Delivery guide
How to deliver photos to clients online
Delivery is the last thing a client experiences and the part they describe to other people, which makes it worth more attention than a folder and a link usually get. The mechanics are simple once decided: export properly, group the set, choose what people can take, and send one address that still works in six months.
Five steps, start to finish
This is the whole job. The decisions in steps three and four are the ones worth thinking about once and then reusing.
-
Export at the size you intend to hand over
Decide before exporting whether the client gets full-resolution files, web-sized copies, or both. Exporting once at the highest quality you will offer, and letting the platform generate smaller versions, saves re-exporting an entire wedding later.
-
Group the set so it can be navigated
A wedding is not one sequence of eight hundred frames, it is getting ready, ceremony, portraits and reception. Sections let people find the part they want, and make the whole thing feel considered rather than dumped.
-
Decide what people can take
Downloads on or off, at what size, and whether the full-resolution set needs a PIN. The common arrangement is web-sized downloads open to anyone with the link, and originals reserved for the person who paid.
-
Decide who gets in
An unlisted link is enough for most jobs. A password suits anything sensitive, and an email gate is useful when you want to know who has been in, or want the addresses for a guest list. Choose per job, not once forever.
-
Send one link and say what happens next
One address, a sentence on how long it will stay up, and a note that they can share it with family. Most follow-up questions after a delivery are about those two things, so answering them in the first message removes them.
What a client should be able to do
Four things people expect without being told, and notice immediately when they are missing.
Open it without signing up
Every account you ask a client to create is a chance for them to give up and email you instead. A gallery link should open in any browser, on a phone, with nothing to install.
Mark the ones they want
Favourites are how a client tells you which frames matter, whether for an album, a print order, or just to show their mother. Collecting that in the gallery beats a list of filenames in a text message.
Download at a size that suits
Web-sized files for sharing, originals for printing. Handing over only the largest files means a client emails a 40 MB image to a relative and nobody enjoys the result.
Come back to it later
People return to a wedding gallery for years. A link that expires in a week turns into a request for you to re-upload everything, usually at the least convenient moment.
How the common methods compare
The three approaches most photographers actually use, and what each one does to the handover.
| What matters | Transfer link | Cloud drive folder | Client gallery |
|---|---|---|---|
| How it looks | A file list and a download button | A grid of thumbnails and filenames | The photographs, presented, in your branding |
| How long it lasts | Days, then the link is dead | As long as the folder exists and stays shared | As long as you choose to keep it up |
| What the client can do | Download everything, or nothing | Download, and accidentally move or delete files | View, favourite, comment, download what you allow |
| What comes back to you | Whether it was downloaded, sometimes | Very little | Who opened it, what they liked, what they took |
What this looks like in practice
Photoglacier does the delivery half of the job described above. Upload a job, group it into sections, set the download and access rules, and send one link that keeps working. It is built in Austria and runs on servers in Germany, so files stay inside the EU.
- Unlimited galleries and images on every plan, including the free one
- Favourites, ratings and comments, with one-click Lightroom filename export
- Galleries that do not expire, and no per-image fees
Questions people are asking
What is the best way to deliver photos to a client online?
A private gallery link. You upload the finished set, group it, set what people can download, and send one address. The client views everything in the browser, marks favourites and takes the files at the size you allow, with nothing to install and no account to create.
How do I deliver wedding photos?
Build one gallery for the couple, split into getting ready, ceremony, portraits and reception, and send a single link they can pass to family. Keep full-resolution downloads for the couple and offer web-sized files to everyone else. If there is a highlight film, put it in the same gallery so the whole job arrives together.
Should clients be able to download full-resolution files?
Usually yes, for the people who commissioned the work. The common arrangement is originals for the client, web-sized copies for guests and family, and a PIN on the full-resolution set when it matters. What to avoid is offering only the largest files to everybody.
How long should a client gallery stay online?
Long enough that the client stops asking, which in practice is months rather than days. Say at delivery how long you will keep it up. Galleries that vanish after a week generate re-upload requests, and galleries kept forever without a reason accumulate data you have to account for.
Do clients need an account to see their photos?
They should not. A gallery is a web page, so a link is enough. Depending on how you set it up they may enter a password or an email address first, but neither is the same as making them register for a service.
How do I collect client favourites for an album?
Let them mark favourites in the gallery, then export the selected filenames and filter by them in Lightroom. It removes the step where a client sends thirty filenames in a message and you retype them.
Online photo delivery for professional photographers
How to deliver photos to clients online is the question most photographers solve once and then keep for years, usually badly the first time. The pattern that holds up is a single private gallery per job, sections instead of one long scroll, download rules set deliberately rather than by default, and a link that outlives the conversation around it.
Photoglacier is built for that pattern and nothing beyond it. Unlimited galleries and images on every plan, video clips in the same gallery as the stills, favourites and comments that come back to you as a Lightroom filename export, download control per gallery, and no expiry. It is an Austrian company hosting in Germany, so photos and client data stay inside the EU. The free plan starts with 5 GB.
More guides
Send the next job as one link
Unlimited galleries, EU hosting, and a free plan with 5 GB to try on a real delivery.
