Envato takes photos two ways: drag and drop through Portfolio Manager, or FTP for anything past a handful of files. Both routes land in the same place, but FTP has a detail that catches people out, because Envato states that all FTP uploads remain in the system for 24 hours only and are then removed automatically. Upload and submit in the same sitting, or the batch is gone.
The two delivery routes, and when each one makes sense
Portfolio Manager is the browser route, at portfolio.envato.com, where you browse for files or drag them in. Envato says there is no limitation on file size or number of files, but recommends staying under 50,000 files in a single go because the browser starts to lag or freeze. The more practical constraint is that closing the window stops the upload; minimising it is fine and lets you keep working, but the tab has to stay alive.
FTP is what Envato itself recommends for more than a handful of images, and the settings are published. Photos, stock video and graphics go to ftp.aws.portfolio.envato.com on port 21, using explicit FTP over TLS. The username is your Envato username, which Envato notes is case-sensitive, and the password is your Envato API key rather than your account password. Envato Market audio uses a different host, ftp.marketplace.envato.com, with the same port, encryption and credential pattern. Content on hard drives is not accepted at all.
Using the API key as the FTP password is worth pausing on, because it changes how you treat the credential. It is an account-level key, not an upload-only password, so it belongs in whatever secret store your transfer tool uses rather than in a saved site profile on a shared machine. If you rotate the key, every FTP profile that used it stops working at once.
The 24-hour window is the part that bites
FTP delivery does not submit anything. It stages files, which then have to be picked up on the Envato side, edited, assigned releases and submitted for review. Envato is explicit that all FTP uploads remain in the system for 24 hours only, after which they are removed automatically, so that pickup is not optional homework for next week. A large overnight batch that nobody touches the following day simply disappears, with no rejection and no notification to react to.
That shapes how you should size batches. Uploading a thousand files because the pipe is free, then planning to work through the metadata over several evenings, does not survive the retention rule. Upload what you can finish submitting today. For contributors sending to several agencies at once, this is also the one destination where the delivery step and the submission step cannot be separated by days, which is worth encoding in whatever schedule you run.
After a Portfolio Manager upload, choosing Edit Your Assets creates a temporary folder containing just that batch, which is where you edit it, attach releases and submit. Treat that folder as the real queue. Anything still sitting in it is unsubmitted work, not work in review.
File specs: JPG, RGB, and a maximum that most agencies do not have
Envato accepts JPG files only, and says its upload system will ignore all other file types outright. Photos must be RGB. The resolution window is the unusual one: photos must be between 4.0 and 80.0 megapixels. A lower bound is standard across the industry; an upper bound is not, and a 100-megapixel medium-format or stitched panoramic file has to be downsized specifically for Envato. Envato also asks for submissions at the highest available resolution and quality within that window.
Upsampling is prohibited, for whole photos and for individual elements inside them. Downsizing is acceptable in some cases as long as the four-megapixel minimum still holds, which is useful to know because downsizing is also Envato's suggested remedy for marginal focus and visible noise. A file pushed up to clear the minimum fails on softness anyway, so the minimum is a real floor rather than a number to engineer around.
Does your export clear Envato's resolution window?
Envato Elements requires JPG files in RGB between 4.0 and 80.0 megapixels, with upsampling prohibited. Enter your pixel dimensions to see whether a file fits Envato's window alongside the minimums published by other agencies.
Envato reads your embedded metadata, in a fixed order
This is the part of the workflow that quietly decides how much typing you do, and almost nobody checks it. Envato reads metadata embedded in the file itself and populates the submission from it, using a published priority order. For the title it looks at XMP Title, then IPTC ObjectName, then IPTC Title, then IPTC Headline. For the description it reads IPTC Caption, then XMP Description. For tags it reads IPTC Keywords, then XMP Subject.
Priority here means first match wins and the rest are ignored. Envato puts it plainly: if the XMP Title field is available it uses that and ignores all following fields and data. So a stale IPTC Headline left behind by an old Lightroom preset is harmless if XMP Title is populated, but becomes your item title the moment it is not. That is the mechanism behind a lot of items arriving with a title nobody meant to write.
Used deliberately, this is the whole batch workflow. If your export writes XMP Title, IPTC Caption and IPTC Keywords correctly, a thousand files arrive already titled, described and tagged, and the Envato-side work collapses into releases and submission. Used carelessly, it is a source of silent errors, because the fields Envato falls back to are exactly the ones that accumulate junk over years of presets and migrations.
Check a title and tag set against Envato's rules
Envato caps photo titles at 100 characters in English characters only with no brand names or trademarks, allows a maximum of 50 tags each up to 100 characters within a 2,048-character total, requires lowercase comma-separated tags, and blacklists promotional words such as Best, Free, Premium and Ultimate.
Metadata rules to satisfy before the files leave your machine
Because Envato pulls from embedded fields, its formatting rules are really rules about your export preset. Titles must be no longer than 100 characters, must use English language characters only, and must not contain brand names or trademarks. Photos take a maximum of 50 tags, each up to 100 characters, with the entire tag set capped at 2,048 characters, comma-separated with an optional leading space, and all lowercase. The full metadata requirements go further into Title Case, the two-primary-keyword guidance and the blacklist of promotional words.
One rule deserves singling out because it is the one most often violated by contributors arriving from microstock: a keyword list is not accepted as a description. The description field has to contain a description. If your export writes your keyword string into IPTC Caption, Envato will read it as the description and you have manufactured a rejection reason before uploading anything.
Releases, review, and what happens next
Releases are attached on the Envato side, in the batch folder, before submission. Every recognisable person needs a signed model release, and protected locations need property releases; Envato's own example is that without a release for each person in the frame, the photo would be rejected. Sorting this at submission time rather than at review time is the difference between a batch that clears and a batch that comes back.
Review can take up to 14 days, and Envato says the actual wait depends on current demand, the content type and the queue. There is no published per-category turnaround, so build your schedule around the outer edge of that window rather than an average. What comes back matters more than when: a soft rejection carries reviewer instructions and can be resubmitted after you make the changes, while a hard rejection carries no feedback, cannot be resubmitted, and Envato warns that resubmitting one puts your upload rights at risk. The rejection reasons in detail are worth reading before your first batch rather than after it.
One thing to settle before any of this: Envato Elements runs selective intake, and its author help centre currently states that it is not accepting applications to become a Photos Author. The workflow above applies once you are in. Envato's application guidance also names an expectation of being able to upload fifty or more photos a month, which is a capacity signal rather than a quota, but it tells you the kind of pipeline the marketplace is built around.
A workflow that holds up at volume
Put together, a batch that goes through cleanly looks like this. Cull and edit as usual. Export JPG, RGB, inside the four to eighty megapixel window, at the highest quality that window allows, with no upsampling. Write metadata into the fields Envato reads first, which means XMP Title, IPTC Caption and IPTC Keywords, with the title under 100 characters, no brand names, and tags lowercase and inside the 2,048-character budget. Verify no stale IPTC Headline is lurking from an old preset. Then upload by FTP, pick the batch up the same day, attach releases, submit, and note the date so you know when the fourteen-day window has genuinely elapsed.
The friction appears when Envato is one destination among several, because almost every element above is Envato-specific. The 80-megapixel ceiling, the JPG-only rule, the tag character budget, the blacklisted words and the field priority order are all different from what Shutterstock's FTP route expects, and the resolution requirements across agencies diverge further once video and vectors enter the picture. One export preset and one metadata set cannot satisfy all of them.
That is the gap Rastock AI is built to close: metadata generated per destination against each agency's own rules, then FTP or SFTP delivery to more than ten agencies with per-agency status you can watch, plus banned and mandatory keyword handling and rollback when a set turns out wrong. For Envato specifically, the useful part is writing the right embedded fields before the files ever reach the server. The metadata and delivery features and the plans are public, and the fourteen-day trial does not ask for a card.
Frequently asked questions
What are Envato's FTP settings for photo uploads?
Photos, stock video and graphics go to ftp.aws.portfolio.envato.com on port 21 using explicit FTP over TLS. The username is your Envato username, which Envato notes is case-sensitive, and the password is your Envato API key rather than your account password. Envato Market audio uses a separate host, ftp.marketplace.envato.com, with the same port, encryption and credential pattern.
How long do Envato FTP uploads stay on the server?
Twenty-four hours. Envato states that all FTP uploads remain in the system for 24 hours only and are then removed automatically, so files must be picked up, edited, assigned releases and submitted for review within that window. A large batch left untouched until the next day is gone, with no rejection and no notification. Size your batches to what you can finish submitting the same day.
What file format and resolution does Envato require for photos?
JPG files only, in RGB, between 4.0 and 80.0 megapixels. Envato says its upload system ignores all other file types. The upper megapixel limit is unusual among stock agencies, so very high-resolution medium-format or stitched panoramic files need downsizing specifically for Envato. Upsampling is prohibited for whole photos and for individual elements within them.
Does Envato read embedded IPTC and XMP metadata?
Yes, in a published priority order where the first match wins. Titles come from XMP Title, then IPTC ObjectName, then IPTC Title, then IPTC Headline. Descriptions come from IPTC Caption, then XMP Description. Tags come from IPTC Keywords, then XMP Subject. Envato states that if XMP Title is available it uses that and ignores all following fields, which is why a stale IPTC Headline only surfaces when the higher-priority field is empty.
How many files can I upload to Envato at once?
Envato says there is no limitation on file size or number of files, but recommends not uploading more than 50,000 files at once through the browser because it may lag or freeze. The real limit is practical rather than technical: closing the upload window stops the transfer, and with FTP the 24-hour retention window means the batch size should match what you can submit the same day.
How long does Envato take to review a submission?
Up to 14 days, according to Envato's own review documentation, with the actual wait depending on current demand, the content type and the size of the queue. No per-category turnaround is published. Plan around the outer edge of that window, and note the submission date so you can tell a slow queue from an item that needs following up.