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Why Adobe Stock reject good photos?

Community Beginner ,
Mar 25, 2025 Mar 25, 2025

I retouched a series of photos according to Adobe Stock guidelines, minimal sharpness, denoising, removing chromatic aberration, colour correction... everything a little bit like in their instructions. + minimalist shots with free space, and they still rejected these photos (quality problem) (50 pieces). Is it because they were taken with a Canon 600D which has worse quality and sharpness? I have a lot of photos and I want to upload them before I switch to a Sony mirrorless camera for good, but I'm worried that I'll do the work on Sony and they'll reject everything too. And I think they're really PRO

I was surprised today when Alamy accepted these photos that Adobe Stock rejected. Here they are:

https://www.alamy.com/portfolio/1498908.html

What's wrong with them for Adobe?

and at the same time Adobe accepted one of my worst photo with huge chromatic aberration and a terrible shot:

https://stock.adobe.com/pl/images/wooden-obstacle-course-with-hanging-red-wheels-in-public-park/1305...

and at the same time Adobe accepts AI upscaled images with artifacts in the details

I wanted to create Pro portfolio on Adobe but it looks that like they deliberately don't want to accept the best photos

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Contributors , Troubleshooting
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Explorer ,
Mar 25, 2025 Mar 25, 2025

Wait and see how often the photos are downloaded on Alamy, then you will have answered your question. No offence meant but I also had to learn all this painfully first. 

Look how many people are complaining here in the forum that their photos are not being accepted. Then the same people complain that they have managed to get more of their photos accepted, but unfortunately they are not making any sales. It's a long learning process. It's best to see for yourself if you can find such a photo on Adobe and whether you would buy it as a customer. That answers a lot of questions. 
The negative example you found on adobe already answers the question of whether a customer would buy it. Probably not, although it was accepted by adobe for whatever reason

 

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Community Beginner ,
Mar 25, 2025 Mar 25, 2025

I have been a graphic designer for 7 years, I have prepared many files for printing and projects from small leaflets to large banners and I have had various clients from a regular service environment and for me I see no problem with this type of photos, I have seen many prints on products and I know what is able to pass in printing.

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Community Beginner ,
Mar 25, 2025 Mar 25, 2025

If it were like you write about the quality, I wouldn't see many complaints and grievances on reddit from graphic designers. I've seen a lot of frustration that they download a photo and it turns out it's poor quality in detail, or they download a photo and it turns out it's AI, or they download an AI image and only after downloading it they can see that the image was upscaled and has artifacts, which is exactly the absurdity of why Adobe accepts opscaled pictures 5000px AI images whose actual size is 2000px, only a graphic designer understands that in print it will come out terribly low quality.

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Community Beginner ,
Mar 25, 2025 Mar 25, 2025

from all the frustrations I've seen from graphic designers, In my opinion it's only a matter of a year or two before agencies and graphic designers start filing mass complaints about AI images on Adobe stock that have been upscaled

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Community Expert ,
Mar 25, 2025 Mar 25, 2025

I upscale from 1024x up to between 6000-7200 ppi. on the longest side. Never had a rejection due to noise or artifacts. When I get them, I don't submit them. There is a vast difference between enlarging an image and upscaling one, and there are upscalers that do a great job and upscalers that aren't worth the time. I've been a graphic designer for 35 years.

daniellei4510 | Community Forum Volunteer | I am my cat's emotional support animal.
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Community Expert ,
Mar 25, 2025 Mar 25, 2025

What Adobe and Fotolia accepted in the past has no relevance today.  That was then, this is now.

 

Adobe Stock has higher acceptance standards than other services. They also pay higher royalty rates (33% for images, 35% for videos). 😃

 

I can't comment about images I can't see close up.  If you want a critique, post the full-sized image here & we'll give you our feedback.

 

Nancy O'Shea— Product User, Community Expert & Moderator
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Community Beginner ,
Mar 27, 2025 Mar 27, 2025

I've never had a fotolia account.

The catch is that they accepted this photo with huge chromatic aberration this year, about a month ago, so I don't know if they still care about the quality.

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Community Expert ,
Mar 27, 2025 Mar 27, 2025
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Humans make mistakes. Especially when tasked with examining thousands of assets per week.

Occasionally, bad assets slip through the cracks. 😕

 

Nancy O'Shea— Product User, Community Expert & Moderator
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