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Do I Need a Gallery Tool If I Already Have a CRM?
Some photography CRMs include real client galleries. Some include none at all. Here is how to tell which one you are paying for, before you add a second subscription.
Updated September 2026
This is a buying question, not a feature question. You already pay for a photography CRM that handles leads, contracts, invoices and workflow. The reasonable reaction to any gallery product is to ask why you would pay twice. That reaction is correct often enough that it deserves a real answer instead of a sales pitch.
The answer depends entirely on which CRM you bought. Two well-known photography CRMs sit at opposite ends of this question, and both say so in their own documentation. Studio Ninja states that it has no galleries of its own. Sprout Studio includes galleries in every plan. Same category, opposite conclusions. So the useful thing is not an opinion about gallery tools, it is a test you can run against whatever CRM you already have.
Two photography CRMs, two opposite answers
Start with the case where the answer is not ambiguous. Studio Ninja publishes a help article titled "Does Studio Ninja offer a gallery for selling photos online?" and answers it no. The article describes Studio Ninja as "primarily a client and shoot management tool specifically designed for photographers" and points at integrations instead. That article carries its own update date of 1 May 2026.
Its Client Portal documentation says the same thing from the other direction. The portal ships with Home, Quote, Contract, Questionnaire and Invoice tabs. Studio Ninja states that "the fifth tab called Galleries is added if you integrate with Pic-Time or ShootProof," and that the View gallery button sends the client to their linked Pic-Time or ShootProof gallery. The gallery is somewhere else by design. If Studio Ninja is your CRM, you need a gallery product. There is no version of this where you do not.
Sprout Studio is the opposite case, and it is worth saying plainly. Sprout Studio states that galleries are part of every plan it sells, with a print lab attached and no commission taken on print sales. Asked whether it takes a cut, Sprout Studio answers "No, never. What you earn, you keep." If Sprout Studio is your CRM and your galleries are working, you may well need nothing else, and buying a second subscription would be a waste of ten dollars a month.
| Question | Studio Ninja states | Sprout Studio states |
|---|---|---|
| Native client galleries | None. Gallery work goes to Pic-Time or ShootProof | Included in all four plans |
| Gallery allowance | Not applicable | 10 or 20 active shoots plus galleries on the lower two plans, unlimited on the upper two |
| Photo storage | Not documented, and it hosts no images natively | 50 GB, 100 GB, 200 GB, then unlimited, by plan |
| Users included | Multi-user exists, per-plan counts not published | 3 users and 2 brands on the lower three plans, unlimited on the top plan |
| Client picks | Not applicable | Favourites collected from clients in galleries |
| Print sales commission | Not applicable | None taken |
Two notes on what is not in that table. Studio Ninja publishes six integrations: Pic-Time, ProSelect, Fundy Designer, QuickBooks, Xero and ShootProof. Pixieset and CloudSpot are not among them, so do not assume a gallery platform connects just because it is popular. And Studio Ninja does not publish its plan names or prices in any documentation readable from here, so this page states none.
The six checks that settle it for your CRM
Most photography CRMs are not at either extreme. They ship something called a gallery, and the honest question is whether it is a real one. Run these six checks against your own account this week. They apply to any CRM, and none of them is rigged in favour of buying anything.
| Check | What a pass looks like | What a fail costs you |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Can the client open it cold | A link opens the photos in a browser, no account, no app, no portal login | Support emails on delivery day, and the grandparents never see the photos |
| 2. Is there a real picks round | Clients mark favourites, you see the list, you can pull it into editing | Selections arrive as a numbered list in an email thread |
| 3. Does the whole gallery come down at once | One button, one archive, the full delivery | The client saves 400 files by hand, or asks you to send them again |
| 4. Whose name is on the page | Your studio, your address, no platform badge | You pay to advertise your CRM vendor to your own clients |
| 5. What happens if you stop paying | You know the answer before you need it | Delivered galleries go dark, and past clients email you about it |
| 6. Is there a cap you will hit | Your busiest month fits inside the plan you are on | An upgrade in August that you did not budget for in January |
Check one is the one photographers underweight. A gallery behind a client portal login is fine for a contract and an invoice, because one person signs those. Photos get forwarded to a mother, a planner, a bride's sister and a marketing manager. Every one of them hits the login wall, and every one of them emails you.
Check two has a subtlety worth knowing. Sprout Studio documents favourites collection inside galleries, and separately sells a Design Proofs product for collaborating on album designs. Those are two different things. When you audit your own CRM, be specific about which one it actually has, because "proofing" is used for both across this category.
Check five is the one nobody runs until it is too late. Ask your CRM what happens to a gallery you delivered in 2024 if your card fails in 2027. Write the answer down. Every platform has one, and yours should not be a surprise.
When you should keep the bundled gallery
For a large share of photographers, the bundled gallery is fine. That is the honest position and we are not going to argue against it. If your CRM's galleries pass all six checks, adding a second subscription buys you nothing but a second login and a second place for a client to get confused.
Keep what you have if all of the following are true:
- Your clients open galleries without complaining. No login questions, no app install, no lost password emails. This is the strongest signal you have and it costs nothing to check.
- Your volume sits comfortably inside the plan. Not just today, but in your busiest month. A cap you clear in February and hit in September is still a cap.
- You sell prints through the bundled lab and it works. A studio whose revenue runs through its platform's print store should not move the galleries away from the print store. That is a real reason to stay, and Sprout Studio's zero-commission print lab is a real thing to stay for.
- Nothing about the branding bothers you. If you have never noticed whose logo is on the page, this is not your problem to solve.
Adding a second subscription is worth it only when the galleries fail one of the six checks in a way that costs you hours or clients. Three fails make it obvious. One fail makes it a judgement call about how much that fail annoys you. Zero fails means close this page and go edit.
What the second subscription has to be worth
If you did fail a check, here is the specific thing you would be adding, stated with its limits so you can do the arithmetic yourself.
clientgallery.io is one plan at $10 a month or $100 a year. Galleries, photos and clients are unlimited under fair use, and the fair-use figures are published rather than hidden: 1,000 photos per gallery, 250 GB of proofs per paid account, 5 GB on a free account. Proofs are JPEGs, compressed in the browser before they are hosted, which is what keeps one flat price honest. There is no RAW warehousing and no master video.
Full-resolution delivery is a separate, paid part of the same plan and it works on a handoff model, not a permanent archive. You upload a full-resolution ZIP for a gallery, it stays live for three days per handoff, and you can re-upload it any time the client needs it again. An account holds 100 GB of standing ZIPs. That is a delivery mechanism, not a backup, and your masters stay on your own drives.
There is no print store and no commission on anything, which means if prints are your business this is the wrong tool and you should stay where your lab is. There is also no seat model at all: no roles, no per-assistant logins. A two-person studio shares one account. That is worth comparing against a CRM that counts users, because the trade goes both ways.
| The stack | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Your CRM | Lead, quote, contract, invoice, payment, workflow, calendar |
| Your gallery | Proofs, client picks, the branded delivery page, the full-resolution handoff |
| The join | One URL, pasted into whatever your CRM already sends |
How the two halves actually connect
Be clear about this, because integration marketing tends to overpromise. clientgallery.io is not an integration of Studio Ninja, of Sprout Studio, or of any other CRM. There is no API, no automatic sync, and no app listing. We are not going to imply otherwise.
A gallery link is a URL. You copy it and paste it into the delivery email your CRM already sends, or into the client portal message, or into the workflow step that fires when a job moves to delivered. That is the whole connection. It takes a few seconds per job and it is the same few seconds whether the gallery lives inside your CRM or outside it.
An integration is a convenience, not a requirement. It saves a paste. It does not change whether the gallery is any good, and a bad gallery with a slick integration is still a bad gallery. Studio Ninja's own integrations are a good example of the real benefit: linking a Pic-Time gallery to a job also pulls Pic-Time orders into the job's invoice box, which is genuine plumbing. If your gallery platform does not sell prints, there are no orders to pull, and the integration would be saving you a paste.
One practical habit closes the loop without any software. Put the gallery URL in the job record in your CRM, in whatever custom field or note your CRM gives you. Then the link lives beside the contract and the invoice, one search finds it two years later, and you never dig through sent mail to find what you delivered.
Sources
- Studio Ninja, "Does Studio Ninja offer a gallery for selling photos online?" · help.studioninja.co/en/articles/437277 · article updated 1 May 2026
- Studio Ninja, "Getting started with the client portal" · help.studioninja.co/en/articles/4106342 · article updated 16 October 2025
- Studio Ninja, "Pic-Time Integration" · help.studioninja.co/en/articles/5054623 · article updated 19 May 2026
- Studio Ninja, "ShootProof Integration" · help.studioninja.co/en/articles/1634945 · article updated 12 August 2025
- Studio Ninja, Integrations collection (six documented integrations) · help.studioninja.co/en/collections/449813-integrations · fetched 21 September 2026
- Sprout Studio pricing (plan tiers, storage caps, active shoots plus galleries, users and brands) · getsproutstudio.com/pricing/ · fetched 21 September 2026
- Sprout Studio galleries (favourites, digital delivery, branding) · getsproutstudio.com/features/gallery/ · fetched 21 September 2026
- Sprout Studio, Design Proofs (album design proofing, a separate product) · getsproutstudio.com/features/proofs/ · fetched 21 September 2026
- Sprout Studio, Freedom Print Lab (print sales, commission answer) · getsproutstudio.com/freedom-print-lab/ · fetched 21 September 2026
Studio Ninja plan names, prices, storage caps and per-plan seat counts are not published in any documentation readable from here, so none appear on this page. Sprout Studio's pricing page prints two figures per plan without labelling which is monthly and which is annual, so no Sprout price appears either. Sprout gallery password protection and bulk download behaviour are not documented on the pages above, so this page makes no claim about them in either direction.
Frequently asked
Do I need a client gallery tool if I already pay for a photography CRM?
It depends on the CRM. Studio Ninja states it has no native galleries and routes gallery work to Pic-Time or ShootProof, so with that CRM you need a gallery product. Sprout Studio includes galleries in every plan, so with that one you may need nothing else. Run the six checks in this guide against your own account before paying twice.
Does Studio Ninja have client galleries?
No. Studio Ninja's own help article answers that question no and describes the product as primarily a client and shoot management tool for photographers. Its client portal ships with Home, Quote, Contract, Questionnaire and Invoice tabs, and Studio Ninja states that a fifth Galleries tab is added only if you integrate with Pic-Time or ShootProof.
Does Sprout Studio include galleries?
Yes. Sprout Studio states that galleries are part of all four of its plans, with favourites collection from clients, digital delivery and a print lab on which it takes no commission. Storage is capped at 50 GB, 100 GB and 200 GB on the lower three plans and unlimited on the top one, and the lower two plans cap active shoots plus galleries at 10 and 20.
How do I tell whether my CRM's galleries are good enough?
Six checks. Can the client open the gallery with no account or app, is there a real picks round, does the whole gallery come down in one archive, is your studio name on the page rather than the platform's, what happens to delivered galleries if you stop paying, and is there a cap your busiest month will hit. Zero fails means keep what you have.
Is clientgallery.io an integration of my CRM?
No. clientgallery.io is not an integration of Studio Ninja, Sprout Studio or any other CRM, and there is no API or automatic sync. A gallery link is a URL you paste into whatever your CRM already sends. An integration saves a paste; it is a convenience, not a requirement.
What does the second subscription actually cost and cover?
clientgallery.io is one plan at $10 a month or $100 a year. Galleries, photos and clients are unlimited under fair use, with 1,000 photos per gallery, 250 GB of proofs per paid account and 5 GB free. Full-resolution delivery is a separate paid part of the plan: a ZIP per gallery stays live three days per handoff, is re-uploadable, and an account holds 100 GB of standing ZIPs.
When should I keep my CRM's bundled galleries instead?
When your clients open them without complaining, your busiest month fits inside the plan, and your print revenue runs through the bundled lab. A studio built around its platform's print store should not move galleries away from that store. clientgallery.io has no print store and takes no commission, which makes it the wrong choice for a print-driven business.
Your client galleries, under your name
Branded galleries, client selections and a Lightroom Classic workflow. Start with your first gallery, then compare the current plan. Full-resolution delivery is a separate handoff with its own limits and conditions.
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