images that work well for book covers without spending thousands of dollars on custom images or illustrations.
In this article about where to find book cover images, we’ll cover:
Why are high-quality book cover images important?
As already mentioned, readers judge books by their covers all the time, if for no other reason than it’s efficient! When a reader is looking for their next read, they likely don’t have time to read the back cover blurbs for every book on the shelf. Instead, they browse the shelves looking for book cover images that grab their attention and entice them to read more. If your cover doesn’t stand out, they’re much more likely to overlook it in favor of catchier covers.
While the overall design of the cover is important, the book cover image is often the thing that stands out most on the cover and draws the reader’s eye. You have to start with a high-quality image for your book cover art or you’re wasting time and resources.
Where are the best places to find book cover images?
There are a few options for finding the best book cover images. Stock photo sites, like the ones below, are often the most affordable way to find the perfect book cover image. Other options include hiring an artist to create a custom cover image or taking the perfect photo yourself. The downside to these latter options is that it’s often more expensive to create entirely custom images. And it’s almost certainly more time-consuming.
Another option is to create book cover art using AI tools, but there are downsides there, too. First, AI images can’t be copyrighted without major modification by a human. That means your “perfect” image could be used on a competing book in the future without any real recourse (the same can happen with stock photos, to be fair). The other downside is that many readers and other authors are pushing back against the use of generative AI, so you’ll want to weigh the pros and cons carefully.
The Best Free Photo Sites for Book Cover Images
Free stock photo sites are often the first stop for authors and designers looking for great book cover images. Most of these sites have favorable licensing terms and a wide variety of images available. The upside is obvious: the images are free to use. But there are downsides, namely that since the images are freely available to anyone for almost any purpose, your book cover art might not be as unique as you’d like without major modifications.
Pexels
Pexels is a long-time favorite among designers looking for free stock images to use in their designs. In addition to a standard search feature, they also offer multiple ways to browse photos, including by collection. The collections page includes popular collections, a curated “recommended for you” section, and even a section for discovering photos by color (although the colors included are pretty minimal—red, blue, green, yellow, white, and black).
Pexels licensing is very flexible, too. Images are free to use without attribution, with only a handful of restrictions on how they can be used (none of which would be likely to affect their use on a book cover). Check out their plain-English licensing terms for more details.
Pixabay
Pixabay is another popular free photo site among designers. You can find photos by searching for particular subject matter or browsing curated collections, editor’s choice photos, or popular photos. In addition to photos, they also offer illustrations and vector images to choose from. This opens up a world of possibilities for authors and designers to create unique book cover images.
Pixabay’s licensing terms specifically include provisions for using their images on book covers, with or without heavy modifications.
PosterMyWall
If you’re looking for a site with free stock images for your book cover art but want a one-stop shop for creating your ebook cover, then check out PosterMyWall’s collection of over 7,000 book cover templates. You can easily modify the covers with additional stock images via their built-in stock image search (with both free and paid images available). While using PosterMyWall is free, there are premium plans available with additional features.
PosterMyWall’s licensing terms are a bit ambiguous (they’re aimed more at those uploading designs to the site, rather than those creating designs with their app), so you might want to consult with a lawyer before using their designs or images on your book cover.
Book Cover Art with the Best Licensing Agreements
While all of the sites in this list offer favorable licensing terms for use as book cover art, some sites have more restrictions than others. The site included here, though, has some of the least restrictive licensing terms out there, with both free and premium images available.
Unsplash
Unsplash is one of the most popular free photo sites for a reason: they have an incredible selection of free stock photos covering a wide range of subject matter. Because photos are uploaded from a huge community of photographers, there’s a ton of diversity when it comes to style, subject, and quality. User-created collections are a great way to narrow down your options since the number of results returned on basic searches can be overwhelming.
Another reason for their popularity that often goes overlooked, though: their licensing is among the most flexible licenses out there. Basically, you can use their photos for anything you want, with the exceptions of reselling photos without modification or using photos to recreate their service.
Most Unsplash images are free to download and use, though they’ve recently added a paid option: Unsplash+, which offers additional images for just $7/month if paid yearly ($20/month if you pay monthly).
Sources for Diverse Book Cover Images
A decade or so ago, finding stock photos that weren’t of able-bodied white people was challenging. Especially if you didn’t want to use book cover images of BIPOC or disabled people in stereotypical (and often borderline-offensive) settings.Thankfully, that’s changed dramatically in the last few years and there are plenty of stock photo sites that offer diverse, well-rounded images of people from a wide variety of backgrounds and cultures. Here are two of the best:
Tonl
Tonl offers culturally diverse stock photos that “represent the true world we live in.” The available images on Tonl’s site also include a diverse representation of body types and abilities, making it a gold mine for authors who feature characters who aren’t typically depicted on stock photo sites.
One unique way to browse the photos on Tonl’s site is to use their Narratives section. The images in each collection here tell a story accompanied by text. Narratives include titles like “Tribesgiving: The Friends We Choose,” “Here’s The Scoop: Community Impact Through Ice Cream,” and “Black Men Do Yoga: Yoga and Accessibility for Black Men.”
Tonl’s photos aren’t free, but they have monthly subscription plans starting at $29/month (which includes 15 images). You can also purchase photos individually, though the prices are steep: $50 for editorial use or $500 for commercial use.
Pocstock
Pocstock features diverse images of people of color from a wide variety of backgrounds and walks of life. Collections include “South Asian Heritage,” “May is for Mothers,” and “Mental Health,” among others. Pocstock includes over 240,000 photos, illustrations, and videos.
Pocstock pricing for images suitable for book covers starts at $150/image if you purchase in bulk (minimum of 3 images), or at $225 if you purchase individually. Lower-resolution images are less expensive. Be sure to verify the licensing for the images you choose, as some of Pocstock’s images are only licensed for editorial use. You can read more about their license terms on the site.
The Best Paid Book Cover Art Sources
While free book cover images are great, sometimes you just can’t find what you need among the free stock image sites. The sites below are just a few of the best paid book cover art sources out there. They’re still royalty-free, though (since you pay one time or in a subscription rather than having to pay each time the image is used).
Envato Elements
Envato Elements is a subscription service that offers stock photos among other creative assets. For designers or authors who want access to more than just book cover images, Elements is an excellent choice, since it also includes stock videos (perfect for book trailers), music, graphics, sound effects, fonts, presentation templates, and much more.
One of my favorite features of Envato Elements, though, is their search-by-color function. While many sites allow you to browse by color, Envato Elements lets you search with multiple colors. Just click on each color you want the image to include and you’ll get a new set of results. This is an excellent function if you’re looking for a very particular emotion or vibe from your cover that you want to convey through the use of color.
Envato’s licensing terms are favorable, particularly their system of “registering” each use so that even if you unsubscribe there’s a paper trail that shows you purchased the assets you’re using. Pricing is reasonable, too: an individual plan is just $16.50/month with team plans starting at $37.25/month for three team members.
Adobe Stock
Adobe Stock is one of the better-known paid stock photo options out there and is an excellent choice for finding book cover art. They offer photos, illustrations, vectors, videos, and more. Book cover images can be found via search, or by browsing popular categories or collections. Adobe Stock is also diligent about indicating if images in their collection are created using generative AI, which is a big plus considering the influx of AI images in recent months on many stock image sites.
Adobe Stock offers both monthly subscription packages and credit bundles for purchasing their images. Monthly subscriptions start at $29.99 for 10 standard assets or one HD video. Credit bundles can be purchased starting at $49.95 for 5 credits (which is enough for 5 standard assets). Their licensing terms are favorable for self-published authors, with a standard license covering up to 500,000 copies of your book being produced (an extended license will cover you beyond that).
Élevae
Élevae (formerly known as Social Squares) is a stock photo site that originally focused on images appropriate for social media but has since branched out to be a more general stock photography site. If you’re looking for book cover images that are sophisticated, elegant, and understated, then Élevae is a great starting point. Their images are geared more toward lifestyle brands, with categories for travel, lifestyle, tech mockups, women working, and interiors.
Élevae offers a free trial where you get 20 images sent to you, with paid plans starting at $149/quarter or $499/year. They also offer a “Curation Concierge” service for $497 that can help you put together a cohesive visual language for your author brand. This is a great option for authors who have limited budgets but need a little branding help. One thing to be aware of is that Élevae’s images aren’t huge: their vertical images are 1200x1800px, which means that larger book cover images might not be suitable without modification.
The Most Unique Sources for Book Cover Art
Years ago, stock photo sites all had very similar (often boring) images that were only suitable for a narrow range of uses. While that has changed drastically in recent years, mainstream image sites are still somewhat limited. The sites below, though, are filled with unique images, from whimsical and off-the-wall art to historical images perfect for books focused on the past.
Gratisography
Gratisography has been around for years and I’m always surprised by how many designers aren’t familiar with it. The images they offer are funkier and more whimsical than many other stock sites, so if you’re looking for something different for your book cover art, they’re an awesome place to start. Besides photos, they also offer vector images. You can browse collections or search images, and they offer related images on each individual photo page.
Gratisography offers images for free, with favorable licensing terms that allow you to use their images pretty much anywhere, without attribution.
Life of Pix
Life of Pix is another often-overlooked stock photo site that offers unique images you won’t find elsewhere. You can search or browse by collection (including subjects like nature, city, objects, animals, desks, architecture, and more). They also have a featured “Photographer of the Week,” which can be a great way to discover different ideas or subject matter for your book cover images.
The images on Life of Pix are free to use with favorable licensing terms for authors, allowing you to use any images on the site commercially without attribution.
Flickr Commons
If you’re looking for historical images for your book cover art, then Flickr Commons is an amazing resource. They partner with cultural institutions around the world to provide images of historical significance that are generally no longer covered by copyright law (double-check the terms on any image you want to use). You can search for photos or browse by member institution to find what you want.
Since virtually all of their images are no longer covered by copyright, you can use them for your book cover images without worrying about licensing terms.
A Word About Licensing Stock Images
Wherever possible in the listings above, I’ve linked to the licensing terms for each site. You might wonder why appropriate licensing is so important. Just as you wouldn’t want someone copying and distributing all or part of your copyrighted book without permission (and/or payment!), photographers and artists feel the same way. Some have opted to distribute their images for free, while others upload to paid sites to generate additional income.
Whether you use images from the sites above or go a different direction, be sure to check the licensing terms for any image you want to use to be sure that it’s acceptable for use in book cover art. In some cases, you might need to purchase an extended license—better to know that upfront than to get a surprise down the road when your book becomes a success and suddenly you get a legal letter demanding additional payment.
Final Thoughts
When seeking the perfect book cover images, it’s important to explore all of your options. Stock photo sites are a great place to start for both designers and self-published authors.
Most of these sites let you create collections or add images to your favorites, which is a great way to keep track of images you’ve liked without having to make multiple purchases. You can also often download watermarked images for creating mockups, which means you can test out different images before purchasing your final choice.
Adding filters, creating composites of multiple images, or otherwise customizing them to suit your needs will help set your book apart, even if another author uses the same image for their book. If you’re an author who doesn’t have design skills, partnering up with an experienced book designer will ensure you end up with a book cover you love (and one that readers love, too!).
