Which Agency Has The Largest Stock Video Media Library

When making a video project, size of available stock footage database is very crucial. If working from a small port, you sometimes can’t find suitable media. That means you’ll need to search from more different stock agencies to finish the project. Buying from several agencies has its own problems. Different licenses, prices, and packages. If you are a huge company and need stock footage more often it would be more logical to use an agency that has as many different clips as it can. Agencies that offer exclusivity maybe have more unique footage, but you might run into a problem that they are missing a variety of them. For example, iStockphoto/Getty Images agency which has a tiny port of great exclusive stock footage, but you’ll still have to buy more or less variety of footage from other agencies. Even Dissolve has the same problem. That is because many artists don’t upload their ports to such agencies because of various reasons.

Stock Footage of Business Skyscraper Under Storm Clouds Time Lapse

But, which popular stock video agency has the most video clips available?

⇒ Pond5 8,526,000

There are few reasons why Pond5 is a great choice for buyers of stock footage. They also have the biggest database of stock footage and many contributors use collections to match theme related footage. That way it is easier to find suitable footage from a related shooting set. Prices are set by contributors themselves.

⇒ Shutterstock 8,035,000

Also, a big player in stock footage industry is Shutterstock agency. They have a bit more narrow view on more artistic stock themes, that is why you rarely see something out of the box in their collections. They are so strict on sharpness, noise, and right composition that many contributors don’t upload some non-standard stock footage.

⇒ Fotolia 4,421,000

Fotolia and Adobe are now almost identical agencies because Adobe bought Fotolia and almost everything now syncs together. But still, Fotolia somehow has more footage than Adobe. They aren’t such a huge player in video, but the footage is included in Adobe production tools. They are also very strict on sharpness, noise, composition and “commercial value” that is why many themes or a variety of similar clips won’t be seen on Fotolia or Adobe.

⇒ Adobe 4,188,861

Same as Fotolia, contributors uploading via one system automatically sells the stock footage on other too.

⇒ Depositphotos 2,782,000

Another even lower end stock footage agency is Depositphotos. They don’t have so big of a stock footage port but could suit some needs.

⇒ Dissolve 1,218,000

This agency is one of the newest and it has only a million of available clips. They are supposedly more open to creative works, but they still lack the variety of database. Many contributors avoid them for being too aggressive with their price plans, which are dropped lower if contributor sells the same stock footage on other agencies with lower price tiers.

There is no data about the number of stock footage available on iStockphoto/Getty Images, Videoblocks or 123RF.