Free Stock Videos for Commercial Use: License and Selection Guide 2026

Free Stock Videos for Commercial Use: License and Selection Guide 2026

A looping hero video makes a landing page feel finished in a way a still image rarely does. The download takes ten seconds. The license questions take longer, because a stock video is not a photo that moves. It is a bundle of separate rights: the footage itself, the people performing inside it, the logos and places caught by the lens, and often a music track the uploader dropped in. Each of those layers has its own owner, and the free license on the download button covers only some of them.

This guide reads the video licenses of four widely used free libraries: Pexels, Pixabay, Coverr, and Mixkit. Every term below was checked against the license, terms, or help pages published by the platform itself. It covers what each license allows in commercial work, where the traps sit, and the checks to run before a clip ships in a client site, an ad, or a template you sell.

This is practical guidance for working designers, not legal advice. For a paid campaign, a broadcast spot, or a product sold at scale, take the actual license texts to a qualified reviewer.

The Short Answer

If you need free stock video for commercial work today, three of the four libraries give you a single, site-wide license that covers client work without attribution. The fourth makes the decision per clip, which is where people get caught.

• Pexels - one license covers photos and videos together. Free for commercial use, attribution not required, modification allowed. The site names websites, e-commerce, templates you sell, ads, and print as allowed uses.
• Pixabay - the Pixabay Content License allows free commercial use with no attribution and modification into new works. The main limit is a ban on selling or distributing content on a standalone basis, plus strict rules for clips showing recognisable brands.
• Coverr - videos and music are free for commercial and non-commercial use with no permission or attribution required, under an irrevocable license. Coverr states that it obtains model releases but does not hand them to users, and it holds no releases for brands or properties in frame.
• Mixkit - two stock video licenses live side by side. Clips under the Free License cover commercial projects. Clips under the Restricted License are personal use only, and some clips are free to download only at a lower resolution under that restricted tier. The label on the clip you download decides, not the site name.

The pattern across all four is the same pattern as photos, with one extra layer: the license grants rights in the footage, not in the people, brands, property, or music inside the frame. Video adds sound and motion to that problem, and both raise the stakes in ads.

Why Video Licensing Is Not Photo Licensing

Designers reuse their photo habits on video and miss four things that change the answer.

1. A clip can contain a second copyrighted work: the sound. Many stock clips ship silent, which keeps the question simple. Some ship with ambient audio or a music bed. The video license you read covers the footage; if a recognizable music track sits inside the file, that track is a separate work with its own rights holder. The practical fix is boring and safe: check what the audio track actually is before the clip enters an ad, and replace it with music licensed for the job when the source is unclear.

2. People in motion read as endorsers faster than people in stills. A smiling face in a photo next to a product is already the implied-endorsement pattern the licenses forbid. A person on screen, using a product or reacting to it for ten seconds, makes that implication stronger. Paid stock libraries sell model-released footage with the release on file for exactly this case. Free libraries license the clip and leave the person question with you.

3. Some libraries license per clip, not per site. On Pexels, Pixabay, and Coverr, one license text covers the library. On Mixkit, the license name changes from clip to clip, and the free download button on some clips offers a lower resolution under the restricted tier while a premium tier carries the commercial rights. A habit formed on the first three sites (download, check the one license page once) fails on the fourth.

4. Resolution tiers can carry license tiers with them. Read the download panel, not the search result. Where a free tier is capped at a smaller file, find out which license that smaller file ships under before you build a client deliverable on it. A clip that is free at 720p and commercial only through a paid tier is a paid asset for client work, whatever the search page headline said.

What a Stock Video License Actually Controls

Five questions decide whether a free clip is safe for a given job. Every source in this guide answers them differently, so the habit to build is reading for these five, in this order.

1. Does the license cover your exact use? Commercial use covers the clip appearing in work that earns money or promotes a business: a client website, an ad, a monetized video, a product page. Personal use covers practice and private projects. Two of the four libraries also carve out specific channels. Pexels names ads and templates you sell as allowed. Mixkit's Free License names YouTube videos, social media posts, online marketing ads, music videos, commercial projects, and filmmaking. Match the named use to your deliverable.

2. Can the raw clip travel? Using a clip inside your edit and handing the clip file to someone else are different acts. Every license here forbids redistributing the raw footage as a standalone asset or offering it on a stock or inventory basis. Your client gets the rendered video. The loose MP4 files stay in your archive with your license notes, unless the license says the file itself may be shared.

3. Which license is printed on this clip? On a one-license library, the site-level text answers for every file. On Mixkit, the download area names the license for that item: Free or Restricted. On libraries with paid tiers mixed into the same catalog, the tier you actually downloaded is the tier whose terms you hold.

4. Who and what appears in the frame? Recognisable people, logos, branded products, and private property all carry rights the footage license does not grant. Across these four licenses the wording converges: no implied endorsement by the people or brands shown, no use of clips with recognisable brands to market goods or services without the brand owner's permission, and no depicting recognisable people in offensive, illegal, or misleading contexts.

5. Does attribution need to be planned into the layout? For the four libraries in this guide, no visible credit is required, on either a website or a video description. That is a property of these four licenses, not of free video in general. If you ever pull a clip from a library outside this guide, treat credit as an open question until its license page answers it.

Pexels: One License for Photos and Videos

Pexels publishes a single license for photos and videos at pexels.com/license, and its help center answers the commercial question directly: all photos and videos on Pexels are free for commercial use, on a commercial website, blog, product, or anywhere else. The license's allowed list states that attribution is not required, although credit to the creator is appreciated, and that you can modify the content as you like.

The use cases Pexels names on the license page map closely to design work: your website, blog, or app, including an e-commerce shop, newsletter, e-book, presentation, or a template you sell; ads, banners, and marketing campaigns for your product; print material such as flyers, postcards, magazines, and book covers; and social media posts, including YouTube.

The help center's rules page lists five restrictions, and all five matter for video:

1. Identifiable people may not appear in a bad light or in a way that is offensive, which Pexels illustrates with people portrayed engaging in criminal activities, suffering from a medical ailment, or in a pornographic context.
2. Do not sell unaltered copies, for example as a stock photo, poster, print, or on a physical product, without adding any value. For video, read this as: the clip itself is not a product you can resell.
3. Do not imply endorsement of your product by the people or brands on the image.
4. Do not redistribute or sell the content on other stock photo or wallpaper platforms.
5. Do not use the content as part of a trademark, design-mark, trade-name, business name, or service mark.

The help center adds the caveat that matters most in ads: depicted content such as trademarks, logos, or brands may still be protected by privacy, copyright, or trademark rights, and you should not imply that the depicted person, brand, or rights holder is endorsing or taking part in your product or service. Where a use needs it, permission from the depicted third parties is your job to obtain. Part of the older Pexels library sits under CC0 from before the current license, so the license shown on the clip's page at download time is the record to keep.

Pixabay: The Content License and the Standalone Test

Pixabay releases its images, videos, and audio under one Content License. The license summary published by Pixabay states what is allowed in three lines: use content for free, use content without having to attribute the author (credit is appreciated), and modify or adapt content into new works. The binding grant in the terms is an irrevocable, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free right to use, download, copy, modify, or adapt the content for commercial or non-commercial purposes.

The prohibited list is where Pixabay's video terms get specific:

• No sale or distribution on a Standalone basis. Pixabay defines standalone in the terms: no creative effort has been applied to the content and it remains in substantially the same form as it exists on the site. The same section states the positive version: using content in combination with other media so that the combined effect is a new creative work is not standalone use. In practice, a Pixabay clip inside your edited video is the second case; the clip offered by itself, or as a downloadable background pack, is the first.
• Recognisable trademarks, logos, or brands cannot be used commercially in relation to goods and services. Pixabay adds, in particular, that such content cannot be printed on merchandise or other physical products for sale.
• No immoral or illegal use, especially content featuring recognisable people. Pixabay's prohibited-use text also covers portraying people in a way that suggests they suffer from, or are medicating for, a physical or mental ailment, and political contexts. Check sensitive pairings before a stock face illustrates a health, finance, or campaign topic.
• No misleading or deceptive use, and no use as part of a trademark, design-mark, trade-name, business name, or service mark.

Two more Pixabay facts change how you archive. Content published before 9 January 2019 sits under CC0, which carries none of these conditions, so the publish date on the clip page matters for older downloads. And Pixabay states plainly that it does not warrant that any consents or licenses have been obtained for the people, brands, or other rights depicted, and puts the responsibility for checking on you. That sentence, not the free headline, is the one to plan around for ads.

Coverr: A Curated Library With the Release Caveat Printed on the License Page

Coverr's license page grants an irrevocable, non-exclusive, worldwide copyright license to download, copy, modify, perform, and use its videos and music for free, including for commercial purposes, without permission from the content creator or Coverr. Attribution is not required for free downloads or for Coverr+ members, although it is appreciated.

The prohibited list has three items. You cannot compile Coverr videos or music to create a similar or competing service. You cannot use the content to train AI algorithms, build AI models, or form a dataset. And you cannot use trademarks, logos, or brands that appear in the videos or music tracks without separate permission from the brand owner where the use needs it.

Coverr is also the most direct of the four about releases, and the directness is the useful part. Its license page states that Coverr obtains model releases for individuals appearing in its content, but does not provide those releases to users. It holds no releases for brands, trademarks, or identifiable properties or landmarks in frame. It also states that while uploaded content is required to have the necessary releases, especially for identifiable individuals, Coverr cannot guarantee the scope of permitted uses for each piece of content, and users are responsible for making sure their use complies with the law and does not infringe third-party rights.

Read that as a working instruction: a Coverr clip of a person is a better starting point than an unvetted upload, because releases were collected at upload, and it is still not a release you can show a client. Coverr's FAQ adds one more boundary with practical weight: its videos cannot be resold or offered as part of services where providing video is part of the offer, and it names stock video sites, website builders, theme providers, mobile app builders, and video editing services. If your deliverable is a theme or template with the clip bundled in, that sentence is aimed at your use case. Coverr also reserves the right to modify its license terms, which makes your dated copy of the terms part of the project record.

Mixkit: Two Licenses, and the Label on the Clip Decides

Mixkit, run by Envato, publishes a separate license for each item type. For stock video there are two: the Stock Video Free License and the Stock Video Restricted License. This is the library where reading one license page once is not enough, because the license attaches to the clip, and the clip pages prove it: free download buttons on some clips offer a 720p file for personal use only under the Restricted License, with a premium Envato download carrying the commercial terms.

The Free License, as Mixkit's license page states it, covers commercial and non-commercial projects: you are permitted to download, copy, modify, distribute, publicly perform, and broadcast the items, and Mixkit's video FAQ names YouTube videos, social media posts, online marketing ads, educational purposes, music videos, commercial projects, and filmmaking. Attribution is not required, although it is appreciated where possible. There is no watermark on downloads.

The Restricted License is the mirror image: non-commercial use only. Mixkit's FAQ gives personal projects and personal social media posts as the shape of allowed use, and its license summaries list commercial projects, advertising, company social media posts, and YouTube videos as outside it. A restricted clip in a client project is outside its license even if the project is small, the client is a friend, or the video never earns a cent. Commercial describes the use, not the profit.

Mixkit's User Terms add three rules that apply across the library. You must not sell physical or digital copies of items without first altering them by applying human skill and effort and incorporating other elements; the terms add that merely printing an item on an object such as a mug or shirt is not sufficient alteration. You must not make items available to a third party on a stock or inventory basis. And for items that contain a third-party component such as a trademark or brand, Mixkit states those components may not have been cleared for your use, and evaluating and obtaining any needed permission is your responsibility. The terms also pull in Envato's Acceptable Use Policy, which is where limits on sensitive-topic footage live.

The workflow this library demands is simple: before you download, read the label in the download area of that clip, and record which license was printed there in the project note. If the free button says personal use, the commercial answer is the premium tier or a different clip. Do not let a good shot argue you out of a label you already read.

Side by Side: The Four Video Licenses

Each entry below was checked against the platform's own license, terms, or help pages. Read the table as a map, then open the same page for the exact clip you download, because per-clip tiers (Mixkit above all) can move a file out of the row you expected.

The pattern to take from the table: all four grant the footage. None of them hands you a signed release, clears a logo in frame, or licenses a music track that arrived inside someone else's upload. The differences worth money are procedural: whether the license is decided once per library or once per clip, and whether the platform tells you plainly what it never cleared.

What No Free Stock Video License Covers

The license is a copyright grant from the person who shot or uploaded the clip. Four risks sit outside it, on every platform in this guide.

1. You never receive the model release. Coverr states it collects releases and does not provide them. The other three do not promise releases exist. A client, a broadcaster, or a platform dispute process can ask for the release as a document. If your workflow cannot produce it, choose clips where the people question does not arise: backs, hands, crowds at distance, places, objects, and motion graphics. Save identifiable faces for editorial-style use, where a person illustrates a topic rather than sells a product.

2. Logos and landmarks keep their own owners. A storefront sign in a street scene, a badge on a car, or a famous building used as the face of a travel product all carry trademark or property questions the footage license does not answer. Pixabay draws the hardest line: recognisable brands cannot be used commercially in relation to goods and services at all. Pexels and Coverr leave the consent question with you. Mixkit says trademark components inside an item may not be cleared. The working rule is the same everywhere: brands appear as scenery, never as sponsors.

3. The music inside a clip is a separate asset. If a downloaded clip carries an audio track, treat the track as unlicensed until you can name its source and its terms. Replacing the track with music you have licensed for the project, or shipping the clip muted under your own licensed score, is the clean default for client work. A beautiful edit built on an unknown track exports the problem into every copy of the video.

4. Uploaders can upload work they do not own, and terms can change. Platforms rely on contributors and takedown processes. A clip removed later for infringement was never licensed to you in the first place. Your dated download record, the license text as it read that day, and the clip's page URL are your evidence that you acted in good faith. Coverr reserves the right to change its terms with continued use counting as acceptance, and Pixabay's own history (CC0 across the library until January 2019, a custom license after) shows that terms move. The download date is the fact that protects you, so archive it like you archive the file.

Pick the Source From the Job

Start from the deliverable and work backwards. The same clip can be cleared for one job and wrong for the next.

Client website hero or background loop

All four libraries clear this use under their commercial terms, with the Mixkit label check applied. Pick on production quality and file weight. This is the lowest-risk job in the guide: the video is scenery around your client's own content, nobody in frame appears to sell anything, and the clip is embedded in your edit rather than offered as a file. For delivery, pair the loop with a poster frame and a still-image fallback; the web animation performance guide covers motion budgets on the page, and the responsive images guide covers the fallback still.

Paid advertising

All four licenses allow ads, and ads are where the people and brand questions stop being theoretical. Run the endorsement test on every frame: does any recognisable person appear to use, hold, praise, or react to the product? Does any logo sit close enough to the product to read as a partnership? If either answer is yes, change the clip, not the caption. For a campaign whose idea is a person endorsing the product, free footage is the wrong tool; that job needs released footage from a paid library or a shoot.

Product packaging and product pages

The video itself rarely lives on packaging, but the landing page a QR code opens, the product page the box points to, and the retail screen beside the shelf all carry it. Pixabay's brand rule is the one to apply here: a clip showing a recognisable brand cannot be used commercially in relation to goods and services, so a competitor's product visible in frame disqualifies the clip for a product page even when the same clip was fine as a site hero. Keep packaging-adjacent video to your own product, hands, materials, and process shots.

A template, theme, or pack you sell

Assume the raw clip cannot ship inside the product. Every license here bans distributing the footage as a standalone asset, Pixabay names the standalone test in its terms, and Coverr names website builders and theme providers in its no-resale rule. Two compliant patterns exist: embed the clip in a flattened preview or demo render where it cannot be extracted as a usable asset, or link buyers to the source to download the clip under their own license, with the license named in your documentation. Selling a template with the loose MP4 in a folder is the prohibited pattern on all four.

YouTube and social video

Pexels names YouTube and social posting on its license page, and Mixkit's Free License names YouTube videos, social media posts, and music videos. Apply the same checks as the ad case when the video is monetized or built for a client: person endorsement, brands in frame, and the audio track. Keep the license name and clip page URL in the video's project file even when the platform description stays credit-free; a claim or a client question is answered from the project record, not from memory.

Client handoff

Deliver the rendered master, the caption and subtitle files, and your own project files. The downloaded clips stay in your archive with their source pages and license notes. If the client will re-edit the footage later (a seasonal cut, a new end card), they need their own downloads under their own acceptance of the terms, or a license that allows file transfer. Handing over the raw clips because it feels helpful transfers the one thing none of these licenses grants.

A Worked Example: Clearing Video for a Small Studio Site

The following is a hypothetical example, written to show the checking order. No real client, studio, or product is involved.

A designer is building a site for a small ceramics studio: a hero loop for the home page, two clips for a product page, and one short video for a paid social ad.

1. Hero loop from Coverr. A potter's hands shaping clay, no face, no logos. Coverr's license covers commercial website use with no attribution. Verdict: cleared. The license page text and the clip page URL are saved with the project files.
2. Product page clip from Pexels. A kiln being opened, shot from behind the potter. Pexels allows commercial use and its license page names websites and e-commerce. Verdict: cleared. The clip ships muted under the designer's licensed music track, so the audio question never arises.
3. Second product clip from Mixkit. The shot is right (glazes being poured), but the download area labels the free file as personal use under the Restricted License, with the commercial tier behind the premium download. Verdict: not cleared on the free file. The designer swaps in a different glaze clip whose download area names the Free License, and records the label in the project note.
4. Social ad clip from Pixabay. A customer smiling at a shelf of mugs, recorded before 2019 per the clip page, so CC0 applies to this download. The clip works for the ad, and the publish date is saved in the project note because that date is the reason the terms are as permissive as they are. A second candidate, a newer clip showing a recognisable soft drink can on the shelf beside the mugs, is rejected under Pixabay's brand rule for goods and services.

Total time: about twenty minutes, most of it reading two download panels carefully. The set ships with every clip's source, license name, and date recorded, and the two risky files (the restricted clip and the brand-heavy clip) were caught at download, where fixing them cost a search instead of a reshoot.

The Pre-Delivery Checklist

Run this before any stock video leaves your machine. It extends the pre-shipment pass in the design asset licensing checklist with the video-specific steps.

• License named per clip: every clip has a recorded source, license name, and clip page URL, saved at download time.
• Terms archived: a dated copy of the license text in force at download is stored with the project, not only linked.
• Tier and label checked: for Mixkit and any tiered catalog, the license printed in the download area of the actual file is the one in the note.
• Original files kept: the downloaded clip is retained unmodified in the project archive, separate from the edited timeline.
• People reviewed: recognisable faces are not endorsing the product, are not shown in an offensive or misleading context, and are avoided entirely where the job is sensitive.
• Brands and property reviewed: logos, branded products, and identifiable locations do not suggest a partnership, and brand-heavy clips stay out of goods-and-services uses.
• Audio cleared: any music or voice inside the delivered video is named, sourced, and licensed for the job, or removed.
• Redistribution check: the deliverable contains renders, not raw clips; templates and handoffs do not ship loose stock files.
• Accessibility shipped: captions are included, burned-in text passes contrast, and a poster frame plus a still fallback stand in where the video cannot play. Caption contrast can be tested with the contrast checker.

A 60-Second License Check for Any Free Video Site

1. Can you find the license in words? No readable license text means no commercial clearance, whatever the homepage promises.
2. Is the license site-wide or per clip? On a per-clip library, the label in the download area is the license you hold. Read it before the download, not after the edit.
3. What does the license ban? Find the lines on standalone resale, on people in a bad light, and on competing services. Every library in this guide has all three in some form.
4. Who is in the frame, and what is the audio? The footage license covers the clip. The people, the brands, and the music each need their own answer.
5. Can you prove it later? Save the clip page, the license name, and the terms as they read today. Terms change; the download date does not.

FAQ

Can I use Pexels, Pixabay, Coverr, or Mixkit videos in client work?

Yes, with one condition on the fourth name. Pexels, Pixabay, and Coverr license their libraries for commercial use, including client work, at no cost and with no required credit. Mixkit does too, but only under its Stock Video Free License; clips under its Restricted License are personal use only. Check the license printed on the specific clip before it enters a client project, and keep a dated record of the terms with the project.

Do I need to credit the videographer?

No, not for the libraries in this guide. Pexels, Pixabay, Coverr, and Mixkit all state that attribution is not required, although credit is appreciated. That is a property of these four licenses. A library outside this guide can require credit, and if it does, the credit placement needs to be decided before the edit is approved, not after export.

Can I sell a template or theme that includes the stock clip?

You can sell the template. You cannot ship the raw clip inside it. Every license here bans distributing the footage as a standalone asset, Pixabay defines the standalone test in its terms, Coverr names theme providers and website builders in its no-resale rule, and Mixkit bars making items available on a stock or inventory basis. Embed the clip in a flattened demo that cannot be lifted as a usable file, or link buyers to the source so they download it under their own license.

Can I use a clip of a person in an advertisement?

The footage license allows ads. It does not include a model release you can show anyone, and the licenses forbid implying that the person endorses your product. A face reacting to, holding, or praising the product is the risky pattern. People shown at work, from behind, in crowds, or as context around your own footage carry far less risk. For an ad built around a person endorsing the product, use paid stock with the release on file or shoot the spot.

The free download says personal use but the site advertises commercial use. Which is right?

The label on the file you downloaded. On Mixkit, both licenses live in one library, and some clips offer the free file under the Restricted License with commercial rights in the premium tier. On any library, the tier attached to your download is the agreement you accepted. When the free tier and the job disagree, upgrade the tier or change the clip.

What if the clip has music in it?

Treat the track as a separate asset with a separate owner. The video license covers the footage. Unless you can name the track and the terms it came with, replace it with music licensed for the project or ship the clip silent under your own score. This is the most common way a cleared video becomes an uncleared deliverable.

What happens if a clip I used gets removed from the library?

Pexels, Pixabay, and Coverr grant their licenses as irrevocable for downloads already made, so a routine removal does not cancel rights in a clip you downloaded under the license. If the clip is removed because the uploader never owned it, the clip was never validly licensed in the first place; your dated license text and download records are your evidence that you acted in good faith. This is the practical reason the archive step in the checklist exists.

What to Read Next

• Free stock photos for commercial use - the photo companion: the same four-license discipline for stills, where model and property releases join the file license.
• Free mockups for commercial use - licenses for the scenes your finished video stills and renders will sit inside.
• Design asset licensing checklist - the full pre-shipment review across fonts, icons, photos, mockups, video, and AI images.
• Web animation performance guide - motion budgets for pages that carry video: what to preload, what to lazy load, and when a poster frame should do the work instead.

This guide is maintained by the Lucky Graphics editorial team and reviewed when the platforms above change their terms. It is general information about how stock video licenses work, not legal advice for a specific project.