Pricing your event photos: commission, subscription or both?

Two prices matter when you sell event photos: what you charge buyers, and what your platform charges you. Most articles only talk about the first. This one covers both, because the platform's fees decide how much of each sale you keep, and the right choice depends on how much you sell.

What buyers pay: singles and bundles

Most event galleries sell two things:

• A single photo, for the one shot someone loves.
• A bundle of every photo someone is in, for the person who finds themselves six times.

The bundle is usually the better sale. It earns you more for the same person, and the buyer gets every photo they're in. Price it so that, once someone has found three or four good shots, the bundle is the obvious choice.

There's no single right price for either. It depends on your market, the event, how many photos each person appears in and whether the organiser is promoting the gallery. Start with numbers that feel sensible locally, then look at what actually sold after a few events. Photohawk also supports packages, coupons and pre-order pricing if you want to test offers.

Prices are only half the story. The other half is whether people find themselves and whether the gallery is online while they still care. Our guide to selling race photos online covers both.

What platforms charge: the three common models

Event photo platforms charge in a few ways, often combined:

1. Commission only. No monthly fee; the platform takes a share of each sale. Low risk when you're starting out, expensive once you sell a lot.
2. Subscription only. A monthly fee and no share of sales. Predictable, but you pay in quiet months too.
3. Subscription plus commission. A monthly fee and a smaller share of each sale. The higher the monthly fee, the lower the commission.

Photohawk uses the third model, with a plan that has no monthly fee at the bottom. Every plan has a monthly price and a commission on sales, charged on sales only. Higher plans cost more each month and take less of each sale. The current plans, rates and storage are on our pricing page.

How to compare platforms honestly

A headline rate tells you little. Add up everything you'd pay in a typical month:

• The monthly price, if any.
• The commission, at your typical monthly sales.
• Any per-order or per-photo fee.
• Card or payment fees. These are usually separate from the platform's commission. On Photohawk they're charged by the payment provider: on your own Stripe account, by Stripe; where Photohawk processes the payment for you, at cost-based local rates.
• Storage, if you'll keep more than a plan includes.
• Free-download galleries, if organisers pay you to give photos away.

Then do the sum at three levels of sales: a quiet month, a typical month and your busiest month. A plan that's cheapest in a quiet month is often the most expensive in a busy one.

The break-even point

With subscription-plus-commission pricing, there's a level of monthly sales above which the dearer plan costs less overall: its lower commission saves more than its higher monthly price. Work it out like this:

Break-even sales = difference in monthly price ÷ difference in commission rate.

If a plan costs more each month but takes a lower share, divide the extra monthly cost by the difference in rates. If you regularly sell more than that, the dearer plan is cheaper for you. On Photohawk you can change plan at any time from Billing in your workspace.

Beyond the price

Fees aren't the only thing that differs between plans and platforms. Before you choose, check:

• Search. Can buyers find themselves by bib number and by selfie, with no tagging? On Photohawk, selfie, bib and time search are on every plan.
• Speed. Can a big gallery go live from the venue's connection? On every Photohawk plan, previews first gets galleries live in minutes; see how fast event photos can go online.
• Protection. Are previews watermarked, and is there preview protection against screenshots?
• Your brand. Can galleries carry your logo, and your own domain?
• Your team. How many people can upload, and with what roles?
• Payouts. Do payments go to your own account?

Free-download work

If organisers or sponsors pay you to give photos away, you need to know what free downloads cost on your platform. From 1 November 2026, each Photohawk plan includes a number of free-download photos every month, with a charge per photo above that; the pricing page has the figures. Our article on free-download galleries for sponsors and organisers explains how to quote for that kind of work.

A simple way to decide

1. Estimate your monthly sales for a quiet, typical and busy month.
2. Work out each plan's cost at each level: monthly price plus commission.
3. Add card fees, storage and free downloads where they differ.
4. Pick the plan that's cheapest at your typical month, then check the features you need.

When you're ready, create a free Studio account and set up your first gallery; you can move plans as your sales grow.