If you’re on a budget, there are several free plugins that do a great job of adding much-needed gallery functionality to WordPress. Without further ado, here are the top 7 best free gallery photo plugins for WordPress.
You’ve got to love WordPress’ ability to host any kind of content, thus letting you basically publish whatever you wish as a website owner or blogger. That being said, though, there is still a lot that can be done to make those non-standard content types look even better compared to what you get from an untouched installation of WordPress and a standard theme.
Best WordPress Gallery Plugins For Free
NextGEN Gallery WordPress Gallery Plugins Free
NextGEN Gallery is a heavy-duty WordPress gallery plugin that makes a great option for photographers or other people working with tons of images. Its slogan is “made for photographers by photographers”.
It helps you display galleries, but it also helps you manage images on the back end, send images to clients for proofing, or even sell images directly from your website. If you just want a simple way to create some nice-looking galleries for your blog, I think there are better options for that use case. But if you want those more advanced features, NextGEN Gallery is one of the best options.
So why do I say NextGEN is for power users? First off, it includes dedicated tools to help you manage your gallery content outside the regular WordPress Media Library. You’ll probably find those extra features convenient if you have hundreds or thousands of images. So if you’re a photographer, definitely give NextGEN a look. Pricing: Limited free version. Pro version starts at $99
Photo Gallery by 10Web
Photo Gallery by 10Web is a popular freemium WordPress gallery plugin with many different templates. As well as support for images, video, and audio galleries. The plugin includes different “views” like Slideshow. Thumbnails. Masonry. Image browser and Mosaic. Price: Limited free version. For Pro, you can either pay $40 for the standalone plugin or get it as part of the 10Web WordPress service.
Gallery Plugin for WordPress – Envira Photo Gallery
Envira Gallery is a popular option that offers both a free way to create stylish galleries and a premium version with more advanced features for power users, like built-in support for client proofing, WooCommerce sales, Lightroom, and more.
With the free version at WordPress.org, you can create good-looking masonry galleries using simple drag-and-drop ordering. Price: Limited free version. Pro versions start at $29, though, the features you get access to depend on which pricing tier you choose.
Modula Image Gallery WordPress Plugins for Free
Modula is an easy-to-use WordPress grid gallery plugin that creates beautiful galleries right out of the box. The free version lets you create galleries with up to 20 images. Your galleries are responsive by default and use an interesting masonry layout.
Then, suppose you want to remove that limit and get more flexibility. In that case, the premium version gives you real-time Ajax gallery filters, video gallery support, more lightbox styles, built-in hover effects when a visitor hovers over a gallery item, and more.
If you don’t need advanced gallery management features and just want a tool to create great-looking front-end galleries, Modula is a good option. Pricing: Limited free version. Modula Pro starts at just $27 as the best photo gallery plugins.
FooGallery
A popular WordPress gallery plugin is a good option for both image and video galleries. FooGallery isn’t as heavy-duty as something like NextGEN Gallery, but it does come with a good number of features to help you configure your galleries.
WordPress Free Gallery Plugin Features
- Choose from a variety of different gallery templates
- Load galleries from external sources (like a folder on your server or Adobe Lightroom)
- Add infinite scroll
- Choose from multiple loaded effects
- Use media tags and categories to organize your images
The free version gives you 6 gallery templates by itself, and then the premium version adds more gallery templates for polaroid, grid, and slider. Pricing: Limited free version. FooGallery Pro starts at $59. If you’re on a budget, several free tools can add functions to your site, here are the top 7 best free gallery photo plugins for WordPress.
Gallery PhotoBlocks: WordPress Gallery Plugins for Free
Gallery PhotoBlocks is an easy-to-use gallery plugin with a twist. In addition, you can change the layout of your grid gallery by dragging one of the images in the gallery. So if you want to control the actual layout of your masonry gallery. As a result, that might be one reason to consider this over the Block Gallery plugin.
Essentially, you’ll build your gallery by putting together different blocks. Then, you can use drag-and-drop to arrange everything. For example, you could make one image take up three columns and another takes up one. The free version is great for image galleries, and you can also upgrade to Pro to get advanced features like post galleries and gallery filters.
Block Gallery – Photo Gallery Gutenberg Blocks (Outdated)
Let’s start off with the simplest WordPress gallery plugin on this list – Block Gallery. Block Gallery was originally a CoBlocks creation before GoDaddy acquired it (and CoBlocks). As the name suggests, Block Gallery helps new blocks to the WordPress block editor that lets you create some really great-looking galleries.
If you’re using the WordPress block editor and you just want a quick-and-easy way to create galleries that look great, definitely check this one out. On the other hand, if you want more advanced gallery management features or other advanced features, you might prefer a dedicated WordPress Gallery plugin. Pricing: 100% free
