Photo Sharing: Reviews

Updated April 2009

Reviews of photo sharing services come mainly from enthusiasts, who help determine whether it's necessary to pay a subscription a fee, rather than use a free site. Reviews recommend trying out a site before committing so you can see how easy it is to upload and organize photos and so you can get an idea of how much storage space you'll need.

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Best photo-sharing website

SmugMug

*Est. $40 per year Learn More

SmugMug draws kudos from experts and users as the most powerful and feature-rich photo-sharing website. Pluses include unlimited photo storage and an array of customization features for your online photo albums. Privacy… expandand backup options are considered to be better than what's found at most competing sites. Print quality is generally excellent. Customer service is called very responsive. Reviews note that SmugMug is a top choice for professionals as well, with an excellent interface for selling images. However, even a basic SmugMug photo-sharing account is pricy compared to other photo-sharing services, and a Pro account (*est. $150 per year) is required to unleash all of the site's power. collapse

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Expert & User Review Sources:

FirstTube.com: This comparative review of eight photo-sharing services has the most objective and balanced analysis we found, rating each service on 15 pre-defined criteria.

Photography Bay: This review describes the type of user to whom each of seven photo-sharing services might appeal.

Zerokspot.com: This review highlights key differences between several photo-sharing services and describes SmugMug as the only "real alternative." A comparison chart at the bottom of the review is particularly handy.

PhotoSharingReviews.com: PhotoSharingReviews.com reviews and rates five photo sharing services and gives SmugMug the highest rating, appreciating its "feature-rich" service.

Lifehacker.com: This Australian website rounds up five online photo-sharing websites that the site's readers voted as the best.

TechnoFriends: Six photo-sharing websites, including SmugMug, are described.

PhotographyReview.com: Nearly 20 users weigh in on SmugMug, granting it an impressive score of 4.9 out of five stars.

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Best free photo sharing

Flickr

Free basic account Learn More

While experts aren't overly impressed with Flickr's paid Pro offering (*est. $25 per year), its free photo-sharing account draws praise as one of the best of the bunch. Like any free account, there are limitations; for… expandexample, you can only upload 100 MB of photos in any calendar month, only view the 200 most recent images uploaded and only access resized versions of your online photos (no more than 1,024 pixels along its longest edge). However, the free photo-sharing account, which is advertising supported, includes lots of features, such as inline captions and advanced tagging. Experts say there are good privacy options, as well as access to a large user community. Photo quality is also judged excellent. collapse

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Expert & User Review Sources:

FirstTube.com: FirstTube.com's comparative review of eight photo-sharing services provides an objective and balanced analysis, judging each service on 15 points.

Which? (UK): This report compares six photo-sharing services and deems Flickr best for organizing and categorizing photos.

PCMag.com: Flickr is called a "top-notch site for photo enthusiasts." An enthusiastic user community is among the positives mentioned; however, learning to use the site can be difficult.

Zerokspot.com: This article, written by an Austrian computer science student, looks at a number of photo-sharing services in an attempt to find a replacement for Flickr.

DownloadSquad.com: DownloadSquad.com compares Flickr to Photobucket and Zooomr.

Ben Co: Comparing Flickr and Picasa, this blog post explains that image quality is the most important factor in an online photo-sharing service.

Lifehacker.com: Flickr is among the five photo-sharing services that readers of the Australian website Lifehacker selected as the best in an online pole.

Free photo-sharing/photo-editing suite

Picasa Web Albums

Free basic account Learn More

Google's Picasa Web Albums earns praise for its simplicity and for the way it seamlessly meshes with free Picasa software for photo organization, editing and uploading. Features are sparse, however. For example, there are… expandno options for customized page layouts. You can limit who can view your online albums and remove the album from public searches, but you can't control who can download images. Online photo storage is capped at 1 GB, but additional storage can be purchased (*est. $20 per year for 10 GB). The lack of ads to clutter things up in free accounts is widely appreciated. We've seen some complaints that photo quality could be better. collapse

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Expert & User Review Sources:

FirstTube.com: This review of photo-sharing services provides objective and thorough analysis of eight websites, rating each on over a dozen performance standards.

PCMag.com: PCMag.com includes discussion of Picasa Web Albums in its review of the latest version of Picasa photo-editing software.

The New York Times: The New York Times' technology columnist David Pogue is on a mission to find an online photo service that even his mother can handle.

Lifehacker.com: Based on voting by its readership, the Australian site Lifehacker names the top five online photo-sharing services.

TechnoFriends: This blog entry names the best photo sharing websites according to its author.

Picasa.com

Photobucket Free basic account

4 picks by top review sites.

MyPhotoAlbum *Est. $20 per year

3 picks by top review sites.

Snapfish Free

2 picks by top review sites.

Fotki Free basic account

2 picks by top review sites.