Social Media Image Sizes (2026 Cheat Sheet)
You post a perfect photo and the platform crops it, squashes it or turns it grainy: that's what happens when the image size doesn't match the aspect ratio the platform expects. Every social network resamples and recompresses everything you upload, and the only way to stay in control is to hand over a file that's already in the right dimensions.
Here you'll find the 2026-updated charts with the correct pixel sizes and aspect ratios for Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, TikTok, YouTube, LinkedIn and X. Plus: what safe zones are, why WhatsApp ruins photos more than most, and the three-step process to fit any shot to any platform using the site's free tools.
Why image sizes matter (and what happens when you get them wrong)
When you upload an image, the platform performs three automatic operations: it crops it if the aspect ratio doesn't match its format, resizes it to the resolution it uses internally, and recompresses it to save bandwidth. You get no say in any of these — unless the file arrives already compliant.
There are three classic mistakes. A landscape photo uploaded as a story shows up tiny between two huge bars. A photo far bigger than needed gets aggressively compressed by the algorithm, with visible artifacts across skies and gradients. A photo smaller than the required format gets upscaled and looks blurry. The practical rule: always deliver a file at exactly the sizes listed in the charts below, or at most slightly larger with the same aspect ratio. The ratio (1:1, 4:5, 9:16, 16:9) matters even more than the absolute pixels: it's what decides whether your photo gets cropped.
Instagram: posts, stories, reels and profile
Instagram works at 1080 px wide for all content. Since 2025 the feed favors the 4:5 vertical (and supports 3:4), which takes up more screen than the classic square; stories and reels share the same full-screen 9:16 format.
| Content | Size (px) | Aspect ratio |
|---|---|---|
| Square post | 1080 × 1080 | 1:1 |
| Vertical post | 1080 × 1350 | 4:5 |
| Landscape post | 1080 × 566 | 1.91:1 |
| Story | 1080 × 1920 | 9:16 |
| Reel (cover) | 1080 × 1920 | 9:16 |
| Profile photo | 320 × 320 | 1:1 (displayed round) |
Tip: for the feed, go 4:5 whenever you can — the same shot gets more screen real estate. And remember the reel cover gets cropped to 1:1 in the profile grid: keep the subject centered.
Facebook and WhatsApp: posts, covers and statuses
Facebook accepts lots of formats but renders only a few of them well; WhatsApp is even harsher, as we'll see in the compression section.
| Content | Size (px) | Aspect ratio |
|---|---|---|
| Facebook — image post | 1200 × 630 | 1.91:1 |
| Facebook — vertical post | 1080 × 1350 | 4:5 |
| Facebook — page cover | 820 × 312 (desktop) | ~2.63:1 |
| Facebook — profile photo | 720 × 720 (displayed 170 × 170) | 1:1 |
| WhatsApp — status | 1080 × 1920 | 9:16 |
| WhatsApp — profile photo | 640 × 640 | 1:1 |
Watch out for the Facebook cover: on mobile it's cropped at the sides and shown taller, so keep logos and text within the central band of roughly 640 × 312 px. For your profile photo, upload a ready-made square using the tool to crop your photo: you'll avoid the automatic crop that often pushes the face off-center.
TikTok and YouTube: vertical versus horizontal
The two video platforms live in opposite worlds: TikTok is pure vertical, YouTube is horizontal (with the exception of Shorts).
| Content | Size (px) | Aspect ratio |
|---|---|---|
| TikTok — video/photo | 1080 × 1920 | 9:16 |
| TikTok — profile photo | 200 × 200 | 1:1 |
| YouTube — thumbnail | 1280 × 720 | 16:9 |
| YouTube — channel banner | 2048 × 1152 | 16:9 |
| YouTube — profile photo | 800 × 800 | 1:1 |
The YouTube thumbnail is the most "strategic" image in this guide: it's seen at tiny sizes in the suggestions, so you need big subjects, few elements and huge text — you can add it in a minute with the tool to add text to your photo. Maximum allowed file size: 2 MB — if your graphic goes over the limit, shrink it with the tool to compress images with quality set around 85. The channel banner, meanwhile, has a very narrow safe zone: more on that shortly.
LinkedIn and X (Twitter): professional formats
On LinkedIn and X, post images are previewed in landscape: a 1.91:1 or 16:9 format avoids unpredictable crops in the feed.
| Content | Size (px) | Aspect ratio |
|---|---|---|
| LinkedIn — post image | 1200 × 627 | 1.91:1 |
| LinkedIn — profile cover | 1584 × 396 | 4:1 |
| LinkedIn — company page cover | 1128 × 191 | ~5.9:1 |
| LinkedIn — profile photo | 400 × 400 | 1:1 |
| X — post image | 1600 × 900 | 16:9 |
| X — profile header | 1500 × 500 | 3:1 |
| X — profile photo | 400 × 400 | 1:1 (displayed round) |
Two known traps: the LinkedIn cover gets partially hidden at the bottom left by your profile photo, so keep anything important out of that corner; the X header gets cropped at the top and bottom on some screens, so center your content vertically.
Safe zones: the area that survives on every screen
The safe zone is the portion of the image that stays visible on any device, after all the interface's automatic crops. The cases where it's decisive:
- Stories and reels (9:16): the platform overlays the username at the top and buttons plus caption at the bottom. Leave roughly 250 px free at the top and 320 px at the bottom: text and faces need to sit in the central band.
- YouTube banner: of the full 2048 × 1152 px, only the central 1235 × 338 px rectangle is visible everywhere — on TV you see it all, on a phone only that strip. Your logo and channel name belong there.
- Cropped covers: Facebook trims the sides on mobile, LinkedIn covers the corner with the avatar.
The practical method: compose the image keeping every important element at least 10-15% away from the edges. If a key element ends up too close to the margin, reposition it by cropping the image with different margins before uploading, instead of hoping the platform will be kind.
Why WhatsApp compresses (and how to limit the damage)
WhatsApp is designed to work even on slow connections, so it aggressively recompresses every photo: it resizes the long side to roughly 1600-2048 px, converts everything to JPG and drops the quality to around 70. The result: an 8 MB photo reaches the recipient weighing 100-200 KB, with fine detail and gradients visibly degraded. The paradox is that the bigger the source file, the more the algorithm has to cut.
How to fight back:
- Prepare the file yourself: if you resize it to 1600 px on the long side, convert it to JPG and compress it at quality 80 before sending, WhatsApp has little left to recompress and the photo arrives nearly identical.
- Send it as a document: attaching the photo as a "Document" instead of an image means WhatsApp doesn't touch the file — handy for prints and client work.
- For your status: use exactly 1080 × 1920 px, so you avoid the double hit of cropping plus compression.
Fitting any photo in three steps
The process is identical for every platform — only the target size changes:
- Crop to the right aspect ratio. Open the crop tool, set the ratio from the chart (for example 4:5 for an Instagram post) and choose which part of the photo to keep. Deciding the crop yourself always beats leaving it to the algorithm.
- Resize to the exact pixels. With the tool to resize your photo, enter the required width (e.g. 1080), enable "Lock aspect ratio" and hit "Apply size": the height is calculated for you.
- Compress just enough. Get the file under 1 MB with the tool to compress images: quality 80-85 is invisible to the eye on social media and reduces the platform's own recompression.
The whole procedure runs in your browser without sending your images to any server, so it's fine even for company material that isn't public yet. For the full editing workflow, from cropping to filters, there's the guide on how to edit photos online.