How much do professional headshots cost?

A professional studio headshot session typically costs $200 to $600, with the national median around $250 and premium or big-city photographers charging well over $1,000. You usually walk away with just two to five retouched final images.

AI headshots cover the same everyday need starting at $39 for 35 finished headshots, with 55 headshots for $49 or 75 for $59. The rest of this page explains where those numbers come from so the comparison is fair.

Headshot pricing sorts into three rough tiers. What separates them is experience, studio quality, retouching, and how many final images you keep.

• Budget ($75 to $200): a quick session with a newer photographer, a mobile setup, or a volume studio. Often one look and one or two edited images.
• Standard ($250 to $550): an established local photographer, a proper studio or lighting kit, one or two outfit changes, and three to five retouched finals. This is where most professionals land.
• Premium ($600 to $1,500+): a sought-after portrait or brand photographer, hair and makeup, multiple looks, full retouching, and broader usage rights. Top names in major markets run higher still.

Location moves the price more than almost anything else. Rough 2026 ranges for a standard session:

• New York: about $300 to $900 for a standard session; top photographers charge $1,200 to $2,500.
• Los Angeles: about $300 to $800; with hair, makeup, and travel a session can reach $500 to $1,200.
• San Francisco and Chicago: roughly $250 to $800, tracking close to other major metros.
• Miami: tends to start lower, around $150 to $350, then climbs from there.
• Smaller cities and towns: often $100 to $300, though strong local photographers still command more.

The session fee is not the real price. The real price is what you pay per photo you can actually use, and studios deliver very few finals.

A $300 session that includes three retouched images is effectively $100 per usable photo. Want a fourth? Extra retouched images usually run $25 to $150 each. By the time you have a headshot, a LinkedIn crop, and one with a different background, you have often spent far more than the quoted fee.

Weak way to compare: "The session was only $300."

Honest way to compare: "The session was $300 for three usable images, or $100 each, before any extra edits."

The booking fee is rarely the final number. Watch for:

• Extra retouched images: $25 to $150 each beyond the few included.
• Hair and makeup: $100 to $300 if the studio arranges it.
• Rush delivery: a surcharge to get edits back in days instead of weeks.
• On-location or travel fees: added when the photographer comes to you.
• Commercial usage or licensing: extra if the photo is for a company site, ads, or press, rather than personal use.
• Reshoot fees: if you do not like the results, a second session often is not free.
• Your time: a half-day between travel, shooting, and waiting on edits.

If two quotes look very different, it usually comes down to these levers:

• City and studio location
• Photographer experience and reputation
• Session length and number of outfit changes or looks
• How many images are retouched and delivered
• Whether hair and makeup are included
• Usage and licensing rights
• Studio shoot versus an on-location setup

For teams, photographers usually quote a per-person rate or an on-site day rate. Expect roughly $100 to $400 per person depending on volume, city, and how much editing is included, plus the logistics of getting everyone in front of the camera on the same day.

The hidden challenge is consistency. New hires, remote staff, and anyone who missed the shoot end up with mismatched photos taken later by someone else. Matching lighting and background across a growing team is a recurring cost most companies underestimate.

A modern phone in good window light can produce a serviceable photo for almost nothing, and for some people that is genuinely enough.

But "free" has real costs: your time, a clean background, soft even light, and the skill to direct yourself. The results are usually fine for an internal directory and noticeably weaker for a profile that is trying to win interviews or clients. It is the right call when the stakes are low and the wrong call when first impressions matter.

HonestHeadshots offers three one-time packages: Starter at $39 for 35 headshots and 10 edit credits, Professional at $49 for 55 headshots and 20 edit credits, and Executive at $59 for 75 headshots and 40 edit credits. Each starts from a single photo, with a free preview first. Use your credits to swap backgrounds or outfits.

The package price works out to about $1.11, $0.89, or $0.79 per included headshot, respectively, compared with $100 or more per usable image at a studio. There is no scheduling, travel, or makeup fee.

Spending $500 to $1,500 on a photographer is the right move when the photo has to carry real weight: high-end personal branding, editorial or press portraits, full-body or environmental shots, or a campaign with a specific creative vision.

A skilled photographer directs you, reads the room, and produces something AI cannot yet match for those use cases. If that is what you need, pay for it. For everything else, it is overkill.

If you do book a photographer, spend where it counts and skip where it does not:

• Pay for retouching quality and the number of finals you keep, not a fancy studio address.
• Confirm usage rights upfront if the photo is for a company or commercial use.
• Decide how many final images you actually need before you book, so add-on edits do not balloon the bill.
• Skip rush delivery unless you genuinely need it.
• For an everyday LinkedIn or resume photo, try the AI route first and save the studio budget for when it matters.