Stock Photo APIs

Wire stock imagery into a product through the three main free APIs - Unsplash, Pexels, Pixabay - without tripping the compliance rules that get API keys revoked. The fetch is trivial; the contractual obligations (Unsplash's download-endpoint trigger, Pixabay's mandatory caching, attribution everywhere) are the actual work, and skipping them is the #1 reason apps get deactivated.

Operating procedure

Step 1: Gather inputs

• Is the need dynamic, repeated, or in-product? For a one-off hero image, download it by hand - an API key is overkill.
• Which provider(s), or should the integration abstract over all three? (Choosing a source for a specific image is stock-photo-finder's job.)
• Expected request volume, to check against the rate-limit table.
• Where images will render (client hotlink vs server cache) - this decides between Unsplash's hotlink rule and Pixabay's cache rule.
• Whether anything commercial ships - a human owns that license call via image-license-rights.

Step 2: Pick against the provider quick reference