Wallpaper apps and websites are tiring to trawl through, which is why I find the most original, creative, and stunning wallpapers by visiting more unusual spots. No barriers to downloading nor sign-ups are required here—just incredible images worth saving to your phone.
The iPhone Photography Awards have been running since 2007, the same year Apple launched the original iPhone. You will find an incredible archive of photographs in the winners’ gallery.
I love browsing this site for wallpapers for two reasons: It has the perfect size collection with plenty of images to browse but not so many choices that it leaves me with decision fatigue. Secondly, the images are conveniently in portrait orientation, perfect for mobile wallpapers.
There is no better place to find wallpapers than a site dedicated to showcasing mobile photography at its best. You might even leave wondering if you should ditch your DSLR and start using your smartphone camera.
The James Webb Space Telescope was launched in 2022, and it immediately led to some of the most jaw-dropping images of our universe we’ve ever seen.
Thanks to its near-infrared camera, this telescope can see billions of years into the past, capturing light that we humans could never see with the naked eye.
Over the years, the telescope has taken a few hundred stunning high-definition images, which have been posted to NASA’s Flickr account. It’s a treasure trove of insanely beautiful, mysterious, and awe-inspiring images of the galaxies, and I’ve found plenty that I plan to keep as wallpapers.
Midjourney is an AI image-generation tool that people have been using to create outstanding images through creative prompting, which is when you use text to create AI-generated art.
The latest images created by Midjourney users are displayed on the Midjourney Feed. On this page, you’ll encounter wacky, imaginative, and fantastic creations, all of which come in high resolution and are in portrait orientation, perfect for mobile wallpapers.
It’s one of my favorite places to scroll because of the sheer diversity of weird and wonderful images! It’s also a breeze to save the images I like and set them as my wallpaper.
With tons of AI art generators you can try, you can even make your own wallpapers if you want to.
Fans of anime and the incredibly popular Studio Ghibli films should check out the huge archive of screen images that the studio has posted to their website. They include some of their biggest film titles, like Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, My Neighbor Totoro, and Ponyo, among many other classics.
Since the website is in Japanese, you may find it easier to browse this Google Drive folder of upscaled Studio Ghibli images that somebody has collected into one easy-to-download place.
Even if you haven’t watched these films before, you can appreciate the gorgeous scenes crafted by a studio that has gone on to win an Oscar award for its animations. You’ll find plenty of adorable images that will look great as your new background.
The one downside is that most images are in landscape, which will require some editing to use as phone wallpapers.
The Library of Congress website is one of my undercover sites for finding fascinating historical images, many of which make great wallpapers.
Its “Free to Use and Reuse” section has a vast online collection of photographs, illustrations, art prints, and more, which you can easily download without signing up for anything. Most will give you the option to download at a higher quality as well.
There are some true gems on this site, some of which look so quirky that you might think they were created by AI.
IMPAwards, which stands for Internet Movie Poster Awards, is a website dedicated to the great art of film posters. With its black and neon green color scheme, the website is reminiscent of the retro internet of the past.
You can search for categories beyond director and film titles to include poster designers. Whether you’re after a vintage poster or the latest Hollywood release, chances are you can find it.
If you really like what you see, there are affiliate links to buy the poster off Amazon or eBay, but for my purposes, I had no trouble downloading a copy to use as a wallpaper.
Steam offers a few rabbit holes that are worth going down, including my search for a new wallpaper. It’s another hidden gem for finding amazing screenshots, art, or official images of my favorite video games.
You can search for the game title on the Steam store and flip through the image gallery on the product page or explore the community page to find user-submitted screenshots and fan art. There’s nothing like going straight to the game source to find fantastic wallpapers worth downloading.
These are my go-to places when I need to find a new wallpaper for my phone. Thankfully, with all these options, I no longer have to download and pay for third-party wallpaper apps on the App Store and Play Store.
