Lightroom presets: where to get free and paid ones (2026)

Start with the presets already in Lightroom

You probably own more presets than you think. Adobe says its Premium presets are installed by default and sit under the Premium tab of the Presets panel. They include Adaptive presets that use AI masking to change only the subject or the sky, plus style groups such as Vintage and Cinematic, and subject groups for things like travel and night photography.

Adobe keeps adding to them. Its June 2022 release added five Premium packs made by working photographers, including Portraits: Black & White by Ayesha Kazim and a Video: Creative set by Stu Maschwitz. The same release brought the first Adaptive presets and a Preset Amount slider, so you can turn any preset up or down instead of accepting it at full strength.

The Amount slider changes how you should judge presets. A look that’s too strong at 100 can be right at 40, which means you need fewer presets than the marketing suggests.

Lightroom also has a Recommended tab. It uses Adobe’s machine learning to suggest community presets that worked on photos similar to yours. Adobe’s 2022 blog post says Recommended Presets are for paying Lightroom subscribers on desktop, mobile and web.

Save free presets from Adobe’s Discover community

The biggest free source is inside the app. Adobe’s Discover section holds “hundreds of thousands of shared edits” with downloadable presets, according to a 2022 Adobe blog post. When a photographer has allowed it, you click Save as Preset and the settings land in your Presets panel under Yours, in a group called Saved from Discover.

Two filters make it useful rather than endless. Search for a subject, then turn on the “Preset downloadable” toggle so you only see edits you can actually save. You can also press play on any shared photo to watch each editing step, which teaches you more than the preset does.

Remember what you’re saving. A community preset holds the slider positions one person used on one photo. It’s a starting point, and it may need its exposure and white balance reset for your picture.

Where paid presets come from

Paid presets are sold by individual photographers and by companies that make preset packs for a living. They’re worth buying when you want a consistent look across hundreds of photos, such as a wedding gallery, and don’t want to build it yourself.

Before you pay, check four things on the product page:

Which apps it supports. Lightroom Classic, Lightroom (the cloud version) and Lightroom on mobile import presets differently, covered below.
The file format. Current presets are .xmp files. Older packs may be .lrtemplate files, which Lightroom Classic converts to XMP on import. Some mobile packs come as .dng photos.
Whether it includes profiles. A preset can call a profile without containing it. If the profile isn’t installed, the preset won’t look like the samples.
What you’re allowed to do. Read the license, especially if you’ll use the presets on client work or want to share them with a second shooter.

You can always skip buying and make your own. After editing a photo you like, create a preset from it and choose which settings to include. Adobe’s preset guide suggests saving only the panels you reuse, for example just color grading, so the preset doesn’t overwrite exposure on every photo.

Source	Cost	Where it appears	Notes
Premium presets	Included with Lightroom	Presets > Premium	Includes Adaptive presets for subject and sky
Recommended presets	Paid Lightroom subscribers	Presets > Recommended	AI suggestions drawn from the community
Discover community	Free	Yours > Saved from Discover	Only edits the author allowed to be saved
Your own presets	Free	Yours	Save only the settings you reuse
Paid packs	Set by each seller	Yours, or the group you import into	Check app support, format and profiles first

What is Sleeklens, and is it still selling?

Sleeklens is a preset maker that sold Lightroom presets, brushes and Photoshop actions. Its Behance profile lists it in Valby, Denmark, describes it as “dedicated to the production of tools for photographers, focused on Adobe Lightroom and Adobe Photoshop,” and shows it joined in August 2015.

Gadget Daily News published an explainer on it in August 2016, which is why old links to this site mention it.

Its current status is unclear. When we tried to open sleeklens.com on October 20, 2026, the site returned a Cloudflare 526 error, which means the site’s security certificate couldn’t be validated. That may be temporary. Until the site loads normally over HTTPS, don’t enter payment details there. If you bought Sleeklens presets years ago, back up the files you downloaded, since you may not be able to download them again.

How to install presets

The steps depend on which Lightroom you use. The three apps don’t share presets automatically.

Lightroom Classic: in the Develop module, click the + at the top of the Presets panel and choose Import Presets, or use File > Import Develop Profiles and Presets. Lightroom Classic can import XMP presets and profiles straight from a zip file. Old .lrtemplate presets should be unzipped first, then imported, and they’re converted to XMP.

Lightroom (cloud) on Mac or Windows: choose File > Import Profiles and Presets, pick the folder or zip, and click Import. Presets you import here sync through Adobe’s cloud to Lightroom on your phone and tablet when you’re signed in with the same Adobe ID.

Lightroom on mobile: open the Presets panel, tap the three-dot menu and choose Import Presets, then pick the files from your phone’s storage or Google Drive. The Lightroom Queen notes mobile import takes XMP presets. If a seller sends .dng files instead, add them as photos, open each one and use Create Preset.

Lightroom Classic plus a phone: Classic doesn’t sync presets to the cloud. The Lightroom Queen’s workaround is to install the Lightroom (cloud) desktop app, import your Classic presets there once, and let them sync to your phone.

If an imported preset doesn’t show up, it may be hidden or marked incompatible with the photo’s file type. In Classic, turn on Show Partially Compatible Develop Presets under Preferences > Presets. In the cloud apps, the same option sits in the Presets panel’s three-dot menu.

For a full Classic setup, see our Lightroom Classic workflow for beginners.

Avoid pirated preset packs and “free Lightroom” downloads

A real preset is a small settings file, so a download that asks you to run an installer or switch off your antivirus isn’t a preset. That pattern is how criminals spread malware to photographers.

In October 2025, Check Point Research reported a network of more than 3,000 malicious YouTube videos offering cracked software. It said Adobe products were the main targets in the cracked-software category, “with Photoshop and Lightroom leading the list.” The videos sent viewers to password-protected archives on file-sharing sites and often told them to disable Windows Defender. Most of the payloads were infostealers that take saved passwords and other credentials.

Use these red flags to sort a preset download:

It contains an .exe, .msi or .dmg file instead of .xmp, .lrtemplate or .dng files.
The archive is password protected.
The instructions tell you to turn off antivirus.
It’s a paid pack from a well-known seller, offered free on a third-party site.

Pirated packs also skip updates and support, and you have no license to use them in paid work.

What to do next

Open the Presets panel and work through the Premium tab, using the Amount slider before you judge a look.
Search Lightroom’s Discover section for your subject, turn on “Preset downloadable,” and save three or four edits you like.
If you still want a paid pack, confirm it supports your version of Lightroom and includes any profiles it needs.
Install it with the steps above, then build a preset of your own from your best edit.

If black and white is the look you’re after, our guide to editing black and white photos in Lightroom shows how to get there without a preset. Wedding shooters can see how presets fit a full gallery in our Lightroom wedding photo editing workflow.

Where can you get Lightroom presets, free and paid?