Free photo printing offers

Storing your selfies and night out pics on your phone is easy, but did you know there are ways you can also get free photo prints? Read on to find out how!

Credit: Jacob Lund – Shutterstock

They say your uni years are meant to be some of the best in your life. But with all the pub crawls involved, the memories can get a bit hazy!

That's where having a good photo collection comes in, and the great news is that there are tonnes of ways you can get free photo prints. So, to save you searching, we've rounded up some of the best offers below for you to take your pic(k).

Note that these free print offers are usually for new customers only, so you'll only be able to get them free first time round. Although by the time you've exhausted this list, you probably won't have any space left to decorate your walls!

Best free photo prints offers UK

The table above is just a quick summary of the offers available. If you click on each company, you can read more details about the specifics of each offer, including how to redeem the prints and what size you can receive.

Here are our top places to get the cheapest photo prints:

1. Snapfish

   

   Number of free prints: 600 (50 per month for a year)
   Postage cost: £1.49 – £5.99

   For our money, Snapfish's free prints offer is the best of the bunch – not just for the impressive number of free prints, but the relatively low postage costs, too.

   You'll get 50 free 6" x 4" prints every month for 12 months, but note that the credits don't roll over if they go unused – if you forget to order your free prints in a given month, or don't use your full allowance, you can't carry it forward.

   Snapfish's free prints offer can only be redeemed through its free prints app, but as a fair number of your photos will already be on your phone, this shouldn't be too much of an issue.

   Get your free prints »

2. FreePrints app

   

   Number of free prints: 45 per month (up to 500 per year)
   Postage cost: £1.49 – £3.99

   The FreePrints app allows you to upload any photos from your social media accounts, Dropbox, Google Drive or Microsoft OneDrive, and print up to 45 free each month (with a maximum of 500 per year).

   Free prints with these guys are 6" x 4" and there's a limit of one print per photo (so you can't print multiple copies of the same photo, making it useless for promotional purposes). Again, any unused photo credits from a given month won't roll over to the next – once the month is over, those credits are gone.

   There are also 17 bonus prints available every month for your first six months of membership, earned by sharing FreePrints on Twitter and successfully referring your friends to the service.

   Get your free prints »

3. FreeFotos

   

   Number of free prints: Unlimited (15 per order)
   Postage cost: £1.99

   FreeFotos are relatively new to the photo printing scene, but their free prints offer is easily one of the best.

   You can get 15 free 6" x 4" prints with every order, and crucially, there's no minimum order value. Better still, this offer can be redeemed time and time again – still with no minimum order value.

   We checked with FreeFotos, and this does indeed mean that you can order 15 free prints as many times as you'd like, and only ever pay for postage!

   Get your free prints »

How to get the cheapest photo prints

Credit: Roadrunner

Before you start ordering hundreds of free photo prints to decorate your uni bedroom or sewing them into a blanket (whatever takes your fancy!), here are a few extra things to consider:

1. Keep an eye on delivery prices – It is worth remembering that although the free prints you'll receive are indeed free, you're going to have to pay delivery charges (all prices are stated above). So, if you're splashing out on any larger prints that aren't included in these offers, be sure to choose the service that offers the lowest postage price.
2. 'One address only' rule applies – You'll often find that a lot of these offers will be restricted to one deal per household. This means you'll have to make sure you get in there before your flatmates, or kindly ask your parents if you can use their address to get your freebies sent there (and ask them even more kindly if they'll then post the prints on to you).
3. Instagram filters aren't always the best choice – Remember that although some of your pics might look great on your phone screen with bright Instagram filters, they don't always translate so well into print. And, on a similar note, make sure your photos are decent quality too – small or grainy images are likely to look even worse when printed!
4. Sort your photos before uploading – If you're going to be uploading a lot of photos then it's best to sort them all out into different folders beforehand so they're easier to upload.
5. Try printing them yourself – If you only have a couple of photos to print, you might be better buying some good quality photo printing paper and printing them yourself at home (if you have a decent printer). Check out our guide to cheap home printing here.
6. Be wary of the quality – As the prints are free, it's unlikely that you'll be getting the absolute best quality paper and printing methods. There's no reason for them to be bad, but it's worth keeping an eye out just in case. And remember, even though they're free, you're still entitled to complain and ask for them to be replaced.

Why not use your free prints to create a photo scrapbook? It's just one of our many cheap and easy homemade gifts ideas.