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Dreamstime Reviews Summary
Dreamstime has a rating of 3.7 stars from 1,260 reviews, indicating that most customers are generally satisfied with their purchases. Reviewers satisfied with Dreamstime most frequently mention great selection, high quality and many years. Dreamstime ranks 2nd among Stock Photos sites.
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I wanted to try Dreamstime, so I signed up for the trial, which offered several free downloads. However, when I tried to download anything, it said I had to upgrade to a "pay immediately" plan ($25) in order to download any pictures without watermarks! Scam!
Update: I canceled the "free trial" within hours of signing up. The trial period was supposed to be a week, so canceling the same day should have avoided the subscription fee. However, the next day, I received an alert that Dreamstime had tried to charge my credit card for a month's subscription fee! Fortunately, I had used Privacy.com to generate a card number and had closed the number the same time I canceled the subscription, so Dreamstime was not able to steal my money. But wow, even more of a scam than I had thought!
Dreamstime is contacting businesses with claims of license infringement for images that have been legally obtained from other stock image sites. This company is unethical in trying to scare businesses into paying them for images they already paid for from other stock photo sites.
Thank you for your feedback! A reply was provided within hours of your email. Dreamstime represents the portfolios of approx.900,000 worldwide contributors and we usually check image usage and licenses. If your images were licensed elsewhere, then this is perfectly acceptable. In order for us to close these cases, we may require license proof. Please reply to the emails, our colleagues from Infringements will surely assist you!
They advertised free download and payment info after submitting all. I get is Blurry images with watermark. I immediately unsubscribed. How can I get charged after I unsubscribe. I never got even a single email from them from past 5 months for the invoices or for anything else... only to realize that they have been charging me $34 every month. Now that I want to unsubscribe their website says if unsubscribe I will loose the 84downloads which I got charged for past months. Or there is a pause option, but if I pause the subscription then too I cant use the downloads.
Thank you for your review.
Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed. This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content.
Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
I don't use this service now. Because when I registered and added the card number, Dreamstime immediately stole money from my card. I am not interested in cooperating with scammers like the site Dreamstime. This site Dreamstime steals money from your bank card.
Thank you for your review.
Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed. This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content.
Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
They have lots of images, but the ordering system and the relentless marketing system is painful at best. I would describe as slimey. The pressure is to sign up on a subscription, they post it all to look good, but it was completely useless. Non of the images I tried to use were allowed to be used for business under copywrite. Upon asking help desk they hardly knew themselves. Unclear help, unclear copywrite rules and a waste of my money. Money spent = nothing useful in return. And they dare to keep asking me for more money. Not happy.
Thank you for your review.
Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed. This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content.
Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
Total garbage. Even behind the paywall, all the images are watermarked. What's the point of purchasing an image, if it has their name and logo plastered all over it. Totally useless! I'm all for paying artists their fair share for creative works, but this website is a complete bait-and-switch.
Thank you for your review.
Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed. This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content.
Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
I agree with the poor reviews here. Ridiculous that they get your payment information and give you NOTHING in return. There is NO free trial, be sure of that! I canceled and will never use them again. Deposit Photos is much better and really has a one-week trial with a few downloads available during that time.
Thank you for your review. Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed.
This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes. We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content. Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
They employ misleading tactics to sign you up for a free trial, and only after you've sunk time into image sourcing is it revealed that watermarks aren't removed unless you upgrade
Thank you for your review. Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed.
This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes. We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price.
Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content. Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
Like my title says they advertise their images as free, they take your email address then get hit with the pay wall. All complete bull$#*!.
Thank you for your review. Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed.
This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content. Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
Excepted my money and I got no video. Stay away from them, there are a lot better out there. Very disappointing. Companies like this should not be allowed to continue.
Hi Adrian.
Could you please send a mail to office (@) dreamstime.com describing the problem you encountered?
I utilize Dreamstime for all kinds of different photographs. If they don't have a photograph of it, it might not exist! Looking for pictures of Ferris Wheels? They've got over 1400 of them. Kids playing with Legos? Try 248 photos. I work for a Lab, and I wanted some pictures of beakers. 3200 pictures of BEAKERS! They even have 7 photos of staplers. You need not go anywhere else but Dreamstime.
Thank you for your review!
Advertise images as free. But when you go to download them they tell you you need to subscribe and pay a monthly fee for the "free images". Obviously something is not free if you have to pay for it.
Purchased the so called "free trial," but what they don't tell you (until you have joined) is that the images you get for free are watermarked. I've read the lame excuse they give to others about this. A honest company would give you the details of what you are getting before you sign up.
Jason Fischer on behalf of Dreamstime contacted us claiming the invoice for finding a photo they have.
We already explained that we bought it from another photography supplier and we had the invoice.
Still, he has been bothering us for months.
What right do they have to continue to harass us when that same photograph is being sold by another provider?
It says free image on the search and on the webpage but even after you put in your credit card details (WARNING: you have to sign up to a one-week free trial to get the image), and then the image you get is watermarked. What was the point in signing up? I can get that from a google search. Waste of time and effort. Should not be legal to promote a free image when you have to put in credit card details for it.
Thank you for your review. Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed.
This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content. Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
An ethical company. Contacted them that I did not want to subscribe for the second month - despite the fact it was set as automatic renew as a basic set-up and I have not changed it simply because I have not seen that. Other than that there are a great selection of photos available. Satisfied with the service.
Watch out for free trial. There is language that is meant to confuse and they Will charge you immed.
Thank you for your review. Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed.
This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes. We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price.
Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content. Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
Scammy trash thieves. Will only allow downloads with watermark... AFTER signing up for paid account. Total waste of time
Thank you for your review. Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed.
This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content. Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.
I have been using Dreamstime as the primary stock subscription site for my small business for over a decade, and am very satisfied with the service. The functionality which allows me to search by date, search within results, and add favourite contributors is extremely helpful, and why I chose this service over similar RF sites I have used such as 123RF, Deposit Photos, etc.
However, there are QA issues related to lack of adequate oversight on how the photographers tag their images. Sometimes the haystack is far, far too large for users to find their needles because a) contributors to the site do not tag the ethnicity of the models when the models are Caucasian, making it impossible to weed those results out when searching for ethnically diverse assets or b) contributors include unrelated tags and c) Digital illustrations are tagged as editable vector files when there is no vector format of the image available. Any one of the three can result in search results including unrelated images--even on the first page of search results sorted by 'most relevant' (see attachments).
The first is unfortunately up to the form fields on the contributions themselves, and more importantly, of the contribution vetting process. If contributors are allowed to either skip tags or add unrelated tags, those tags need to be reviewed before the assets are available for purchase. The second should be an easy fix, only allowing the tag to be applied if an AI or EPS file is the primary asset being submitted. Also, Corel Draw is not supported by most graphics software and contributors who submit CDR files need to re-submit in EPS or similar vector format.
As a designer, this site has long been the best value for the price, with a huge global contributor base offering images that are often only available from the service. The quarterly subscription fees are excellent, and I have found customer service to be exemplary over the years.
My only notes aside from the tagging issues I've mentioned above is that occasionally when attempting to download lightboxes, the servers time out repeatedly.
Thank you dreamstime... Thank you dreamstime...
Thank you dreamstime...
Thank you dreamstime...
I am so happy joint with dreamstime..
Had deactivated the account but still money got deducted and they didn't refund. Admitted technical glitch at their end and still did nothing about it. Lost money for no fault of mine.
Customer service representatives are arrogant, rude and adamant at just pushing their point. In short, useless.
Hi A,
Please send a mail to office (@)dreastime.com describing the issue you encountered.
From the business
Find the perfect stock photos, images and vectors for your project. Quickly search over 260 million images including free and public domain images.
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- Sitejabber’s sole mission is to increase online transparency for buyers and businesses
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- Suspicious reviews are flagged by our algorithms, moderators, and community members
Thank you for your review.
Our site provides access to a free trial plan for premium images that allows you to download free high-res comp images and after you upgrade your plan the images will have their watermark removed. This is a trial plan and comp images are the norm in the stock photography industry for test purposes.
We also provide a free section, https://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos where you can download a certain number of images for free or upgrade for unlimited downloads (over 1 million) at a very low monthly price. Since our website caters the largest community in the world we simply cannot provide all content for free, because we have to pay the bandwidth costs and, most importantly, the photographers who create and upload the content.
Thank you for your patronage, please email us if you need extra information about the above or about our discounts.