How Much Does It Cost to Develop Film? 2026 Prices

For a standard roll of 35mm color negative film (C-41, the regular color process), develop-only prices run from $5.00 at Citizens Photo in Portland to $11.50 at The Great American Photo Lab in Carlsbad, California. That covers 10 of the 11 labs below that list a develop-only price. Develop-only means you get developed negatives back and no digital files.

Add scans and the cost to develop 35mm film climbs to $11.50 to $29 a roll. The cheapest mail-in option is Dwayne's Photo at $11.50 ($7.50 developing plus $4 for standard scans), then Reformed Film Lab at $12 and The Darkroom from $14. Larger scans cost more: Richard Photo Lab charges $23.98 to $32.98 depending on scan size.

Mail-in prices are before shipping, which gets its own section below. Old School Photo Lab is the exception: its $18 develop-only and $25 develop-and-scan prices include a prepaid label both ways and the return of your negatives. For how these labs compare beyond price, see the best mail-in film labs.

Medium format 120 usually costs the same as 35mm to develop, or a little more (Dwayne's charges $10 instead of $7.50). Black and white is the same price as color at Dwayne's, Richard Photo Lab and Photoworks, and $1 more at The Camera Company ($8 instead of $7). Slide film (E-6) is the expensive one, at $12.50 to $19 to develop a 35mm roll before scans.

Disposable cameras hold 35mm color film, and most labs charge their regular 35mm price. The Darkroom adds $3 for a single-use camera, and LensLurker notes that some labs charge an extra $1 or $2. With scans, 120 starts at $14 at The Darkroom, $21.98 at Richard Photo Lab (Noritsu web scans) and $26 at Old School Photo Lab with shipping included.

The big chains still take 35mm film and disposable cameras at stores with a photo counter. Walmart's film page lists no price, so the Walmart and CVS numbers below come from third-party guides, and the Walgreens figure is as reported by Cultured Kiwi and Pellica. Confirm at the counter.

Cheap prints come with two catches. Turnaround is days, not hours, because Walmart and CVS send film to outside labs, according to Cultured Kiwi and Shotkit: Walmart quotes about 6 days, while Cultured Kiwi says one to three weeks is typical. And you usually lose the negatives: Cultured Kiwi says Walmart usually doesn't return them and Walgreens doesn't, and Shotkit says CVS throws them away after printing and scanning. Without negatives you can't rescan or reprint later.

A develop-only price buys developed, cut negatives and nothing digital. Scans are the main add-on, and the size you pick sets the price. The Darkroom says its Standard scan (1024x1536 pixels) is fine for social sharing, email and prints up to 5x7, while its Enhanced scan (2048x3072) is meant for editing, cropping and prints up to 11x14.

Prints cost extra nearly everywhere. One set of 4x6 prints adds $5 at Dwayne's, and The Darkroom charges $10 per set (one print of every frame) for 4-inch color prints, $18 for 5-inch and $20 for 4-inch black and white silver prints. Reformed's single prints add $9 to a small-scan order ($21 instead of $12). At The Camera Company develop-only costs $7 for 24 or 36 exposures, but develop and print is $15 or $18.

Negatives are the part people forget. The Darkroom always returns them, Dwayne's returns them unless you ask it not to, Old School includes the return in its price, and Reformed charges a flat $5.95 per order to send them back. The Darkroom notes that many drugstores and retail stores no longer return negatives at all.

Mail-in prices look low until shipping is added. Reformed charges a flat $5.95 per order and Dwayne's adds only $0.50 for each extra roll, so sending several rolls in one box cuts the cost per roll. At Dwayne's you also pay to ship the film in, choosing your own carrier.

Time is part of the cost. Citizens Photo turns C-41 around in 24 hours, Monday to Thursday, and Green's Camera World turns 35mm around the next weekday. By mail, The Darkroom says film reaches it in 2 to 5 days from almost anywhere in the US and is scanned within 2 to 4 days; Dwayne's quotes about 12 business days in the lab. More detail is in How long does it take to develop film?

The headline price assumes a normal roll of 35mm color. These add-ons are where the bill grows.

• Push or pull processing: $2 at Citizens Photo, $3 at The Darkroom and Photoworks, $4 at Dwayne's. See how to push and pull film.
• Slide film (E-6): The Darkroom's order form adds $6 to its $11 develop-only price.
• Disposable cameras: The Darkroom adds $3; LensLurker says some labs charge $1 or $2.
• Odd formats: The Darkroom adds $6 for 110, 126, 127 and APS and $10 for 220. Old School charges from $25 to develop 117, 126 and old color film such as C-22.
• Blank rolls: Citizens Photo charges for all film processed, including blank and unexposed rolls. Indie Film Lab keeps a $10 processing fee on a blank roll and credits the rest back.
• Order minimums: Photoworks San Francisco requires $20 per order, so one $10 develop-only roll won't meet it alone.
• Rush service: Citizens Photo offers 3-hour service on C-41 and black and white develop-only for $2 more per roll.

Per roll, yes, once you own the gear. CineStill's Df96 black and white monobath costs $19.99 for a liter that develops 16 or more rolls, roughly $1.25 a roll. Its Cs41 color kit is $32.99 for up to 24 rolls, about $1.37 a roll if you get all 24. Those per-roll figures are the kit price divided by CineStill's stated roll count, so treat them as best-case estimates.

The catch is start-up cost and labor. A JOBO MONO starter kit with a tank, reel, funnel and enough Df96 for 8 or more rolls is $69.95, and you still have to scan the negatives yourself. Black and white is the easier start because Df96 works at room temperature (68 to 82°F); for color, CineStill recommends 102°F for Cs41. Our guide to developing film at home walks through both.

If you shoot a few rolls a year, a lab is simpler. The savings show up over dozens of rolls.

Many pages that rank for this question are two or three years old. LensLurker's survey, dated January 1, 2023, put the average cost to buy, develop and scan a roll of 35mm color at $27, or $0.75 per photo, and that includes the film itself. Color Experts' 2024 guide gives $10 to $20 for development only, higher than the $5 to $11.50 develop-only prices on most 2026 lab pages.

Single-lab prices drift too. Shotkit lists Dwayne's at $6 a roll; Dwayne's own page now starts at $7.50, with scans extra. The Darkroom's 35mm and 120 pages say from $14, while its older page on old rolls still says as low as $12. On black and white, LensLurker found develop-and-scan averaged 19% more than color, while Dwayne's, Richard Photo Lab and Photoworks charge the same develop-only price for both.

Every lab price on this page except Trigger Analog's was read on the lab's own price page on October 28, 2026. All sellers are in the US, and no Amazon listings were used. Where a lab says "starting at," the tables show that cheapest option, usually 35mm C-41 with the smallest scan. Camera Dojo has not sent film to these labs, so this page compares published prices, not results.

• Labs: prices copied from each lab's own price page.
• Walmart, Walgreens and CVS: third-party figures from Cultured Kiwi, Pellica and Shotkit, labeled as such in the table.
• Trigger Analog Film Lab: from a Community Impact news report dated June 2026, not the lab's own page.
• Home developing: per-roll figures are the kit price divided by CineStill's stated roll count.
• Left out: Samy's Camera, Indie Film Lab and Pro Photo Supply, whose price lists could not be read, and current official CVS prices.
• Prices change. Check the lab's page before you send film.