Did you know that you can make some extra money by selling the photos you take with your smartphone? It’s true!
Gone are the days when only professional photographers with expensive equipment could profit from the photos they take. Today, anyone with a good smartphone camera can make some extra income from their mobile photos.
Best of all, it’s not that complicated at all. You can do everything right from your mobile phone. These days, there are several apps that allow you to take photos and upload them from your smartphone directly to their marketplace where they can be sold to businesses and individuals.
If you’re looking to make some money with your smartphone photos, here are five apps you may want to consider.
Note: If you’re looking for other ways to make money online from your mobile photos other than using apps, check out these alternatives.
1. FOAP
Foap is a popular free-to-download app that gives you a platform to sell your smartphone pictures and videos. It’s a legitimate way to make extra money, and it’s simple enough for even an amateur to use. It’s available on Android and iOS, so anyone can get in on the action.
There’s an entire post with a complete breakdown of Foap but, briefly, this service acts as the middleman in selling your photos. Brands, agencies and businesses of all sorts are always searching for images to use commercially. When a business finds your picture and they like it, they can buy it and you get a cut from the sale.
This app is super simple to use! Once you’ve downloaded it and registered, you can upload the pictures you want to sell directly from your phone. You don’t have to visit any website! Just click on the camera icon in the app and you’ll be able to select which picture to upload from your phone.
How do you make money on Foap?
There are two ways in which you can make money on Foap:
Marketplace. When a buyer is searching for pictures to buy, this is where they’ll be looking. When someone buys your photo, the money is split 50/50, where each photo is sold for $10 and you get $5. You retain ownership of your photographs so you can sell the same image multiple times to different buyers, even on other platforms.
Missions. These contests are open to all photographers to submit a photo that satisfies a specific brief provided by a company. The winning photo chosen by the company can receive up to $100USD or more. Each mission is different, therefore it’ll have its own requirements, reward amount, and copyright stipulations.
Payouts are made through PayPal.
General thoughts
The app is free and easy to use. It has a large and helpful community that can provide valuable feedback. The Missions mean exposure to big brand companies and high payout potential, which is great.
But because Foap is accessible to anyone, there’s a lot of competition. This could make it harder for your pictures to be noticed, especially if you’re a beginner. If you think you can just take one photo and sit back while the money rolls in you’ll be sorely disappointed.
2. SNAPWIRE
Snapwire is among the top apps that allow you to sell your mobile photos. It’s free to download from the Play Store and also on Apple Store. Unlike with Foap, Snapwire appears to be geared more towards people who more or less know what they’re doing. Amateur photographers may struggle to find exposure on this platform.
This mobile app provides a platform where a photographer stands a chance to have their smartphone photographs purchased by an individual such as a blogger or a big brand company.
After downloading the app, you’ll go through a sign-up process where you can sign-up using your Facebook or email account. As soon as you’ve completed the rest of the registration process, you can start uploading your pictures into your portfolio or entering contests. What’s great about Snapwire is that you can upload your pictures via their website, too.
How do you make money on Snapwire?
There are 7 ranks you can achieve on Snapwire. The higher you rank, the more opportunities you have to make money. So, it’s very important that you upload only your best work because the site monitors the pictures you upload to see if they have enough value to level you up the ranks.
The biggest way to make money on Snapwire is by entering a challenge. That’s basically what Snapwire is known for. When a person or business is in search of a certain type of photo, they will post a request or challenge.
This challenge is open to all interested photographers and contains details of exactly what the buyer wants, how much the prize money is, and for how long the challenge will remain running.
The money that can be made from these challenges varies from one challenge to another. But no matter how much the prize money for the challenge is, you get to keep 70% of it.
As the content creator, you get to keep the copyright of your work. When someone buys your image, you’re simply giving them a licence to use your photo. They can’t sell or licence your work to someone else.
Another way you can make money on this platform is by building a portfolio, which then becomes available on the Snapwire marketplace. A portfolio with really high-quality images will help you earn points and rank you higher.
Not only will you make more sales in the marketplace if you rank highly, but you could also get commissioned directly by buyers. Unlike with the challenges, you only get to keep 50% of whatever you make selling directly to buyers.
Payments are made through PayPal and Stripe.
General thoughts…
This is a good app to use if you’re a confident photographer and you have great skills because not only is there a lot of competition on this app, it is fierce. It’s an absolutely legitimate way to pocket some extra money but you need to bring your A-game.
Alternatively, you could use the app as a hobby. You could enter the challenges just as a way to help you improve your photography. Practice makes perfect. Who knows, with time, one of your photos could attract a buyer.
3. EyeEm
EyeEm is a great mix between a photo-sharing social app with an incredible community and a marketplace where you can sell your photographs. You can get it for free on both Android and iOS. Whether you’re professional or amateur, you’re welcome and respected on EyeEm. It connects you with a huge community of photographers.
You can sign up on EyeEm (using social media or email) as an individual or a business via the app or website. From there it’s a simple process to upload your photos and start selling. However, before your images can go into the market, they go through a review process.
Once your picture is approved, you can sit back and wait for the sales to come in. There’s no guarantee of when your image will sell and how many times it will sell. But to increase your chances of making money on the market, I advise that you constantly keep uploading quality photos.
You and EyeEm split the revenue of your sales 50/50. Payment is made via PayPal and can take up to 7 business days for it to arrive in your account. You retain the copyright of your image and make money every time it sells.
How do you make money on EyeEm?
As already mentioned, you receive 50% of the money you make from selling a photo. The amount of money your photo sells for depends on the type of licence the buyer chooses to purchase.
Here are the licence options and their cost:
Social licence = $20 per photo
Web licence= $50 per photo
Full Commercial licence = $250 per photo
EyeEm also has something called Partner Collection. If your image or images make it to this collection, they will also be featured on partner sites such as Getty Images. There’s no telling how much your images will sell for on these third-party sites. The price is set by the partner site.
But even then, images from these sites are often bought through subscriptions or high volume packages. This means you probably won’t be making as much money through third-party as you would on EyeEm.
General thoughts…
If you’re looking for a great photography community, then look no further than EyeEm. It’s a fantastic place for photographers to connect with each other and get discovered by some big brands. I like that they also allow you to keep the copyright for your work. And being able to make money over and over for the same picture is pretty cool.
The 50/50 split may seem steep, but that’s almost standard practice across the board. The photo upload review process can take a while, depending on the photo. Also, waiting up to seven business days for payment seems a bit long.
4. miPic
Similar to the other services above, miPic is an app that allows sellers to make some legit extra cash. The difference with miPic is that it’s a print-on-demand app that allows you to print and sell your photos on various products. That’s pretty awesome!
It’s basically a custom print platform that allows photographers to turn their photos into some real money. No need to worry about manufacturing and delivery. They’ll take care of it.
Unfortunately, the app is only available on iOS at the moment, but there’s also a web version for non-iPhone users.
To get started with miPic is very easy. All you have to do is download the app (or visit their website) and create an account. Once you add your PayPal details, you’re good to go.
You can choose which products you want to sell, and promote them to your friends and followers on social media, blog, or elsewhere online. You can earn up to 20% commission on every product you sell.
When someone searches or browses through the miPic website and finds your photos, they can click on the image and see which products your photo can be printed on. Once they’ve selected the product they like, they make payment and you make money.
miPic will take care of the stock and manufacturing costs, so you, the photographer, need only concern yourself with uploading great images. They also handle delivery and customer service.
How do you get paid on miPic?
When an item has been purchased, it is manufactured and then shipped to wherever in the world it needs to go. The owner of the image will earn up to 20% in commission of the sale.
Remember, a single image can be printed on multiple products of varying cost so it is difficult to say how much you could earn from each sale. However, the more items with the photo you sell, the more money you stand to make.
Some of the products miPic prints on include:
- Framed Prints
- Pillows
- Phone cases
- Wallpaper
- T-Shirts
- Canvas
- Flip-flops
- and more
Whatever money you make, miPic pays it into your PayPal account.
General thoughts…
miPic is a very different way of making money with your photos compared to the other apps. They have a very wide variety of products you can print on, and their quality is pretty good.
A 20% commission is not too bad, and considering the number of products you can print on, you stand to make good money, even with just one really good picture. You can also privately print your own photos without putting them up for sale.
My only issue with miPic is that you might need to have a really substantial online presence and following for you to make serious money with this app. If you promote your products to your followers on social media, that will definitely help your sales. If you have no audience, the chances of making a lot of money are slim.
Alternatively, you can ensure your visibility on miPic by tagging your images with good keywords that will make your pictures come up in searches. Even then, your photos have to be really amazing because competition can be tough.
5. Fotomoto
To be honest, Fotomoto doesn’t really belong on this list because it’s not technically an app, it’s a widget. By just adding a few lines of code to your photography blog, Fotomoto will add a “buy” button to the pictures on your site, thus turning your ordinary blog into an e-commerce site without driving traffic away.
What’s really cool is the fact that you can choose to have your photographs printed on a number of different products. They’ll take care of everything without you having to lift a finger or pay a cent!
Although technically not an app for your mobile phone, you can still use your smartphone to take photos of whatever you like and upload them to your blog. Whoever visits your blog will then have the option to buy your smartphone photography work.
How does Fotomoto work?
For starters, you need to have a blog or website where you upload your own photos. If you don’t already have one, then you should consider doing so. It’s inexpensive (sometimes free) to start one and it can be a great source of extra income.
To add the Fotomoto service to your blog or website, you first need to set up an account with them on their website. You can open a FREE account, however, two other levels of paid accounts are available with added benefits.
From here you’ll select the type of merchandise you’d like your photos to be printed on and how much you’d like them to sell for. You can also specify pictures you don’t own or have the rights to sell as not for sale.
Once you’ve set everything up, all you have to do is add a line of javascript code that they provide you to your blog (it’s really easy), and “Buy” buttons will appear on your images.
When someone buys something from your blog, you’ll get notified via email. You can choose to either fulfil the order yourself or let Fotomoto take care of EVERYTHING for you, which I think is a great option to have especially when you receive large amounts of orders.
All the profit you make is deposited directly into your account.
How do you make money?
You make money on Fotomoto based on the type of product you wish to print your images on. At the time of this writing, the Fotomoto product choices are:
- Premium prints
- Canvas prints
- Fine art prints
- Metal prints
- Acrylic prints
- Greeting cards
- Digital download
- Wall peels
- Print frames
- Custom calenders
How much you make in profit from the sale of any of your images really depends on you. You set your own profit margins.
General thoughts
There’s a lot to like about Fotomoto. The fact that you can select your profit margin is a big seller. There is a wide variety of products that your images can be printed on, and it seems to be expanding.
The sheer simplicity of it and how it easily integrates with a very large number of sites (WordPress, Wix, Tumblr, Blogger, HTML, etc.), makes it easy for anyone to sell their work from their site, no matter the platform.
But, as much as I like Fotomoto, I have to admit: it’s tough to crack, especially if you’re a newbie. The main reason is that unlike other photo selling apps and sites, Fotomoto has no app or website for people to search from.
This means that in order for you to make a decent amount of money from Fotomoto, not only do you have to have a blog with your own images on it, you have to have a large enough audience and following for you to see impressive amounts of cash flowing into your account.
Conclusion
Now, can you make enough money on these apps to quit your job? Chances are most likely not, but you could make a decent amount of side money.
And even if you don’t make a great amount of money from these apps, participating in the contests and missions that some of these platforms provides is a great way to practice your smartphone photography and sharpen your skills. Who knows, one day the money might start rolling in.
The secret to getting noticed on these platforms is to learn and truly master the art of taking pictures with your smartphone. That way, you can get the most out of your mobile camera and capture amazing mobile photos that could earn you some money.
If you are a novice at taking photos with your smartphone and would like to improve your mobile photography skills, then I recommend you download my free ebook which will teach you how to do just that. It’s very informative yet simple and easy to understand. You can get your FREE copy here.
This article first appeared on my other blog thesmartphonephotographer.com. Check it out!