Contributor Agreement

Please read the terms and conditions of this Contributor Agreement (“Contributor Agreement”) carefully before contributing any Stock Media. This Contributor Agreement, which may be amended from time to time, outlines the rights you are granting to Canva in any Stock Media, and what uses Canva may make of the Stock Media.

Capitalized terms that are not defined in this Contributor Agreement have the meaning given them in our Terms of Use⁠(opens in a new tab or window).

This Agreement incorporates the terms of the following additional documents, including all future amendments or modifications thereto:

1. Content License Agreement⁠(opens in a new tab or window)
2. Royalties Page⁠(opens in a new tab or window)

You must be a User in order to be a Contributor. Your use of the Service is governed by our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

1. Our Service

1.1 Our Service

Canva operates an online visual communications platform, which allows users to license a variety of media to use in their designs. You may choose to contribute to the Service, stock photographs, illustrations, fonts, templates and other media, along with any associated text, for license to other Users (“Stock Media”). Any User who contributes Stock Media to the Service (including any “Canva Template Creator” or “Canva Element Creator” who is a part of Canva's Creators Program) shall be referred to as a “Contributor”. Contributors must be over the age of 18 years old (or the minimum legal age required in their country to enter into an agreement).

1.2 Contributor Guidelines

You agree to follow Canva’sElement Guidelines⁠(opens in a new tab or window) and Template Guidelines⁠(opens in a new tab or window) (together, “Guidelines”), as updated from time to time. Canva can make changes to the Guidelines without telling you if it considers that the change is likely to benefit you or have a neutral impact on you. We will provide you with reasonable advance notice of any change to the Guidelines that, in our sole determination, materially adversely affects Contributor’s rights or your use of the Service. We may provide you this notice via the Service and/or by email to the email address associated with your account.

1.3 Refusal of Stock Media by Canva

Canva may, in its discretion:

(a) refuse to accept any Stock Media;

(b) remove any Stock Media from the Service;

(c) pause your account;

(d) impose submission limits on your account; or

(e) place a temporary hold on review of Stock Media from your account.

For example, Canva may take these actions where Canva reasonably considers that your Stock Media:

(f) is not of acceptable quality;

(g) infringes a third party’s rights;

(h) violates Canva’s Guidelines or the Term of this Agreement;

(i) is fraudulent;

(j) would or does subject Canva or its Users to legal action.

1.4 Removal of Stock Media by You

You have the right to remove any of your Stock Media from our Service at any time for any reason, including by withdrawing entirely from the Contributor program. Canva will use reasonable efforts to cause the Stock Media, including any additional versions such as Cut Outs (as defined below), to be removed from the Service and affiliated or partner websites within sixty (60) days of your deactivation of such Stock Media. However, you agree that any licenses issued by Canva in respect of any Stock Media (in accordance with our Content License Agreement⁠(opens in a new tab or window)) that is removed from the Service will remain in full force and effect under the terms of that license. In addition, you also agree that Canva will be able to keep at least a thumbnail of any Stock Media that you removed indefinitely. In the event that Stock Media is deleted between the time when a User uses it in a Canva design and when that design is exported, you will earn royalties for the Stock Media even after it has been deleted. This is an uncommon, special circumstance. Deactivated content is not available for licensing to any User who hasn’t already included it in a design prior to the time it is removed.

2. Ownership, Releases and Your License Grant and Warranty

2.1 Ownership

Nothing contained in this Agreement shall be construed to transfer any copyright to Canva. The copyright in and to all Stock Media remains with the owner of such copyright. Any and all Stock Media submitted to the Service must be your own original work.

2.2 Model and Property Releases

By submitting Stock Media to Canva, you agree to provide valid and accurate releases for all Stock Media you upload to Canva that, in our judgment, contains an identifiable face, identifiable person, other identifiable attribute, or property. If you do not have a release for the Stock Media that contains an image(s) of an identifiable person or property, Canva may choose to reject such Stock Media. You agree that you are solely responsible for retaining all original releases and maintaining complete and accurate release records for all Stock Media. Any applicable releases are required to be electronically submitted to Canva with the Stock Media or made available to Canva at our request. You acknowledge and agree that the submission of falsified, inaccurate or otherwise defective releases constitutes a material breach of this Agreement and may result in the immediate termination of your account by Canva, acting reasonably.

You agree to inform the model, including in such releases, that:

(a) Canva will apply and publish descriptive labels (including via machine learning, data analytics and predictive analytics) in conjunction with Stock Media (including, but not limited to, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and health information) in order to make them more easily searchable and for analytics purposes;

(b) Canva users may apply and publish descriptive labels (including via machine learning technology) to individual instances of Stock Media (including, but not limited to, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and health information) in order to make them more accessible; and

(c) The Stock Media and labels may be publicly available worldwide and transferred to countries with different privacy laws where they may be stored, accessed and used under Canva's Privacy Policy⁠(opens in a new tab or window).

2.3 License Grant

By submitting any Stock Media to the Service, (in the case of Templates, see the additional requirements in Section 4.1 below), you hereby grant Canva, a worldwide, non-exclusive right and license to use, reproduce, create derivative works of, store, publicly display, market, sublicense and sell any Stock Media uploaded by you and accepted by Canva, subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement. Canva may also use, reproduce, create derivative works of, store, publicly display, transmit, broadcast, adapt and sub-license any Stock Media to promote, advertise, use for educational purposes and otherwise market Canva, and develop and improve Canva’s products and services (and those of its affiliates, related bodies corporate and third party service providers) without additional compensation to you (except as otherwise agreed or as outlined in this Agreement). Marketing may include, but is not limited to, the use of Stock Media within the Service, and also social media and networking sites.

You agree that Canva shall have the right, but not the obligation, to license all Stock Media to its Users in accordance with our Content License Agreement⁠(opens in a new tab or window) or any other license offered by Canva. This includes the right of Canva to license Stock Media to its users via a subscription model. The specific terms that will govern specific Stock Media will be determined by the Content License Agreement (or equivalent terms). You also agree that Canva may grant or sublicense any rights granted under this Agreement to its service providers, affiliates, related bodies corporate, or other third parties for use on any versions of the Service throughout the world.

2.4 Warranty

You agree that you are solely responsible for all Stock Media that you make available on or through the Service. You represent and warrant that (1) you are either the sole and exclusive owner of all Stock Media or you have all rights, licences, consents and releases that are necessary to grant to us the rights in such Stock Media as contemplated in this Contributor Agreement; and (2) neither the Stock Media nor the posting, uploading, publication, sending or receiving of the Stock Media or our use of the Stock Media on, through or by means of the Service will infringe, misappropriate or violate a third party’s intellectual property rights, or rights of publicity or privacy, or result in the violation of any applicable law or regulation.

2.5 Metadata and data labeling

From time to time, Canva may apply or edit the metadata to Stock Media and Templates for the purposes of search and discoverability of the templates and/or the Canva library. This may include applying machine learning and predictive analytics to improve our service for users. This could include: components (e.g. background, eyes); labeling raw individual data (e.g. “man with dog”); detecting content prohibited by our Terms of Use for moderation and security purposes (e.g. pornographic or copyright-protected material); and translating audio soundtracks. Further, Canva users may apply and publish descriptive labels to individual instances of Stock Media and Templates for the purposes of accessibility, including by machine learning technology. This could include labeling raw individual data (e.g. “man with dog”). By submitting Stock Media and Templates to Canva you agree that your content may be used and sub-licensed by Canva for these purposes.

2.6 Attribution

Canva will always attribute you as the author of your Stock Media in the Canva library. You acknowledge and agree that Users are not required to attribute you as the author of your Stock Media when using Stock Media in their designs. You agree to waive (or where a waiver is not possible, you agree not to enforce against Canva or our Users) any moral rights you have in respect of your Stock Media. For example, you agree that you can't take action against Canva or our Users if a User doesn't attribute you as the author of your Stock Media, or they claim authorship of your Stock Media, or they materially alter your Stock Media. Don't forget that all of our Users are subject to Canva's Acceptable Use Policy⁠(opens in a new tab or window).

2.7 Use of Stock Media to develop and improve artificial intelligence and machine learning models and Opt-Out

(a) You agree that, pursuant to the License Grant under Section 2.3 and subject to your right to opt-out under Section 2.7(b), Canva has the right and license to use your Stock Media to develop and improve artificial intelligence and machine learning models. You agree that Canva may sub-license this right and license to any of Canva’s affiliates and related bodies corporate for the same purpose.

(b) If you do not want Canva, its affiliates or its third party service providers to use your Stock Media to develop and improve artificial intelligence or machine learning models you can opt-out by filling out this form⁠(opens in a new tab or window). Please note that if you opt-out, you will no longer be eligible for the Machine Learning Payment as described in section 5.1.1 below.

(c) If you opt-out, Canva will retain the right to use your Stock Media to develop and improve artificial intelligence or machine learning models for a period of 1 month following the payment of the Magic Creators Payment, after which time we will not use your Stock Media from the day after the expiry of that 1 month period for that purpose unless you opt-back in. Any development or improvement activities carried out prior to your opt-out will not be affected by this opt-out.

(d) For the avoidance of doubt, if you withdraw entirely from the Contributor program, Canva will retain the right to use your Stock Media to develop and improve artificial intelligence or machine learning models, unless you opt-out.

3. Cut Outs and Canva’s Proprietary Rights

3.1 Cut Out Photos Overview

Additional versions of certain Stock Media that are ‘cut out’ so the background is transparent and the resulting file is in PNG format (“Cut Out(s)”) are also available on the Service. Canva will store and sell licenses for both the originally submitted Stock Media file and the Cut Out version. You will always receive appropriate royalties for license sales for all versions of your Stock Media, though Canva reserves the right to charge a premium (which is NOT included in royalty calculations) for the Canva-created Cut Out (as defined below).

3.2 Canva-created Cut Outs

Canva may, in its sole discretion, create a Cut Out as an additional version of Stock Media (“Canva-created Cut Out”). Any Canva-created Cut Out of your Stock Media will be created at no cost to you. However, you will have no right to use, sell, distribute, modify, or create derivative works of any Canva-created Cut Outs in any way. Canva will offer Canva-created Cut Outs for license only while the underlying original Stock Media remains available for license on Canva. You understand that Canva is under no obligation to perform the cut-out process and any Canva-created Cut Out will be made at Canva’s sole discretion.

3.3 Contributor-created Cut-Outs

You are welcome to submit your own Cut Outs, along with the original Stock Media in accordance with Canva’s Contributor Quality Guidelines⁠(opens in a new tab or window). Canva will review both the original Stock Media and the Cut-Out version. Canva may, in its discretion acting reasonably, reject a file for the content of the Stock Media and/or the quality of the Cut Out. You remain the owner of all copyright in and to all Cut Outs you submit to the Service.

4. Templates

4.1 Publishing

You are welcome to submit your Templates to be made publicly available to other Users. You must publish Templates to the Canva library through the Service.. Canva will review submissions of Templates and may choose to not promote them, or take other such action for reasons such as but not limited to, removing content that does not meet our content guidelines or that may infringe a third party’s intellectual property rights. If your Template is accepted by Canva, you agree that the Template (including elements contained within it) will be licensed in accordance with clause 2.3 above, except that the license in respect of the Template will be on an exclusive basis for a period of 3 years from the date of submission of the particular Template, during which time the design cannot be submitted, featured or otherwise accessible via a competing online graphic design platform, where the user will be taken to a different design platform to use that design. You acknowledge and agree that elements, such as vectors, contained within Templates submitted by you will be from the Canva library and in the event that they are not, you agree to submit them as a free element to Canva, where you have not submitted them as Pro elements.

4.2 Profile

Canva may create a collection of each Templates, where Users can browse Templates created and publish results by a reference to specific Contributors.

4.3 Royalties

You may choose whether to submit Templates on a free or a paid basis to Users. Contributors will be eligible to receive a payment from a royalty in accordance with section 5.1 and subject to the applicable royalty model set forth on the Royalties Page⁠(opens in a new tab or window), which may vary based on usage and at the discretion of Canva.

5. Payment Amounts and Payment Terms

5.1 Royalties

Canva will pay you a royalty for each unique, de-duplicated license issued for your Stock Media, which Users can obtain by either (a) purchasing a license; or (b) holding an eligible Canva subscription. The current royalty model is set forth on the Royalties Page⁠(opens in a new tab or window). Canva may suspend payment or modify the royalty model and/or payment schedule at any time. If Canva intends to suspend payment of royalties to you, or otherwise modify the royalty model or payment schedule in a way it reasonably considers is likely to materially adversely affect a majority of Contributors, then Canva will provide affected Contributors with reasonable advance notice before doing so. You can terminate your Canva Contributor account if you do not agree with Canva's actions under this clause 5.1. If Canva does modify the royalty model, royalties earned before the effective change will be credited based on the model in effect at the time such royalties were earned. You may also choose to not receive payment for Stock Media by marking the appropriate box during submission, in which case that particular Stock Media will be available for free to Users.

5.1.1 Magic Creators Payment

If you have not opted-out of Canva using your Stock Media to develop and improve artificial intelligence and machine learning models, or to sub-license the right to do so to its third party service providers (pursuant to Section 2.7 above), Canva will compensate you in accordance with the AI Compensation Model set out on the Royalties Page⁠(opens in a new tab or window).

5.2 Payment

Payment of royalties is made automatically each month, via Canva's nominated payment processing method, when the previous month's balance is above $10. The $10 threshold for royalty payouts cannot be modified. Contributors voluntarily closing their accounts may request payment of all outstanding royalties. If your account is terminated for a breach of this Agreement by you, Canva may determine, acting reasonably, that, any royalties and/or other compensation otherwise payable to you under this Agreement will be forfeited by you. If you receive your payments through an online payment processing service, you'll also need to comply with their terms and conditions in order to receive payments.

5.3 Refunds

If you are credited with a license sale or license sales and Canva thereafter issues a refund to a User that licensed any of your Stock Media, Canva will have the right to deduct royalties credited to your account and/or allocated to such refunded subscriptions. Credit card chargebacks will be treated in the same manner as refunded license purchases. If Canva makes an overpayment of royalties or other compensation to you for any reason, Canva shall have the right to deduct the amount of such overpayment from your accrued royalties or to demand the immediate repayment of such overpaid royalties or other compensation.

5.4 Withholding tax and information requirements

Canva will withhold a percentage of Contributor’s royalties and submit the withholdings to the relevant tax authorities. The rate of withholding taxes will depend on the country where the Contributor is registered and whether or not an applicable tax treaty exists. Upon Contributor’s request, Canva will provide a summary of tax collected by Canva at the end of the Australian financial year, 30 June, which Contributors may use to submit a claim for a credit for the withheld tax from its own country’s tax authorities. Users are responsible for completing and updating any necessary forms in order to receive payments from Canva, including any forms that we consider reasonably necessary to comply with applicable taxation, financial crimes, and sanctions laws.

Canva requires tax forms to be completed and submitted to a nominated platform as notified to Users from time to time. Canva will require that Users update tax forms and other information in the nominated platform periodically and will notify Users in advance when updates are required. For more details on these requirements, please see the Tax forms for Creators section⁠(opens in a new tab or window). If a User does not wish to complete or update these necessary forms, we may, acting reasonably, withhold royalty payments.

5.5 Forfeit of royalties

Payment of royalties is covered in the Payment section. Any payments or royalties held by Canva for five years will be forfeit by the User. Any royalties under the applicable threshold that are left with Canva for five years will be forfeit by the User. Canva will take reasonable steps to inform Users of their obligations prior to forfeit of any royalties or payments.

6. Termination

Participation in Canva’s Contributor program requires you to remain in good standing throughout the term of our relationship. If Canva determines that your continued participation in the program is causing, or has the potential to cause, harm to Canva or any of its Users, Canva may terminate your participation in the Contributor Program and remove your Stock Media from the Service. This may include, but is not limited to, if you are found to:

(a) violate this agreement;

(b) excessively submit Stock Media that does not meet the Guidelines;

(c) submit Stock Media that Canva determines to be fraudulent or unauthorised, including:

1. duplicates of the same content;
2. resizing identical content;
3. public domain or CC0 content;
4. third party logos; or
   
5. basic shapes and lines that do not add value to the Canva library;
   

(d) download Stock Media you have contributed to Canva (or solicit any third party to do so);

(e) engage in conduct that harms Canva’s reputation or brings the Creators programme into disrepute;

(f) harass Canva staff or any other Contributor or user.

7. Assignment

Canva may assign its rights and obligations under this Agreement to a related body corporate. You may not assign your rights and obligations under this Agreement without Canva’s prior written approval.