Bhinish Dhiman
Social media image sizes, checked against each platform's own pages
Use the size the platform itself publishes, not a figure copied between blogs: Instagram allows posts up to 1080 × 1440 (3:4), a Facebook Page cover is 851 × 315, an X header 1500 × 500, a LinkedIn background 1584 × 396 and a YouTube thumbnail 3840 × 2160 under 2 MB from a phone. Crop each around the subject, keep text inside the published safe zones, and check the file against the upload limit before posting.
Most size guides copy each other. That is how a figure outlives the rule it described. On 8 October 2026 we read every platform’s own help pages and compared them with the widely shared guides; several popular numbers were out of date, and a few platforms publish no figure at all.
Where the popular figures and the platforms disagree
| Place | Widely quoted | The platform’s own page says |
|---|---|---|
| Instagram, tallest post | 1080 × 1350 (4:5) | between 1.91:1 and 3:4: “a width of 1,080 pixels with a height between 566 and 1,440 pixels” |
| YouTube thumbnail | 1280 × 720 | 3840 × 2160; 2 MB when uploaded from a phone, 50 MB from a computer |
| LinkedIn cover | 4200 × 700 | 1584 × 396 for a profile background; 1512 × 256 for a Company Page |
| X header | 1500 × 500, no caveat | 1500 × 500, and “60 pixels on the top and bottom could be cropped” |
A safe zone is the part of the frame a platform promises not to cover or cut. Where one is published, anything outside it, such as a headline, a logo or a face, may disappear behind a profile picture or a button.
The sizes, with their sources
Every figure below was read on the platform’s own page on 8 October 2026. The social media image sizes page lists all 30 with links and the quoted words that set each number.
| Platform | Place | Size | Upload limit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Post | 1080 wide, 566 to 1440 tall | not stated | |
| Story or Reel ad | 1440 × 2560 | 30 MB | |
| Page profile picture | 320 × 320, shown as a circle | not stated | |
| Page cover | 851 × 315; under 100 KB loads fastest | not stated | |
| X | Profile photo | 400 × 400 | 2 MB |
| Profile photo / background | 400 × 400 / 1584 × 396 | 8 MB | |
| YouTube | Channel banner | 2560 × 1440, text inside 1235 × 338 at 2048 × 1152 | 6 MB |
| Standard Pin | 1000 × 1500 | 20 MB | |
| Bluesky | Avatar / banner | 1:1 / 3:1 | 1,000,000 bytes |
| Mastodon | Avatar / header | 400 × 400 / 1500 × 500 | 2 MB |
| Link previews | Open Graph image | 1200 × 630 | 8 MB |
Bluesky’s limits come from its published record schema and its app’s source code, which state 1,000,000 bytes for avatars and banners and 2,000,000 for post images, with post images capped at 4000 pixels on the long side.
Platforms that publish nothing
TikTok’s help centre gives no image size for a profile or a photo post, and its advertising help site could not be reached on the day. Threads has no image size on any Threads or Meta help page. Snapchat’s specification page returned “not found”. Instagram publishes no size for an ordinary Story or a profile photo; the Story size above is Meta’s specification for Story ads, and the page labels it so. Figures for all of these circulate widely. Without a page from the platform to check them against, we leave them out.
One photo, many crops
Each place has its own shape, from 4:1 for a LinkedIn background to 9:16 for a Story, so one photo becomes several crops. A focal point is the spot every crop is centred on as far as the edges allow; set it on the subject and a centred crop will no longer cut through a face that sits above the middle of the frame.
On the page:
- Press Choose a photo, or use a sample.
- Tap the subject in the photo. The marker moves there; the arrow keys move it too.
- Tick the sizes. Six common ones are ticked to start, and each card shows its crop, the safe zone where one is published, and whether the focal point lands inside it.
- Press Make 6 sizes (the number follows your ticks) if they have not started already: once you have chosen a photo, tapped or ticked, they are remade as you go. Each file comes out at exactly its size, fitted under the platform’s upload limit, and Download all 6 sizes as .zip saves them as one .zip.
A card warns when a size enlarges a small region of your photo. A 3840 × 2160 thumbnail cut from a 2400-pixel-wide photo has no more detail than the photo had, whatever the pixel count says.
Working out a ratio by hand
The other side of a ratio is one multiplication: a 16:9 frame 1920 wide is 1920 × 9 ÷ 16 = 1080 tall. Going the other way, 1200 × 630 reduces to 40:21, which is 0.27% away from 1.91:1, close enough for the link previews that ask for that shape. The calculator at the foot of the size guide does both and prints the working.
Other ways to do it
Canva’s Magic Resize turns one design into many sizes, but it is a Canva Pro feature. Adobe Express offers presets for the major platforms and accepts files under 40 MB. Both upload your photo to their servers.
Checking that nothing was uploaded
Open the developer tools’ Network tab before pressing Make. The resize engine loads from this site; the photo stays in the tab.
To resize a batch to one rule, a print size or a file size instead, use resize image. The measurements behind the resizer are in how to resize a photo to an exact size.