The 6 photos every used-car listing needs (and the 14 most dealers waste their time on)

Open Carzone and look at the front page. Half the listings have 4-5 photos, the other half have 30+. Both miss the point.

Buyers scrolling on a phone scan listings in 1.5 seconds. They look at the first photo, glance at the price, swipe. If they pause, they tap. Then they look at maybe 3 more photos before they decide whether to enquire.

So you've got essentially four photos to win them. Here are the six you should always shoot — and why most of the rest is wasted effort.

The 6 photos that actually sell

1. Three-quarter front, hero shot

Front-quarter angle from the kerbside, eye level, taken from about 3 metres back. Car fully framed with maybe 10% of clean ground in front of it. This is the photo that goes in the listing thumbnail — get this one wrong and nothing else matters.

Common mistakes: straight-on front (boring), too close (looks like a passport photo), shooting from above (foreshortens the car).

2. Three-quarter rear

Same angle from the back. Shows the back doors, rear lights, and exhaust setup. Buyers use this to confirm bodystyle and trim level (saloon vs estate vs SUV-with-a-bigger-boot).

3. Driver-side dashboard from passenger seat

Centre console, dash, steering wheel, infotainment screen if it's on. Have the screen turned on, with a clean home screen. If the trim has heated seats, leather, paddle shifters — this is where they're visible.

4. Rear seats from the driver's side

Open the rear door, shoot across the back seats. Confirms three-seat or split-bench layout, leather vs cloth, ISOFIX, headrest count. Family buyers care about this one more than anything else.

5. Boot, open

Shot from the back, tailgate fully up, parcel shelf removed if there is one. Show the cargo space honestly. If there's a spare wheel and toolkit, leave them visible.

6. The odometer

Close-up of the dash showing the mileage. Take it with the engine running so the screen is on. This is the single photo that builds the most trust — buyers know dealers can fake everything except the photo of the actual mileage on the actual screen.

What you can skip

• Wheel close-ups. Nobody buys a car for the alloys.
• Engine bay. Used cars buyers don't look here. Trade buyers do, but they'll come and see it.
• Door cards. Nobody.
• Steering wheel close-up. Already in photo 3.
• Twenty interior detail shots. Three is enough.
• Photos of the badge. They know what brand it is.

The setup that takes 4 minutes

1. Park the car on a clean piece of ground (forecourt, not the auction lane).
2. Use your phone's default camera, not Instagram. Landscape orientation. Clean the lens with a microfibre.
3. Shoot the 6 above in this order. 4 minutes, 6 photos.
4. Drag them into Dealerexport in this order so the hero shot is photo #1.
5. Done. Buyers see exactly what they need to decide whether to enquire.

The honesty premium

The dealers who get the most enquiries on Carzone aren't the ones with the most photos — they're the ones whose photos look unedited. A bit of forecourt in the background, the right shadows, no clearly Photoshopped background. That photo says "this is a real car at a real dealer who isn't hiding anything."

That's the photo that converts.

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