Images
Where our pictures come from
Every image on this site has a source recorded against it before it publishes — not “we checked at the time”, but an actual record stored alongside the file naming where it came from and under what terms.
Where images come from
Four sources, and every file on the site is one of them.
- Royalty-free stock libraries — Pexels, Unsplash and Wikimedia Commons, used under their stated licences, recorded per file and credited even where the licence does not require it.
- Manufacturer press assets, used editorially and credited to the brand.
- Our own illustration and charts, always labelled as illustration and never presented as a photograph of a real object.
- Retailer product images — see below.
Retailer product images
Where a guide recommends a specific product we link to, we may show the product image from the retailer’s own listing for that product. It is used to identify the item you would be buying, on a page that links to the retailer’s listing for it, and it is served in the same commercial context the retailer published it in.
We do not claim ownership of those images and we assert no rights over them. They remain the property of the retailer, the brand or the photographer. We never present a product image as our own photography, never crop or colour-grade one to imply we shot it, and never use one to illustrate a product we are not linking to.
If you are a rights holder and you would rather we did not use a particular image, write to us and it comes down. We do not require you to explain why.
What we do to them
Every image is converted to a modern format and generated at two sizes, because a three-megabyte photograph is a worse experience than a good one. Colour and crop are adjusted only where the licence allows it — manufacturer press assets and anything under a share-alike licence are fitted to the layout rather than cropped, and are not colour-graded. The framing you see is the framing that was published.
What we do not do
- We do not use images from other publications’ reviews.
- We do not generate pictures of real products with AI. On a page carrying a buying recommendation that is fabricating evidence, and no disclosure label makes it acceptable.
- We do not use images of identifiable private individuals without a model release.
- We do not hotlink. Every file is served from our own infrastructure.
If we have got one wrong
We would rather hear from you than not. If you own an image on this site and believe we are using it without the right to, write to [email protected] with the page and the image. We will take it down while we check, not after — and if we were wrong, it stays down and we correct the record.
That offer is not a substitute for permission and we do not treat it as one. It exists because source records can be wrong, and uploaders to free-licence sites sometimes claim work that is not theirs. We would rather be correctable than confident.