Getty Images does not give contributors an FTP or SFTP address. If you have been hunting for a host and a password, there is nothing to find: every accepted contributor uploads through ESP, the web portal at esp.gettyimages.com, or through the Contributor mobile app for royalty-free stills. Approved third-party tools exist, but they hand files to ESP as well.
That single fact reshapes how you plan a Getty images upload workflow. The habits that work at Shutterstock or Adobe Stock, such as a nightly SFTP drop and a scripted batch, do not transfer. What Getty gives you instead is a batch system with its own queue behaviour, a controlled keyword vocabulary that locks the moment a file is accepted, and a set of file rules that are strict about pixels and unusually quiet about almost everything else.
The three routes Getty actually offers
Getty documents exactly three ways to get content in front of an inspector, and the same portal serves both the Getty Images and iStock brands.
ESP web upload
ESP, the Enterprise Submission Portal, is the main surface and also the identity layer. The contributor help centre, account management, creative briefs and batch history all resolve into it, so if you are signed in as a contributor you are signed in to ESP. Everything else in this article is really a description of how ESP behaves.
The Contributor mobile app
Contributor by Getty Images, published by Getty Images Inc., lets you submit creative still images straight from a camera roll, attach model and property releases, and add keywords, descriptions and titles. Getty is explicit about two boundaries. You can start a royalty-free creative stills submission in the app and finish it in ESP, and the app does not yet support editorial, illustration or video content. Treat it as a capture-side convenience, not a production pipeline.
Approved third-party tools
Getty's public help index carries an article on getting help with third-party tools, naming DeepMeta, qHero and Todayis20, and the app listing tells you that you can review previous submissions whether they came from the app, from ESP, or from an approved third-party tool. So the tools are acknowledged rather than tolerated. What they are not is an alternative protocol. They automate the same portal you would otherwise drive by hand.
Where the Getty FTP myth comes from
The myth is durable because there genuinely are FTP references on Getty domains. Neither of them belongs to the contributor programme, and knowing which is which saves you a week of searching.
- An editorial wire workflow. A Getty-hosted assignment guide for ice hockey coverage, revised in July 2016, gives a test FTP host and a live direct-ingest address for transmitting from the arena, plus an email fallback for use only when FTP is not working. The same sheet says anything sent more than 24 hours after the game has to go in through ESP. That is accredited sports coverage on assignment, not stock submission, and it is a decade old.
- A customer-side product. Getty Images Media Manager is an enterprise digital asset management tool, and its documentation does cover SFTP, including an explicit note that plain FTP is not allowed for security reasons and that the service must be enabled by an account manager. That pipeline moves files into a paying customer's own library. It has nothing to do with contributing content for licensing.
The third source of confusion is Adobe. Adobe Stock does offer an SFTP path, although it is gated to qualifying accounts rather than open to everyone, and advice written for Adobe migrates into Getty threads without anyone noticing the swap. If you want the version of this workflow that really does run over FTP, our walkthrough of uploading to Shutterstock via FTP is the closer comparison.
There is also no contributor submission API. Getty's developer platform documents licensing, search, asset metadata, asset change, single sign-on and generative AI endpoints. Nothing in it sends content in.
File requirements you have to clear before anything else
Getty's preparation guidance is short and unusually concrete about pixels. Photographs need a minimum of 3 megapixels and a maximum of 256 megapixels, in RGB, saved as JPEG at the highest quality setting with no sizing changes and no upsizing. Getty even works the example for you: a file of 2000 by 1333 pixels comes to under three million pixels and does not meet the minimum. The instruction that follows is worth taking literally, because it is what inspectors do, which is to check the file at 100 percent before you upload it.
Illustrations are handled differently. Vector EPS files must be CS6 compatible, with all shapes closed, stray objects and points deleted, and custom effects expanded. Getty requires vectors to be paired with a high-quality raster illustration, and the pair has to share a filename, so illustration.eps travels with illustration.jpg. Raster illustrations start at 1900 by 2800 pixels, with 4075 by 4075 recommended.
Video runs to a minimum of 5 seconds with a suggested maximum of 30, longer if the content justifies it, and a hard ceiling of 6GB per file. Getty's full video technical specification sits behind the contributor login, so treat the public figures as the floor of what you need to know rather than the whole rulebook.
One more constraint sits above all of these. Getty does not accept files created or modified with generative AI models, and it does not accept photo-realistic AI depictions of people at all. Its retouching policy, dated May 2025 and still current, allows retouching that affects up to about a tenth of the pixels with no new elements and no model retouching, using traditional or generative tools, but anything past that threshold counts as modification and generative tools are barred. Inpainting and canvas extension are out. Getty names the consequences for non-compliance as file rejections, account suspension or account closure.
How batches work, and the queue rule that costs you time
A batch is the unit Getty inspects, and it is also the unit you quote when you chase a late review. Getty states that files are reviewed within 3 to 15 days and that inspection times vary with season and other factors. If nothing has happened after 15 business days, you open a support ticket and include the batch ID numbers shown on each batch.
The detail most contributors learn the expensive way is how the queue is ordered. Getty's inspectors work through batches ordered by the last submission date. Adding more files to an existing batch delays the inspection of every file already in it and sends the whole batch to the back of the queue. The practical rule is simple: never top up an open batch. Start a new one.
After acceptance, allow roughly three days for content to appear on the customer-facing site and in credit line and keyword search results. Getty also sends a daily summary email of review activity with links to each batch. That is on by default for creative-only contributors, while contributors who do both creative and editorial opt in from the Profile page in the upload tool.
How many files fit in one batch is a question Getty does not answer publicly. No Getty-owned page states a per-batch cap. Numbers circulate, but they trace back to third-party tool documentation rather than to Getty, which is a good reason not to build a production schedule around them.
Metadata: entered in the tool, and locked once accepted
Titles, descriptions and keywords are added inside the tool, whether that is ESP or the mobile app. Getty asks you not to remove or change metadata that editing software has embedded in the file, so strip nothing on the way out of your editor.
Getty runs a controlled vocabulary rather than free text. Each keyword in the Getty Images and iStock vocabulary is supported by synonyms that are invisible on the site but linked to every keyword you add, which means the term you pick carries a hidden cluster of buyer-side search terms with it. Picking the vocabulary term that matches the concept matters more than piling on near-duplicates.
Then comes the rule that makes Getty different from every other agency in your rotation. Once a file has been accepted, contributors can no longer add keywords to it. Fixing a missing location or primary subject means a support ticket with the affected file IDs, submitted on Getty's spreadsheet template, and the keyword team can decline terms it thinks buyers will not use. There is no bulk re-keyword button waiting for you later. We covered the vocabulary side of this in more depth in our guide to Getty Images keywording rules.
Two things people commonly assert about Getty metadata are not documented anywhere public: whether ESP reads IPTC and XMP fields out of the file, and whether you can import metadata from a CSV. Getty's Content Upload Requirements and Keywording Guide are both behind the contributor login, and the keyword count limits quoted around the internet come from third-party tools rather than Getty. If you have a contributor account, those two articles are worth reading before you design a workflow around an assumption.
Releases are attached at upload, and the forms have a year on them
If your content shows a recognisable person or property, whether as the subject or in the background, Getty requires a model or property release before it can license the file commercially. Releases are attached to files in the upload tool, and the mobile app carries the same capability.
Getty asks contributors to use the latest approved 2026 release forms, including an enhanced model release that it says provides increased legal protection and licensing opportunities. Paper forms are published in roughly thirty-four languages, with country-specific requirements worth checking before a shoot: French is required for models photographed inside France, and the Brazilian Portuguese form carries specific language for minors under sixteen.
Digital releases are accepted only from approved apps, and only with the right template inside them. Getty names SnapSign, where you must use the Getty Images Release rather than any other SnapSign template, and Easy Release, where you must use the Enhanced Model Release Template rather than the standard one. Getty also states it is not affiliated with either app and that templates change periodically, so an out-of-date app is a submission problem waiting to happen.
Getty and iStock: one portal, one real difference
The same help centre and the same portal serve both brands, and the preparation rules are written once for both. The mechanical difference sits at batch level. Getty Images contributors must submit every file in a batch before it can be reviewed. iStock and Moment contributors can have submitted files reviewed without completing the batch, although Getty says completing it is preferred. Where the two brands really diverge is distribution and royalties rather than upload, which we broke down separately in Getty Images contributor payouts.
Editorial is a separate front door entirely. It has its own application, reviewed by editors over two to four weeks rather than the week Getty quotes for creative applications, and it does not permit AI generation or AI modification at all. The mobile app does not handle it either.
What a sensible Getty workflow looks like in practice
Put the constraints together and the shape of the work becomes obvious. Everything that can be got wrong is cheap to fix before upload and expensive or impossible to fix afterwards.
- Cull and tech-check first. Inspect at 100 percent, confirm the pixel count clears 3 megapixels after any crop, and confirm RGB and highest-quality JPEG.
- Write metadata while the shoot is still fresh, and write it as if you cannot change it, because on Getty you cannot.
- Gather releases before you open a batch, on the current year's forms, from an approved app if you sign digitally.
- Upload one coherent batch and leave it alone. Open a new batch for the next shoot rather than adding to the last one.
- Record the batch ID. It is the only reference number support will act on if the review runs past fifteen business days.
Where an external tool actually helps
No tool can invent a Getty FTP endpoint, and you should be sceptical of any that implies otherwise. What a tool can do is remove the two costs Getty imposes on you, which are the metadata pass that has to be right first time and the fact that Getty is rarely the only place your files go. Rastock AI generates titles, descriptions and keywords from the image itself, then delivers to 10+ agencies over FTP and SFTP, including Adobe Stock, Shutterstock, Alamy, Depositphotos, Pond5, 123RF, Canva, Vecteezy and VectorStock, plus any other agency that accepts FTP and that you add yourself.
For Getty specifically, the useful half is the metadata half. You can generate and review titles, descriptions and keywords in bulk, apply banned and mandatory keyword rules so nothing slips through that a controlled vocabulary would reject, and export IPTC, CSV or XML to carry into ESP. There is no revenue share and no claim on your files, so nothing about using it changes your relationship with Getty.
If you want to see whether that halves the slowest part of your week, the 14-day free trial does not ask for a card.
What this means for your Getty routine
Getty is the agency where automation helps least at the delivery step and most at the preparation step. There is no FTP, no API and no CSV import you can point to in public documentation. There is a portal, a batch queue that punishes fiddling, pixel rules that are easy to meet and easy to fail on a crop, and a keyword vocabulary that closes behind you. Get the metadata and the releases right before the batch opens and Getty becomes predictable. Get them wrong and your options narrow to a support ticket. If you are trying to work out why files came back at all, our breakdown of Getty Images rejection reasons covers the other half of that story.
Frequently asked questions
Does Getty Images support FTP uploads for contributors?
No. Getty publishes no FTP or SFTP address for its contributor programme. Every documented submission path runs through ESP at esp.gettyimages.com, the Contributor by Getty Images mobile app for royalty-free creative stills, or an approved third-party tool that itself talks to ESP. Getty's own application page says contributors submit by desktop or mobile device, and FTP is never mentioned. If you have seen a Getty FTP host quoted somewhere, it almost certainly belongs to the editorial news and sport wire workflow or to Media Manager, which is a customer-side asset management product.
How many files can I put in one Getty batch?
Getty does not publish a per-batch file cap on any of its public contributor pages, so any specific number you see quoted is coming from third-party tool documentation rather than Getty. What Getty does publish is more useful in practice: inspectors work through batches ordered by the last submission date, so adding files to an open batch pushes every file in it to the back of the queue. Start a new batch for new work instead of topping up an old one.
What resolution do Getty Images photos need to be?
Getty requires a minimum of 3 megapixels and a maximum of 256 megapixels for photographs, saved as JPEG in RGB at the highest JPEG quality setting with no resizing or upsizing. Getty's own worked example makes the floor concrete: a 2000 x 1333 pixel file is under three million pixels and fails the minimum. Raster illustrations have a separate floor of 1900 x 2800 pixels, with 4075 x 4075 recommended, and vector EPS files must be CS6 compatible and paired with a matching raster file.
How long does Getty Images take to review a submission?
Getty states that files are reviewed within 3 to 15 days, with inspection times varying by season and other factors. If a batch has not been reviewed after 15 business days, Getty asks you to open a support ticket and include the batch ID numbers shown on each batch. Once files are accepted, allow roughly three more days for them to appear on the customer-facing site and in credit line and keyword searches.
Can I edit keywords after Getty accepts a file?
No. Getty states plainly that once a file has been accepted, contributors can no longer add keywords to it. Correcting an essential omission such as a location or the primary subject means opening a support ticket with the affected file IDs using Getty's spreadsheet template, and the keyword team can decline terms it judges unlikely to be used by buyers. This makes the pre-upload metadata pass the single highest-leverage step in a Getty workflow.
Is the Getty Images and iStock upload process the same?
Largely yes. Both brands are served by the same contributor help centre and the same ESP portal, and the file preparation rules are written for both at once. The one mechanical difference Getty documents sits at batch level: Getty Images contributors must submit every file in a batch before that batch can be reviewed, while iStock and Moment contributors can have submitted files reviewed without completing the batch, though Getty says completing it is still preferred.