Public Domain Media & Content: Introduction

Public domain works are creative works to which copyright no longer applies or never applied.

This guide will help you:

• Become familiar with the public domain.
• Find public domain content such as: photos, graphics, and icons; audio and video; maps; publications and other textual materials.
• Apply a public domain license to your own content.
• Find other types of content to reuse without violating copyright.

The term “public domain” refers to creative materials that are not protected by intellectual property laws such as copyright, trademark, or patent laws. The public owns these works, not an individual author or artist. Anyone can use a public domain work without obtaining permission, but no one can ever own it.

There are three common ways that works arrive in the public domain:

• the copyright has expired,
• the U.S. federal government created the work, or
• the creator of the work dedicated it to the public domain.

Public Domain Explained by the U.S. Copyright Office

The public domain covers works not protected by copyright. Learn which works are in the public domain and how works become a part of it.