Use this when the user asks for a real photograph, or states a need that a photograph fills, and the picture is not already in the conversation.

Call it when they ask outright: “find me photos of…”, “show me images of…”, “I need a picture of…”, “do you have a photo of…”, “where can I find free photos of…”, in any language. Call it when they describe the need without asking to search: “I'm writing an article and need a header image”, “my landing page needs a hero image”, “I need something to illustrate this”. Call it when they ask for something meant to carry photographs: “write an article with pictures”, “a deck with images”. Call it when they name only the picture, with no reason given: “a photo of a white mug”, “a train in Japan”. If the user is working on something that usually carries photographs — an article, a page, a deck, a post — without asking for any, you may offer to look for some; call it only once they accept.

This covers requests for photographs for articles, blog posts, websites, landing pages, products, slides, documents, reports, social posts, ads, newsletters, banners, thumbnails, covers, posters, backgrounds, wallpapers and mood boards; photographs that illustrate a concept, explain a subject or accompany a piece of writing; and any request for free, stock, royalty-free, commercially usable, real or documentary photographs.

A request for a visual is not always a request for a photograph: this tool finds photographs that already exist — not illustrations, drawings, logos, icons, diagrams or screenshots — and it does not generate, edit or upscale an image, nor look for a named person.

It searches Pexafy's own index of millions of free-to-use photographs from stock libraries such as Unsplash, Pexels and Pixabay, matched to the scene described. Each result carries a rank, a photo_id, its licence, the credit line to display and an image link.

Use this when the user wants photographs that look like a picture, rather than ones described in words: a picture they link to, one the host passes to the tool as a file, or a Pexafy photo already found.

Call it for “find images like this”, “something similar to this photo”, “find a free alternative to this image”, “I need this but royalty-free”, “photos in this style”, “more like the second one”, whether or not they say “search by image”.

Give exactly one reference: photo_id for a Pexafy photo from an earlier result; image_url for a picture at a public URL, such as a link the user pasted; image_file when the host passes the user's uploaded image to the tool; image_base64 for image bytes a client already holds. Sending two is refused. A picture that is only visible in the conversation — not linked, not passed to the tool — is not a reference this tool can receive; its scene can be searched in words with search_photos. Words are optional, in english_search_sentence: with a photo_id, the words that photograph was found under; with an image, only what the user wants changed or kept (“like this but at night”).

It finds free stock photographs in Pexafy's index that visually match the reference. The reference image is sent to Pexafy only to run the search; it is not stored. Each result carries a rank, a photo_id, its licence, the credit line to display and an image link.

Asks the host to offer its own flow for connecting a Pexafy account, when none is attached. Use it when the person asks to connect, link or sign in to a Pexafy account, or wants more searches than the daily allowance available without an account.

When no account is attached, it returns an error result that carries an account-connection request for the host: the error is how that request is delivered, not a failure. A host that supports it shows its own account-connection prompt, which the person completes or dismisses; other hosts show only the result's text. Calling it again returns the same request. When an account is already attached, it says so and starts nothing.

It does not search, and searching does not require calling it. check_only reads the state without opening a prompt; leave it unset when the person wants to connect or sign in.