500px Upgrades Portfolios, Adds Features and Hikes Prices

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Earlier today, online photo community and Flickr competitor 500px announced that it would be releasing an overhauled portfolio system very soon. Rebuilt from the ground up, the new system offers a slew of features that 500px “Awesome” users will be able to take advantage of in order to build online portfolios they’re proud of.

Set to launch in early May, the system comes with several new bells and whistles for more comprehensive customization. In the new system, users will be able to create their own highly-customizable website complete with its own URL. That website is said to feature a “robust” backup system, tabs, pages and absolutely no maintenance or hosting fees.

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According to the announcement, 500px has kept three principles in mind as it revamped the portfolio UX: the new system must be “Beautiful, Unique and Easy to Use.” With that in mind, set-up will allegedly take “just a few minutes,” and from the very beginning, the company is handing over as much control over the look and feel of the portfolios as possible.

Users will be able to integrate their blog and store into the portfolio, and brave souls even have the option of diving into the CSS to alter the code themselves. 500px is also promising that, as more time goes by, the portfolio system will continue to evolve and improve by adding more themes (the system will launch with 10) and higher levels of customization.

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Of course, there’s no such thing as a free lunch, and so it is that the portfolio announcement came attached to the less exciting news that prices will also be increasing. Plus memberships will go from $20 to $25/year while Awesome memberships will be increasing from $50 to $75/year. On the bright side, you’ll have the option to upgrade or renew at the old prices for as many years as you like, just as long as you do it before May 1st.

Perhaps in an attempt to sooth users over the price hikes, the company also announced that it would be increasing its upload limits for everyone. Free users can now upload up to 20 pics per week, with the max file size increasing to 100Mb for everyone.

For more details and a chance to preview the new portfolio system early, head over to 500px blog by clicking here.

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