Flickr vs. Picasa Web Albums

25th March 2007

Posted in Review, Software |

versus

I couldn’t find a good comparison of the upgraded versions of the best online photo album so I decided to write one myself. This was originally meant for a friend but I thought everyone could benefit from this. Now lets get on with the reviews.

Space
One of the most important and basic features of any image hosting or web album service is the storage limitations. First, lets see the free accounts. In Flickr, there is a 100Mb upload limit per month but not storage limitations or thats what people think. There is a limit of 200 images with a maximum of 5Mb per image which means the limit is around 1000MB for a free account. In Picasa Web Albums, there is a specified limit of 1024MB or 1GB, and a limit of 10MB for each image. Picasa wins here because we can store as many images as we want within the 1024MB.
Now, lets move to paid accounts. Flickr has a fee of US$24.95 a year for a Pro Account. With a Pro Account, all your limitations are removed and you can upload an unlimited amount of images. Even if your Pro Account expires, the images will not be deleted and can be recovered if you pay for the next year. Picasa Web Albums has a slightly different approach with a increasing price for increasing storage limits. For US$25 a year, which is about the same as Flickr, we can buy upto 7GB of storage. This increases in 4 levels upto 251GB at US$500 a year.

Sets/Collections/Albums
A simple way of organizing your images is by putting similar images together in albums. This is very helpful in sorting out images. Once again we’ll observe free accounts at first. Flickr has a limit of 3 set in a free account and collections (a group of sets) are available only for Pro Accounts. Picasa Web Albums has no limit and you can add as many albums as you want but you cannot add sub-albums. But you only add 500 images per album. For paid accounts, there is no difference in Picasa but in Flickr, you can add as many sets and collections as you want. Sets can be defined as sub-albums and the collections can be albums.

Organizing
Flickr has a interactive AJAX Organizer for organizing the images. In this organizer, you can add or modify sets and collections, tag pictures, share your images with your groups, add geo-location tags for the images, edit the permission and captions for the images and do minor editing like rotating, etc. A batch editing feature is also available. Picasa also features a AJAX organiser for arranging images within an album. Adding of image captions is pretty simple and the images do not require a separate image title.

Layout / Viewing
In Flickr, you can alter the layout of the pages to a certain extent with pre-designed layouts. You have an option of 4 layouts for the free version and 6 layouts for the paid version. The visitor can also choose to download different sizes of the same image. Picasa Web Albums does not allow you to change the layout but while viewing the albums, anyone can dynamically change the size of the thumbnails which is pretty good and useful feature.The visitor can also choose to download an entire album which saves time. Even while viewing a single image, you can zoom into the image and scroll around it within the browser itself.

Slideshow
In Flickr, the Slideshow is displayed via Flash and you can choose to display it in a pop-up window or withing the browser itself. It does not cover the entire screen and you have access to basic Slideshow controls. In Picasa Web Albums the Slideshow is displayed via AJAX and HTML and you choose to display the captions. The Slideshow covers the entire browser viewing area and also has the basic controls.

Uploading & Comments
In Flickr, images can be uploaded through the browser, mobile phone, email or Flickr’s software for PC, Mac or Linux. The commenting system is fine, you can also subscribe to the RSS Feed of your comments. You need to be registered to post comments. In Picasa Web Albums ,uploading can either be done through Picasa or via the browser, a plugin is also provided for Mac users. The commenting system is basic but does its job. You need to have a Google Account to post comments.

Misc. Features
In Flickr, you can add notes to individual pictures which will be displayed when the user hovers his mouse over certain areas in the image. Flickr has a API which is useful for integration into websites. Picasa’s most remarkable feature is that it also supports the uploading of videos which can be viewed as a streaming video. Picasa has just released a API Feature so it will take some time before services are developed for it.

Verdict
For free accounts, go Google and use Picasa Web Albums. It supports more images and albums and even though it lacks a few features, one can manage without them. So, if you do not wish to pay and have a simple and good web album, use Picasa. You may opt for Flickr for a feature rich but limited album.
If you are willing to pay $2 per month, then Flickr is your best friend, with unlimited images and sets, there is virtually no limit to what you can do with Flickr.

Another different alternative is DeviantART although it is not intended for usage as a web album but rather as a showcase for your art. You may try it out but it will not have features like Flickr or Picasa Web Albums since it was not meant to be an photo album.

The choice is yours to make depending on your requirements and thoughts.

Thanks for reading this review, I hope you enjoyed reading it. If you feel that I may have missed out something that is worth mentioning, please feel free to post in the comments.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, March 25th, 2007 at 9:53 pm and is filed under Review, Software. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

1 On March 26th, 2007, Bhagyalakshmi said:

ok…really…thank u SO much for that.
that was definitely informative.
Im going to see what i have to do after boards.
thanks again.

posted on March 26th, 2007 at 5:45 pm

2 On March 26th, 2007, kishor said:

Your welcome.

Glad that you benefited from it.

posted on March 26th, 2007 at 8:06 pm

3 On April 4th, 2007, Justin said:

Very nice and to the point. Bravo!
-Justin

posted on April 4th, 2007 at 1:19 am

4 On April 15th, 2007, ok said:

Thank you for nice review. Can Picasa or Flickr generate tags automatically from IPTC keywords that can be embedded directly into the image file? (see http://www.krishnamoorthi.com/2007/03/25/flickr-vs-picasa-web-albums/ for more details on IPTC tags)

posted on April 15th, 2007 at 7:21 am

5 On April 28th, 2007, dadsp33k said:

Nice review. I’m using Picassa Web Albums because everything else I’m using is Google (aps, gmail, gcal, etc..). I especially like how easy it is to upload via iphoto.

posted on April 28th, 2007 at 11:34 pm

6 On May 3rd, 2007, Nikhil said:

Good, informative review. What won me over in picasa web albums is the multiple-albums organization, as well as freedom of arrangement. Those two were lacking in flickr and had made it such that all my visitors would only see the latest-20 images & leave. Plus, the 200-pics limit had caught me completely off guard. Picasa’s interface is just what i need, and now with 500+pics and only 25% space occupied, I’m currently moving my pics form flickr to picasa. Now, i really hope the guys at google-picasa add the tagging feature to picasa web album, that will effectively seal the deal!

posted on May 3rd, 2007 at 9:15 pm

7 On May 13th, 2007, Jose said:

Your review is excellent. One thing I read in another review is that with Flickr if you share a private album with family and friends, then they too have to have Flickr accounts. Only public albums can be shared without the need for an account. Google does not require for a viewer of an album to have an account. This is especially important to me because a lot the people I share my photos with are not very Internet savvy so the least obstacles the better.

posted on May 13th, 2007 at 12:05 pm

8 On May 24th, 2007, kent said:

recently flickr has added an option to view private photos with a special link you can send to specific people. this feature is called ’shared set’ / ‘guest pass’. you can chose when to expire it as well

posted on May 24th, 2007 at 6:17 pm

9 On May 28th, 2007, Taylor said:

Nice review. I use picasa anyway at home - even if you use flickr picasa is the best desktop picture organizer. I suspect the integration of these two will only get better over time - and knowing google I suspect the storage limits will increase over time too. I agree if you’re going free, web albums are the way to go.

One nice thing is if you use iGoogle there is a nice gadget that scrolls thru your online images. Its fun and easy to use. While there is probably one for flickr, the picasa one is easy to find and use.

posted on May 28th, 2007 at 10:07 pm

10 On June 4th, 2007, Sri Sankaran said:

Nice summary. Exactly what I was looking for and confirmed by suspicion of the 200 image limit in (free) Flickr.

posted on June 4th, 2007 at 2:40 am

11 On June 18th, 2007, ole said:

Yes, picasa is better. I just don’t get flickr. Flickr is counter-intuitive, the “latest images” feature is completely disorienting and the homepage for a user makes no sense, showing pics like it does. and free flickr only has three albums? what?!?!? it’s way too complex..

posted on June 18th, 2007 at 9:27 am

12 On June 27th, 2007, pmeyer said:

HI,
I loved your review! It was just what I was looking for.

One thing I’d like to see you discuss -

I would like to know how the two services compare in one aspect: are the photos I put up there available to anyone? In the free or paid accounts?

posted on June 27th, 2007 at 5:37 am

13 On June 30th, 2007, Metamorfose said:

Well, I was about to buy flickr account, because I deal in alot of images, like 500 images after each ‘event’ and so that would add up fast. But since flickr doesn’t have paypal capabilities, I am gona look elsewhere :/ to bad.

posted on June 30th, 2007 at 1:03 am

14 On August 12th, 2007, picORflic said:

Can someone tell me which of (or do both) PicasaWeb or Flick support this:
I have an album that I only want two of my friends to see. Nobody else should have access to it even if those two friends forward the URL to anybody else. Is there a solution for this ?
I think the best way is to provide access to that album based on login ids. Which service provides that level of privacy ?

posted on August 12th, 2007 at 12:04 am

15 On August 12th, 2007, kishor said:

picORflic,

Flickr would be perfect for you, you should mark your images as private and add your 2 friends as ‘Contacts’ so that they will be able to see them.

posted on August 12th, 2007 at 8:09 pm

16 On August 13th, 2007, picORflic said:

Thanks for the answer, Kishor.
That provision of privacy makes me lean towards Flickr. But I have these two questions and somebody correct me if I am wrong:
1. Flickr does not support video right now although PicasaWeb does (I just tried an image+video mixed slideshow in picasa and it works perfectly).
2. Flickr does not allow one to smoothly click on the ‘Next’ button (right arrow icon) and show the next picture without causing a page refresh. In fact, I don’t even see a ‘Next’ button for the main image - it exists only for the photostream which shows those worthless minisize pictures.
Am I correct ? If so, I find that annoying and am back to square One in deciding which of the two to use

posted on August 13th, 2007 at 8:23 am

17 On August 13th, 2007, kishor said:

Yes, Flickr does not support videos.

And what you said regarding the next button is correct. But you can click on the previous/next image rather than the arrow to view it.

However, you have an option of a slideshow for the images which works quite well and is easy to navigate too.

posted on August 13th, 2007 at 9:21 am

18 On September 20th, 2007, aly said:

to make an album viewable by only those you invite, in picasa, you mark the album as private and send invites and that’s it, afaik. i don’t think that others can view the album even if the invite email is fwd’d (cookies). haven’t tested that tho.

one thing i really like about picasa vs flickr is contacts. import your contacts into your gmail acct and they automatically are filled in when you’re sending invites to view albums. flickr doesn’t connect with a yahoo acct or any address book/contact list, so you have to manually enter addresses every time, even if you’ve sent them an invite before. (unless I’ve missed something).

important note tho wrt to picasa is that there seems to be no way to backup a picasa web album if you’re on a mac (or if you’re not using the picasa desktop software). if you want that capability, you must use iphoto and the picasa exporter and the web album is just a copy of the album you created on your hard drive.

flickr’s concept is more about sharing photos among the flickr communityas opposed to photo albums to save and share with friends, but there are some 3rd party freeware apps for downloading to backup your sets; dk if this saves your comments/captions.

posted on September 20th, 2007 at 11:13 pm

19 On September 20th, 2007, aly said:

to correct myself, I just came across this on picasa’s help site:

Unlisted albums include an Authorization Key or a mix of letters and numbers in the URL to keep them “Unlisted.” If you attempt to view an unlisted album without this additional code, you will receive a 404 error. You can ask the album’s owner to send you an invitation to the album which includes the new URL.

posted on September 20th, 2007 at 11:33 pm

20 On September 23rd, 2007, Adrian said:

Thanks a bunch for this review; it’s exactly what I was looking for! I really didn’t feel like comparing the FAQ-sections of both sites… =/

I’ll just stick with Picasa for the moment, maybe go Flickr pro if I exceed the 1GB! I’m in New Zealand right now and shooting photos like crazy.. The lack of sub-albums IS quite a shame though, but I’ll just take that for granted. Thanks!!

posted on September 23rd, 2007 at 7:04 am

21 On October 14th, 2007, Fiona said:

As a non-paying user of both services, I prefer Picasa’s interface to Flickr’s. Photos look more organized when placed in albums and you can create as many albums as you like in Picasa. In Flickr, as you have written, you can only create 3 albums (sets) if you are a non-paying member. I still haven’t figured out the best way to organize my 1,600 travel photos using only 3 albums. I’d rather have a separate album for each destination and I’m glad I can do that with Picasa.

posted on October 14th, 2007 at 4:46 am

22 On November 1st, 2007, Karen said:

Thanks for your post! There aren’t many recent reviews comparing the two sites.

I’m thinking about going with the paid flickr account. My main purpose is to have an online site serve as backup for all my photos. And I’m choosing flickr because of the unlimited space and bandwith.

Now, I need a site to store my videos. Google’s free 1gb space isn’t going to store much.

posted on November 1st, 2007 at 8:18 pm

23 On November 2nd, 2007, kishor said:

Hi Karen, I would recommend Carbonite.com for backing up not only your videos but all your files. They’re priced at around $50 a year for unlimited backup.

And thanks for kind comments

posted on November 2nd, 2007 at 12:24 am

24 On February 13th, 2008, John Beckley said:

We are a web design and marketing company, for a year or so we have been using flickr pro and advising our Real Estate clients to as well. The flickr wordpress plugin works well and even our clients flickr account get indexed in google search results which is even better. The bad news is that flickr deleted one of our clients accounts becasue they said it was commercial which it wasn’t, it showed new development properties but they were used to feed into their blog and keep everyone informed. At no point were they trying to sell proeprty from their flickr account. Flickr didn’t even give a warning…straight delete

So I ahve registered a picasa account and will more than likley advise my clients to move accross. Question, can picasa photos get indexed in google’s search results (not images)? and will they be as strict as flickr reegarding images of property?

posted on February 13th, 2008 at 1:30 pm

25 On February 13th, 2008, Kishor said:

I’m not sure about how strict Picasa is, but I think their results get indexed in Google results. Once again I’m not too sure about this, but I suppose you could contact Picasa for further details.

posted on February 13th, 2008 at 8:53 pm

26 On February 24th, 2008, Et le prix est attribué à … flickr said:

[...] gratuit, et un payant, plus ou moins équivalents. Après quelques recherches sur le net [1] [2] [3], mon choix s’est porté vers flickr, parce qu’il possède les meilleurs [...]

posted on February 24th, 2008 at 10:44 pm

27 On March 31st, 2008, sicl4015 said:

Flickr doesn’t delete the images if you don’t pay. You can start up again upon payment.
You don’t mention what Picasa does…I have been hunting and haven’t found the answer.
Can you help?
Thanks!!
S

posted on March 31st, 2008 at 8:00 pm