Visual materials and videos produced by federal government entities are available in the public domain and, therefore, free from copyright restrictions. Even though the image sources highlighted in this guide are found on government websites, it is always good practice to make sure that the image is not protected by restrictions for reuse. One way to do this is to look for the artist credit and copyright symbol (©). If a copyright statement exists, you should assume that the image is protected by copyright.

If you wish to use a restricted image, you will need to seek permission from the copyright owner. After obtaining permission, be sure to include the image credit and source along with the image.

The resources in this guide are organized by the broad scientific classes. Since many of the government sites are interdisciplinary in nature, there may be some overlap. To search across all government agencies at once for either images or videos, please use the USA.gov search. From those search results, you will generally be taken to the image hosted on the Flickr or Instagram account for the agency, along with citations.