Every European photo gallery software tool reviewed
Haugschlag, Austria
Free 5 GB and 3 published galleries / Starter €8, Pro €19, Studio €45 per month billed yearly (€12, €25, €59 monthly)
Permanent free plan, plus a 14-day trial of the paid plans with no card
Best for: Photographers who need to tell a client in writing that the photographs stay inside the EU
Photoglacier is a client-gallery and review-board service built around the handoff: photos and video clips side by side in one gallery, clients who can favourite and download without creating an account, and access controls that run from a password to a PIN or an email gate.
Its hosting statement is the most complete in the category. The privacy policy names Hetzner Online GmbH in Germany for hosting, says data centres are exclusively within the European Union, and lists a Swiss move to Exoscale by October 2026, with Bunny.net of Slovenia and Mailjet on EU processing. It states that no transfers to other third countries take place.
The operator is nord3 digital e.U., an Austrian sole proprietorship at Rottal 33, 3874 Haugschlag, registered under FN 565722 w at the Landesgericht Krems an der Donau, with VAT ID ATU77643356 and Franz Kuben as owner.
Pricing is in euros: Free gives 5 GB and three published galleries with a watermark, Starter is €8 a month billed yearly for 100 GB, Pro €19 for 500 GB with custom domains, and Studio €45 for 2 TB with five seats and collaborative boards.
The limit to know is size. This is one registered individual, not a company with a team behind it, which suits the hosting story and not necessarily a studio that needs a contractual guarantee of continuity.
What Photoglacier does well
- Privacy policy says every provider processes data within the European Union
- Hetzner in Germany today, with an announced move to Exoscale in Switzerland
- Euro pricing with a permanent free plan of 5 GB
- Complete Austrian imprint with Firmenbuch number and VAT ID
- Photos and video clips in the same gallery
Where Photoglacier falls short
- Run by one registered individual, which raises a vendor-continuity question
- The free plan carries a Photoglacier watermark and allows three published galleries
- Custom domains start at the Pro plan
- No security certification published
Standout feature. It is the only tool here whose privacy policy states that all of its service providers work within the European Union.
Berlin, Germany
Free 1 GB and 3 galleries / Pro €14.99, Advanced €39.99, Business €99.99 per month, Enterprise on request, up to 16% off yearly
14-day trial of Advanced with no card, then the free plan
Best for: Commercial photographers whose clients need to comment on and select from large sets
Picdrop is built around proofing. The pricing page lists comments, colour markers, custom markers, votes and likes and scribbles under client collaboration, supports almost every image and video format including RAW and TIFF, and takes client uploads on all plans. The pricing page states "Hosted in Germany".
The operator is PicDrop GmbH at Am Kupfergraben 4/4a, 10117 Berlin, registered at Amtsgericht Berlin (Charlottenburg) under HRB 173131, VAT ID DE305469813, with Nicky Szmala as managing director. Prices are in euros: Free is 1 GB and three galleries, Pro €14.99, Advanced €39.99 and Business €99.99 a month, Enterprise on request, with up to 16% off yearly and a 14-day trial of Advanced with no card.
The privacy policy is honest about the pages around the product. It lists US processors for a chatbot (Chatbase), ticketing (HelpScout), Google and Microsoft advertising and analytics, affiliate tracking and an OAuth provider, all under standard contractual clauses or the EU-US Data Privacy Framework. None of those is described as holding the photographs, which sit in Germany, but the policy does not name the German hosting provider.
What Picdrop does well
- Detailed proofing: comments, colour markers, votes and scribbles
- RAW, TIFF and video formats accepted
- GmbH with HRB number, VAT ID and a named managing director
- Pricing page states hosting in Germany
- Free plan and a 14-day trial with no card
Where Picdrop falls short
- The German hosting provider is not named in the policy
- The privacy policy lists many US processors for support, marketing and analytics
- Free plan is 1 GB and three galleries
- Store and print sales are not on the pricing page
Standout feature. It is the one gallery service here that lists a full proofing toolset on its pricing page and states German hosting in the same place.
Saint-Sébastien-sur-Loire, France
Self-hosted free / hosted Pro €32, Team €109, Enterprise €219, VIP €439 per month; support plans for self-hosters from €43 per month
30-day free trial on hosted plans
Best for: People who want an open-source gallery they can host themselves or rent from a French company
Piwigo is a long-running open-source photo gallery application with a hosted version run by the company behind it. Self-hosted, it is free with all features, themes and plugins. Hosted, it runs from €32 a month for Pro with 10 GB and one administrator to €439 for VIP with 1,000 GB, with a 30-day free trial and no setup fees. Self-hosters can buy support plans from €43 a month.
The operator is PigoLabs, a French SAS at 12 avenue Jules Verne, Bat. A, 44230 Saint-Sébastien-sur-Loire, registered in Nantes under 528 932 114 with VAT number FR 29 528932114. The terms put the hosting at OVHcloud, 2 rue Kellermann, 59100 Roubaix, France, and French law and French courts govern disputes. That is a short list of facts and all of them point the same direction.
The trade-off is the audience. Piwigo is more a gallery system than a client-delivery product, and the entry price for the hosted plan, €32, is high next to tools aimed at freelancers.
What Piwigo does well
- Open source; every feature free when self-hosted
- Hosted service on OVHcloud in Roubaix, France, named in the terms
- French SAS with registration number and VAT number in the terms
- Free 30-day trial on hosted plans and no setup fees
- Support plans for self-hosters from €43 a month
Where Piwigo falls short
- Hosted plans start at €32 a month for 10 GB
- Less focused on client proofing than Picdrop or Picflow
- Self-hosting means maintaining PHP, a database and backups yourself
- No certification published
Standout feature. It is the only tool here where the same product is both open source to self-host and sold as a hosted service on a named French provider.
Leipzig, Germany
Free 10 GB / Profi €11.90, Profi Flex €22.90, Ultimate €49.90 per month (€8.90, €18.90, €42.90 billed yearly), plus a service fee per sale
Permanent free plan with all features
Best for: Photographers who sell downloads and prints and want orders, production and shipping handled
Pictrs is a gallery and shop system. It handles orders, payments, print production, shipping and customer support, offers QR-code organisation for school and kindergarten shoots, start-number search for sports, video sales and feedback galleries. Photographers keep their image rights, and there is a free plan with all features and 10 GB.
The operator is Pictrs GmbH at Brandvorwerkstr. 52-54, 04275 Leipzig, registered at Amtsgericht Leipzig under HRB 28764, VAT ID DE269737240, with Christian Prüfer and Philipp Albig as managing directors. The privacy page states "Serverstandort Deutschland" and an ISO 27001 data centre. It also states that Google Analytics, YouTube and Facebook plugins, and Stripe card processing transfer data to US servers, which concerns the website and payment, not named as the gallery store.
The cost sits in the sales fee rather than the subscription: on the free plan 15% on downloads and 17.5% on prints, falling to 13% and 15.5% on Profi at €11.90 a month, 11% and 13.5% on Profi Flex at €22.90 and from 6% and 8.5% on Ultimate at €49.90, with 20% off on annual billing.
What Pictrs does well
- Complete German imprint with register number, VAT ID and two named directors
- Servers stated to be in Germany, in an ISO 27001 data centre
- Free plan with all features and 10 GB
- Handles ordering, print production and shipping
- QR-code and start-number search for school and sports photography
Where Pictrs falls short
- Service fee on every sale, highest on the free plan
- US services named for analytics, video and social plugins on the website
- Built for selling; proofing is a smaller part of the product
- Storage on lower plans is 100 GB or 250 GB
Standout feature. It is the only tool here that runs the whole order chain, from gallery to shipped print, from a German GmbH with servers in Germany.
Zürich, Switzerland
Free 2 GB / Plus 100 GB, Pro 1 TB, Biz 5 TB, Enterprise on request; 25% off yearly
Permanent free plan, plus a 7-day trial of paid plans
Best for: Photographers who edit in Lightroom or Capture One and want to publish selects straight to the client
Picflow is a client gallery and proofing tool with a free plan of 2 GB, unlimited galleries and unlimited collaborators on every plan. Its site describes Lightroom Classic and Capture One plugins that push selects straight into a gallery, and clients can favourite, comment and download without signing up. Plans run Plus at 100 GB, Pro at 1 TB, Biz at 5 TB and Enterprise on request, with 25% off yearly and a 7-day trial.
The company is Nusign AG, trading as Picflow, registered at Schöneggstrasse 5, 8004 Zürich. The terms put the relationship with that Swiss company under Swiss law, with the courts of the Canton of Zürich. Switzerland is not in the EU, which matters for an EU controller: it counts as adequate under a European Commission decision, but it is a different legal order.
The privacy policy states "Picflow's primary hosting location is Ireland (EU)" and adds that some infrastructure and subprocessors may process data in other regions, including the United States. It names Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft, Mixpanel, Pinterest and Stripe, and Slack for internal communications.
What Picflow does well
- Primary hosting stated as Ireland (EU)
- Lightroom Classic and Capture One plugins described on the site
- Free plan with unlimited galleries and collaborators
- Swiss company with named registered office and governing law
- Long list of subprocessors published in the policy
Where Picflow falls short
- Swiss, not EU, jurisdiction
- Policy allows processing in other regions including the United States
- No register number found on the pages checked
- The free plan is 2 GB
Standout feature. It is the one tool here that publishes its editing-software plugins and a named Irish primary hosting location together.
Munich, Germany
Pay as you go €10 per gallery (online one year) / Unlimited Bundle €199 per year
Three galleries free for three months, no automatic renewal
Best for: Event and wedding photographers who want each guest to get a personal gallery link
PictoMento delivers galleries to guests, with facial recognition used to give each person an individualised link. It accepts JPG, PNG, WebP, GIF and MP4, with 35 MB per photo and 10 GB per video, stores original files and generates optimised versions, and supports English, German and Dutch. Pricing is €10 per gallery, online for one year before client handover, or €199 a year for the Unlimited Bundle, with three galleries free for three months.
The operator is Evolo Software GmbH at Freseniusstr. 14, 81247 Munich, registered at the Munich local court under HRB 309087, VAT ID DE459746634, with Robin Meindersma as representative. The privacy policy says personal data on the website is stored exclusively on its own systems in Germany.
Photos, backups and databases are stored with Storj Labs, a US company, over a node network which the policy states is exclusively within the EEA, to the best of its knowledge. That is a stated EEA location with a US counterparty, and a client who needs a European provider at every layer should read that sentence twice.
What PictoMento does well
- Personalised guest links with facial recognition
- Personal data stated to sit on its own systems in Germany
- Complete German imprint with HRB number and VAT ID
- Pay per gallery or a flat annual price
- Three galleries free for three months
Where PictoMento falls short
- Media stored via Storj Labs, a US company, though nodes are stated to be in the EEA
- Face recognition is a data protection decision as well as a feature
- No monthly plan; galleries expire after one year on pay-as-you-go
- Interface in English, German and Dutch only
Standout feature. It is the only tool here built around a personal link for every guest at an event.
Berlin, Germany
Community free (AGPL) / paid memberships billed annually / managed hosting through PikaPods from €6.50 per month
Free Community edition with no time limit
Best for: People who want their photo library on hardware they control, not on any vendor server
PhotoPrism is a photo management application for your own server. The Community edition is AGPL-licensed, self-hosted, and supports RAW, video and panorama files, with people recognition, duplicate detection and folder organisation. Paid memberships add features and are billed annually, and managed hosting is available through PikaPods from €6.50 a month.
The operator is PhotoPrism UG (haftungsbeschränkt) at Zimmermannstr. 37, 12163 Berlin, registered at Amtsgericht Berlin (Charlottenburg) under HRB 240600 B, with VAT ID DE352840145. The terms apply German law with disputes in Berlin. The privacy policy says data that never leaves your private network cannot be collected by anyone, including the company.
For the vendor's own services the policy lists Hetzner, DigitalOcean and GitHub for hosting, Stripe, PayPal and Patreon for payments, and Google, Postmark and Mailgun for email, so the ownership question applies to the membership side and not to a self-hosted library.
What PhotoPrism does well
- AGPL Community edition, free, on your own hardware
- The vendor holds none of the photographs on a self-hosted install
- German UG with full imprint including register number and VAT ID
- Unlimited storage and instances on Community
- RAW, video and panorama support
Where PhotoPrism falls short
- You run the server, backups and updates yourself
- A gallery for personal libraries more than client delivery
- Paid memberships are billed annually and priced for organisations
- Vendor services use US providers including GitHub, Stripe and Google
Standout feature. It is the only tool here where the vendor states it cannot collect your photographs, because they never leave your network.
Düsseldorf, Germany
Free 3 galleries / from €14.50 per month, Professional €29 per month, annual billing
14 days of all premium functions after registration, then the free plan
Best for: Photographers who want a gallery with a built-in print and download shop
Scrappbook offers galleries with a shop system for prints and digital products, design templates, branding, download and watermarking, statistics and password protection. The vendor describes it as a B2B tool for professional photographers. A free version allows three galleries without time limit, with all premium functions available for the first 14 days, and paid plans start at €14.50 a month, Professional at €29, on annual billing.
The operator is Photostore24.online GmbH at Erkrather Straße 401, 40231 Düsseldorf, registered at Düsseldorf under HRB 87425, VAT ID DE326829804, with Markus Reichl as managing director. The homepage states that all galleries are hosted on EU servers with GDPR compliance and a processing agreement.
The privacy policy gives a more mixed picture. HostPress GmbH in Germany hosts the website, within the EU only, but the policy also names AWS and Heroku for cloud infrastructure and MongoDB for databases, with MongoDB on EU servers that may in exceptional cases transfer to the USA, plus Google, PayPal and Stripe. Whether the photo files sit with HostPress or with AWS is not stated.
What Scrappbook does well
- Shop for prints and digital products inside the gallery
- Free plan without time limit, three galleries
- German GmbH with HRB number, VAT ID and managing director
- Processing agreement offered and EU servers claimed on the homepage
- Watermarks, statistics and password protection
Where Scrappbook falls short
- Policy names AWS, Heroku and MongoDB, which does not match a plain EU-only claim
- The location of the photo files is not stated separately
- Free plan limited to three galleries
- B2B only; not for private individuals
Standout feature. It combines a free three-gallery plan with a built-in shop, from a German GmbH, but its hosting claim and subprocessor list do not fully agree.
Nancray, France
Essential $12, Standard $25, Business $45 per month; Team $100, Brand $200 per month
14-day free trial, no card required
Best for: Photographers who want a website, client galleries and a shop in one account with no commission
PhotoDeck is a photography website and media-library platform: customisable themes, client galleries for proofing, an e-commerce side for downloads and prints with 0% commission, face recognition and AI metadata, and support for more than 15 languages. Plans run Essential at $12 a month with 10 GB, Standard at $25 with 100 GB and eCommerce, Business at $45 with 300 GB, Team at $100 and Brand at $200, all with a 14-day trial.
The operator is PhotoDeck, SARL at 10 rue des Pins, 25360 Nancray, registered at RCS Besançon under SIRET 523 507 31700023, VAT FR07523507317. The legal notice describes it as "Proudly made in Europe".
The same notice states that the service operates on servers maintained by OVH in Roubaix, France, and by Amazon.com in Seattle, USA. It does not say which holds which data, so a European-only requirement cannot be assumed to be met.
What PhotoDeck does well
- Website, client galleries and shop in one account
- 0% commission on sales
- French SARL with RCS number and VAT number in its legal notice
- Face recognition and AI metadata for large libraries
- Interface in more than 15 languages
Where PhotoDeck falls short
- Legal notice names Amazon in the USA next to OVH in France
- Prices are in US dollars
- No free plan, only a 14-day trial
- More expensive than the gallery-only tools here
Standout feature. It is the only tool here that combines a website builder, a shop and client galleries from one French company, with an honest legal notice about its Amazon hosting.
Ansbach, Germany
Solo €9, Pro €19 per month, Custom for 101+ galleries
14-day trial, no card required
Best for: Photographers who want galleries, a portfolio site and shoot briefings for one flat price
Lumeny bundles client galleries, a portfolio website built from the galleries, mobile shoot briefings with shot lists and mood boards, and a shoot overview dashboard. Storage is unlimited on all plans: Solo is €9 a month for up to 25 active galleries, Pro €19 for up to 100 with a custom domain, and Custom for 101 or more. A 14-day trial needs no card.
The imprint names Christian Bauer, Jüdtstr. 24, 91522 Ansbach, as operator and states no legal form, register number or VAT ID. The homepage says data centres are in Germany with automated backups.
The privacy policy lists Backblaze (encrypted database and image backups) and Cloudflare (CDN) in the United States, OpenAI for content moderation of images, and Stripe Payments Europe in Ireland, with standard contractual clauses and transfer impact assessments. That is the reason it ranks tenth: images are processed by a US moderation API and backed up in the USA.
What Lumeny does well
- Unlimited storage on every plan
- Portfolio site and shoot briefings included in the price
- Euro pricing from €9 a month
- Named German operator with a full address
- Transfer impact assessments referenced in the policy
Where Lumeny falls short
- Images go to OpenAI for content moderation, per the privacy policy
- Backups at Backblaze and CDN at Cloudflare, both US
- No legal form, register number or VAT ID in the imprint
- No free plan; 14-day trial only
Standout feature. It is the only tool here that bundles galleries, a portfolio and shoot briefings, and the only one whose policy names an AI moderation vendor for the images.
Berlin, Germany
Free plan; paid prices could not be verified (the archived pricing page contradicts other figures)
Free plan, no card required
Best for: Photographers who want a simple branded gallery and are comfortable with a one-person vendor
Picstack describes itself as an online photo gallery platform for photographers, with branded galleries, subgalleries for events, activity tracking and client notifications, and a free plan. Its paid prices could not be verified: the archived pricing page contradicts the figures shown elsewhere on the site. The site presents itself as made in Germany and GDPR compliant.
The imprint names Georgian-Alexandru Nastase, Picstack, Karl-Elsasser-Str. 23, 12347 Berlin, with small-business status under section 19 of the German VAT Act, which means a sole proprietor without VAT charged. The privacy policy names Hetzner Online GmbH in Gunzenhausen, Germany, as host for the website and also names Vercel and a content delivery network.
What the pages do not say is where uploaded photographs are stored. The policy covers the website; the product storage location is not named, and the EU-servers claim appears in marketing rather than in the policy. That is why it sits in the last place, below every tool that names a provider.
What Picstack does well
- Free plan with no card required
- Named individual with a Berlin address in the imprint
- Website hosted by Hetzner in Germany
- Branded galleries and subgalleries for events
Where Picstack falls short
- Photo storage location not stated in the policy
- Sole proprietor, so a continuity question for client archives
- Website also uses Vercel and a CDN
- No register number, since it is not a registered company
Standout feature. It is the one tool here where neither the paid prices nor the photo storage location could be verified from the vendor's own pages.
