Palette is live · free plan, paid from $72/yr · last verified 25 Oct 2026 · viability monitor
Palette
AI photo colorizer that turns black-and-white photographs into realistic full-color images in seconds, with 21+ curated filters and keyword-based fine-tuning.
For straight photo colorization, Palette is the one we'd hand to a non-expert and expect a good result on the first try. Skin tones hold up, small details survive, and keyword tuning is genuinely useful rather than decorative. The 21+ filters and the subscription's pin/organize/copy workflow make repeat editing faster than rebuilding settings each time. The catch is volume and billing mechanics: 1 photo = 1 credit, credits run $0.65 each on the $49 one-time 75-credit pack and about $0.15 each on the $72/year, 480-credit subscription, and subscription credits stay valid only while the subscription is active. For a big archive project, do the math before committing to the annual plan.
Verdict generatedVerified 5d ago · liveness 64/100 · cite: rightaichoice.com/tools/palette
- Families and hobbyists restoring old black-and-white prints without learning photo-editing software
- Photographers who want fast, believable colorization before hand-finishing a few images
- Archivists and historians digitizing photo collections in batches
- Content creators chasing a vintage or historical look for still images
- Professional colorists who need per-region manual control across an entire grade
- Video colorization — this is a still-image tool
- High-volume archive work on a tight budget, where per-credit costs stack up
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Skip Palette if you need per-region manual color control across a full grade, need to colorize video, or want a large archive colorized in one pass without a per-credit bill.
Subscription credits are valid only while your subscription is active, so cancelling the $72/year plan forfeits whatever credits you have left.
The $72/year subscription at 480 credits (about $0.15 per credit, $6/month equivalent) is the value tier and fits hobbyists, families, and creators colorizing steadily through the year. The $49 pay-once pack of 75 credits (about $0.65 per credit) suits low-volume users who colorize a handful of photos a year and don't want a recurring charge, but costs over four times more per photo. Palette's free preview tier covers evaluation only — 500x500 pixels with a watermark.
In short
Palette — AI photo colorizer that turns black-and-white photographs into realistic full-color images in seconds, with 21+ curated filters and keyword-based fine-tuning. Best for Families and hobbyists restoring old black-and-white prints without learning photo-editing software, Photographers who want fast, believable colorization before hand-finishing a few images, Archivists and historians digitizing photo collections in batches. Free to start; paid plans from $72/yr.
What is Palette?
Palette — AI photo colorizer that turns black-and-white photographs into realistic full-color images in seconds, with 21+ curated filters and keyword-based fine-tuning. Best for Families and hobbyists restoring old black-and-white prints without learning photo-editing software, Photographers who want fast, believable colorization before hand-finishing a few images, Archivists and historians digitizing photo collections in batches. Free to start; paid plans from $72/yr.
Palette is a browser-based AI photo colorizer that adds realistic color to black-and-white photographs in seconds. You upload an image — or drag in a batch of them — pick from 21+ curated color filters, and download the result. No software install and no manual masking. Palette says the model is trained to dodge the two failure modes that plague most auto-colorizers: muddy brown and purple casts, and flat orange skin. It also picks up small details like hands and lips, which is where cheaper tools usually give themselves away. When a filter gets the mood right but not the details, you can fine-tune with plain keywords instead of wrestling with layer masks. Paid plans remove the watermark and unlock full resolution up to 5000x5000 pixels, with one credit covering one logo-free colorization. Palette reports 6.6M+ users, a 4.9-star rating, and 54 million photos colorized, and its testimonials page quotes Kevin Kelly (Wired), PiXimperfect, and Bycloud. It fits photographers, families restoring old prints, archivists digitizing collections, and creators chasing a vintage look. If you only need a handful of images a year, the $49 pay-once pack of 75 credits sidesteps a subscription entirely.
Key features
- AI-powered automatic colorization of black-and-white photos
- 21+ curated color filters for different color moods
- Keyword-based color adjustment to fine-tune results
- High-resolution exports up to 5000x5000 pixels
- 1 credit = 1 logo-free, full-resolution colorization
- Unlimited free color previews at 500x500 pixels with watermark
- Batch upload by dragging and dropping multiple images
- Watermark-free previews and exports on paid plans
- Pin, organize, and copy filters for faster repeat editing (subscription)
- Filters load automatically on the subscription plan
- Up to 10x faster processing on the subscription plan
- Credit rollover up to five times your monthly plan amount (subscription)
- One-time credit packs of 75 credits valid for 2 years
- API for programmatic colorization
- Web-based — upload and colorize in the browser, no download required
Behind the verdict
Palette's pitch is narrow and it sticks to it: black-and-white stills in, believable color out. That focus shows in the filter library — 21+ presets tuned for different moods (light, flowers, interior, history, clothes) rather than one generic auto mode — and in the keyword adjustment layer, which lets you nudge colors in plain language instead of hand-masking regions. The claim Palette makes on its own homepage is that competitors skew muddy brown and purple, produce flat orange skin, miss details like hands and lips, and force one-size-fits-all styling; whether or not you accept the framing, those are the right things to check on any colorizer, and Palette's sample gallery is built to show them holding up. The pricing model is where you need to pay attention. Previews are free and unlimited but capped at 500x500 pixels with a Palette logo watermark. Logo-free, full-resolution exports cost credits: 1 photo = 1 credit, up to 5000x5000 pixels. The $49 pay-once option buys 75 credits (about $0.65 each) that stay available for 2 years. The $72/year subscription buys 480 credits (about $0.15 each, $6/month equivalent), refreshes them monthly or annually, allows rollover up to five times your monthly plan amount, adds watermark-free previews, automatic filter loading, filter pinning/organizing/copying, no ads, and processing up to 10 times faster — but the credits are valid only as long as the subscription is active. That last line is the one to read twice before buying the annual tier for a large digitization job. Best fit: a family with a shoebox of scanned prints, a photographer who wants a believable base layer to hand-finish, or an archivist processing in batches. Palette also publishes an API and an Enterprise contact route for teams that want colorization inside their own product or pipeline. Where it doesn't fit: professional colorists who need per-region manual control across a full grade, anyone colorizing video (this is a still-image tool), and high-volume archive work on the tightest possible budget, where per-credit costs stack up. Batch upload is supported, but the vendor positions its fastest processing as a subscription feature.
Limitations
- Free previews are limited to a maximum of 500x500 pixels and carry the Palette logo in the bottom right; full-resolution, logo-free exports require credits (1 photo = 1 credit).
- Subscription credits are valid only as long as the subscription is active — cancel and they stop working.
- No video colorization; this is a still-image tool.
- Color control is filter- and keyword-based, not pixel-level manual editing, so per-region control is out of reach.
- Batch upload is supported, but processing is up to 10x faster only on the subscription plan.
- Free-plan usage carries ads and promotions.
as of 2026-10-08
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Is Palette still active?
Palette is live · free plan, paid from $72/yr · last verified 25 Oct 2026 · viability monitor.
Viability score
How well maintained and how widely used is Palette? Built from what the vendor actually publishes (docs, changelog, tutorials, integrations, pricing), whether the site is live, and how much real users discuss it. How we calculate this
Last calculated: October 2026
How we score →What do users say about Palette?
What people actually say about Palette — is it worth it?
We ran a structured research pass across product reviews, community discussions, and post-purchase forum threads to surface the patterns vendors won't publish themselves. Below: the recurring strengths, the hidden costs people mention most, and the cohort that consistently regrets adopting this tool.
ResearchedDiscussed by users across 6 sources (Hacker News, YouTube, Product Hunt, App Store, Stack Overflow, Lemmy) · researched Oct 26, 2026.
Weighted by the 96 posts each of 6 sources contributed.
- +Browser-based with no install or manual masking needed
- +Batch drag-and-drop upload speeds up archive and family-collection work
- +Keyword fine-tuning avoids wrestling with layer masks for detail fixes
- +Free 500x500 watermarked previews let you test before paying
- +$49 pay-once 75-credit pack sidesteps a recurring subscription
- −No verified community feedback available to confirm real-world output quality
- −Credit-per-export billing can get expensive for large batch jobs
- −Pay-once credit pack expires after two years, penalizing light users
- −Auto-colorizer skin-tone accuracy remains the classic weak point to check
- −Vendor-reported ratings cannot be independently validated from this data
- • Each logo-free full-resolution export consumes a credit
- • The $49 credit pack expires after two years
- • Speed boosts and filter organization require the subscription tier
How we verified this
Every listed fact about Palette— pricing, features, links, status — is re-read from the vendor's own pages by our verification pipeline and each change is logged with a date; the last pass ran on 25 Oct 2026. Pages mix model-assisted synthesis with human review; see how we verify.
Verification history
We have re-verified Palette 11 times since . Each pass re-reads the vendor's own pages and re-checks every listed field against that evidence; passes where nothing had changed are marked as such.
- — changed pricing page
- — changed SSL certificate
- — changed pricing page
- — changed pricing page
- — changed setup time, description, our verdict, features, hidden costs, limitations, switching in, switching out, who should skip it, pricing tiers, pricing fit, summary
- — changed who should skip it, summary, pricing tiers, our verdict, who it suits, features, description
Showing the 6 most recent of 11 verification passes.
Free to cite with attribution — this page re-verifies continuously.
How much does Palette cost in 2026?
Palette: Free to start; paid plans from $72/yr. Pricing last verified 25 Oct 2026.
Plans compared
Every published Palette tier, its price as the vendor publishes it, who it fits, and what it adds over the tier below. The 12-month cost projection follows.
| Plan | Price | Billing | Who it's for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | Free | — | Anyone evaluating Palette or colorizing a handful of images casually, before committing to credits.Adds: Starting tier: unlimited color previews, capped at 500x500 pixels with a Palette watermark, plus 1 free full-resolution trial credit. |
| Pay Once | $49 | — | Low-volume users — a family or hobbyist colorizing a handful of photos a year who wants no recurring charge.Adds: Adds 75 logo-free full-resolution credits (up to 5000x5000 pixels) valid for 2 years for a $49 one-time payment, about $0.65 per credit, with limited ads. |
| Subscribe | $72/yrVendor: “$72/year” | yearly | Hobbyists, families, archivists, and creators colorizing steadily through the year who want the lowest per-photo cost and the Pro workflow.Adds: Adds 480 credits per year at about $0.15 each ($6/month equivalent, $72/year), monthly refresh and rollover up to five times your monthly amount, watermark-free previews, automatic filter loading, filter pinning and organizing, up to 10x faster processing, and no ads. |
12-month cost
Project the real annual outlay, including the implied monthly cost when only an annual tier is published.
Vendor list price only. Add-on usage, seat overages, and contract minimums are surfaced under Hidden costs & gotchas.
Where the pricing makes sense
The company stage and team size where Palette's pricing actually pencils out — and where peers do it cheaper.
The $72/year subscription at 480 credits (about $0.15 per credit, $6/month equivalent) is the value tier and fits hobbyists, families, and creators colorizing steadily through the year. The $49 pay-once pack of 75 credits (about $0.65 per credit) suits low-volume users who colorize a handful of photos a year and don't want a recurring charge, but costs over four times more per photo. Palette's free preview tier covers evaluation only — 500x500 pixels with a watermark.
Has Palette's pricing changed?
No plan price for Palette has moved since we began logging in Aug 2026; the pricing page is re-read on every verification pass.
Who should pick Palette?
Pick Palette if you are Families and hobbyists restoring old black-and-white prints without learning photo-editing software, Photographers who want fast, believable colorization before hand-finishing a few images, Archivists and historians digitizing photo collections in batches, Content creators chasing a vintage or historical look for still images.
Look elsewhere if you are Professional colorists who need per-region manual control across an entire grade, Video colorization — this is a still-image tool, High-volume archive work on a tight budget, where per-credit costs stack up, Anyone who needs watermark-free free exports — the free preview is watermarked at 500x500.
Skip it if Skip Palette if you need per-region manual color control across a full grade, need to colorize video, or want a large archive colorized in one pass without a per-credit bill.
GeneratedReal-world workflow fit
Concrete scenarios for the personas Palette actually fits — and what changes day-one when you adopt it.
You scan a box of black-and-white family prints, drag the batch into Palette, apply a filter that suits skin tones and interiors, and tweak the color with keywords where a filter over-saturates clothing.
Outcome: Watermark-free images at up to 5000x5000 pixels from your credit balance, without buying or learning desktop photo-editing software.
You upload a monochrome frame, try several of the 21+ filters to find the palette direction you want, and export a full-resolution colorized base layer.
Outcome: A believable starting point for final manual finishing, produced in seconds rather than built from scratch in an editor.
You batch-upload a set of historical images, keep a pinned set of filters for consistent house style, and colorize the run with automatic filter loading on the subscription tier.
Outcome: Consistent color treatment across a batch at a per-credit cost of about $0.15 on the $72/year plan.
Use cases
- Restore old family photos from albums or scanned prints
- Colorize historical images for archival publications
- Add realistic color to cultural heritage or museum collections
- Create vintage aesthetic photos for social media
- Experiment with different color filters on sample images
- Prototype color schemes by colorizing monochrome design assets
Setup time & first value
How long it actually takes to get something useful out of Palette — broken out by persona, not the marketing-page minute.
First value is fast for everyone: sign up, get one free full-resolution trial credit, and colorize in the browser without installing anything — you'll see a result on your first upload in minutes. Expect a short extra step to learn keyword adjustment and, for teams, to wire up the API. Bigger archives take longer in planning (credit math) than in setup.
Switching to or from Palette
How to bring data in from common predecessors and how to get it back out — written for the switcher, not the buyer.
- →From manual Photoshop colorization: upload the same black-and-white source, then use keyword adjustment instead of building layer masks for a first pass.
- →From MyHeritage or similar consumer colorizers: re-upload originals to compare output, and use Palette's filters plus keywords to control mood rather than accepting a single automatic result.
- →From a generic one-click colorizer: use Palette's 21+ filters and keyword tuning to escape the muddy-brown and flat-orange results you were getting before.
- ↗To a desktop editor: export at full resolution up to 5000x5000 pixels and continue with per-region manual grading.
- ↗To a different colorization service: keep your original black-and-white scans, since Palette credits do not transfer and full-resolution output is per-image.
Resources & guides
Tutorials & Learning
YouTube returned 6 videos for “Palette”, and we withheld 6: 6 could not be judged, because “Palette” is a single word that other videos use for other things. We are showing none, because we could not prove any of them are about Palette.
Official links
What are the best Palette alternatives?
The closest alternatives to Palette we list are Clipdrop, Painnt and Pixlr. Ranked by direct product-type match, not category overlap.
| Alternative | Pricing | Starts at | Last verified |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clipdrop | Freemium | Pricing not published | — |
| Painnt | Freemium | Pricing not published | — |
| Pixlr | Paid | Pricing not published | — |
Alternatives to Palette
View all
Tools that pair well with Palette
Common stack mates teams adopt alongside Palette, with the specific reason each pairing earns its keep.
Clipdrop
Browser-based AI image tools: remove backgrounds, clean up objects, upscale, uncrop, and generate images without opening a full editor.
Painnt
Painnt turns iPhone and iPad photos into AI paintings and comic-book cartoons with 2000+ filters.
Pixlr
Pixlr is a free browser-based AI photo editor and image generator with 20+ AI editing tools, plus AI video and audio generation.
Palette vs its closest rival
Palette's closest head-to-head is with Adobe Firefly Services — Choose Palette if you need a simple, affordable way to colorize old family photos or historical images with no coding. Choose Adobe Firefly Services if you're an enterprise developer or marketing team that needs scalable, secure API access for high-volume image generation and editing, and you already use Adobe tools. Verdict generated
Head-to-head comparisons
Palette vs Adobe Firefly Services
Choose Palette if you need a simple, affordable way to colorize old family photos or historical images with no coding. Choose Adobe Firefly Services if you're an enterprise developer or marketing team that needs scalable, secure API access for high-volume image generation and editing, and you already use Adobe tools.
GeneratedPalette vs The New Black
The New Black and Palette serve completely different markets. Choose The New Black if you're a fashion brand needing AI-generated apparel designs with tech pack exports and virtual try-on. Choose Palette if you're restoring or colorizing black-and-white photos with realistic results. Both have free tiers, but their core value propositions do not overlap.
GeneratedPalette vs Qoves
QOVES and Palette serve entirely different needs — QOVES is a paid facial analysis tool for non-surgical self-improvement, while Palette is a freemium photo colorization tool for historians and creatives. Choose QOVES if you want a science-backed glow-up plan; choose Palette if you need to restore old black-and-white photos. They are not direct competitors.
GeneratedFrequently asked questions
Categories
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