Social Media Image Size Guide

When it comes to social media, the power of visuals can not be overstated. The majority of people recall visual content for a lot longer than written text, which is why your marketing strategy should include lots of attractive images.

But, best practices for online content are always changing, and with them the image size guidelines for different social media platforms. Marketers often find it challenging to post high-quality images that look great on all devices.

That’s why I’ve written this guide - to help you keep up with the changes so you can get maximum exposure for your content. Read on as we look at the best image sizes for all major social media outlets.

But first, you may be wondering why it’s even important to get the image sizes right on different platforms.

Well, the answer is simple. If you don't use proper social media image sizes, it will disrupt the user experience regardless of which platform is being used. By following the recommended image sizes for each social site, you ensure that all your content is presented in a clear and transparent way.

No important information is accidentally cropped out by the platform’s automatic image resizers. Also, when all your posts are adjusted to each platform, it makes your images appear more professional and helps to boost your branding efforts.

With that out of the way, let’s get into our list of social media sites and the correct image sizes for each one.

We’ll start off our list with the world's largest and most popular social media platform. Facebook employs many different image sizes on its site, and their size depends on location and use.

The image below shows a cover image and profile image for Verpex on Facebook:

Facebook image sizes are as follows:

• Profile Image: 170 x 170 pixels

• Business Page Profile: 180 x 180 pixels

• Cover Image: 851 x 315 pixels

• Posts and Timeline Image: 1200 x 630 pixels

This is an example of a timeline image from Verpex:

• Shared Link Image: 1200 x 628 pixels

  • Square Image: 154 x 154 pixels in feed (116 x 116 on page)
  • Rectangular Image: 470 x 246 pixels in feed (484 x 252 on page)

• Event Cover Image: 1200 x 628 pixels

• Fundraiser Image: 800 x 300 pixels

• Group Cover Image: 1640 x 856 pixels

• Highlighted Image: 1200 x 717 pixels

• Facebook Fundraiser: 800 x 300 pixels

• Stories: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Marketplace Images: 1200 x 1200 pixels

• Facebook Panorama or 360 Image: 30,000 pixels in any dimension, less than 135,000,000 pixels in total size

Facebook Ads Image Sizes

• Facebook Feed Ads: 1080 x 1080 pixels (Minimum file size: 600 x 600 pixels)

• Facebook Right Column ads (Desktop-only ads): 1080 x 1080 pixels (Minimum file size: 254 x 133 pixels)

• Instant Articles Ads: 1080 x 1080 pixels

• Facebook Marketplace Ads: 1080 x 1080 pixels

• Facebook Search Ads : 1080 x 1080 pixels (Minimum file size: 600 x 600 pixels)

• Sponsored Messages Ads: 1080 x 1080 pixels

• Messenger Inbox Ads: 1080 x 1080 pixels (Minimum size: 254 x 133 pixels)

In Twitter's help center, you'll find the recommended image sizes for header and profile images. However, there isn't any specific recommendation for feed images. Instream images are displayed at 600 x 335 pixels, but users can click them and view them as large as 1200 x 675 pixels.

Make sure your profile images on different social media websites match to maintain brand consistency. As you can see from the example below, Verpex.com on Twitter maintains seamless branding across different social media websites:

• Profile Images: 400 x 400 pixels

• Header Images: 1500 x 500 pixels

• In-Stream Images: 1600 x 900 pixels

• Twitter Card Image: 120 x 120 pixels (minimum)

Recommended image sizes by types of Tweets:

• Image from a Tweet with shared link: 1200 x 628 pixels

• Tweet sharing a single image: 1200 x 675 pixels (this is recommended, but images with standard aspect ratios won’t be cropped)

• Tweet sharing two images: 700 x 800 pixels (both images)

• Tweet sharing three images: Left image - 700 x 800 pixels, Right images - 1200 x 686 pixels

• Tweet sharing four images: 1200 x 600 pixels (each image). This is the maximum number of images you can have on one Tweet

Twitter Ads Image Sizes

• Website Card Image: 800 x 418 pixels

• App Card Image: 800 x 800 pixels

• Carousels: 800 x 800 pixels

• Direct Message Card: 800 x 418 pixels

• Conversion Card: 800 x 418 pixels

On Instagram, images are displayed both horizontally and vertically-oriented.

Here are the guidelines for Instagram image sizes:

• Profile Images: 320 x 320 pixels

• Instagram Photo Thumbnail: 161 x 161 pixels

• Instagram Stories: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Carousels:

  • Landscape: 1080 x 566 pixels
  • Portrait: 1080 x 1350 pixels
  • Square: 1080 x 1080 pixels

• Instagram Reels: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• IGTV Cover Photo: 420 x 654 pixels

• Feed Images:

  • Landscape: 1080 x 566 pixels
  • Portrait: 1080 x 1350 pixels
  • Square: 1080 x 1080 pixels

Instagram Ads Image Sizes

• Landscape: 1080 x 566 pixels
• Square: 1080 x 1080 pixels

YouTube is more about videos than images, but there are still a lot of places within the platform's interface where you can use images, like we do on Verpex Official YouTube channel.

Here are the recommended image sizes for YouTube:

• Profile Image: 800 x 800 pixels

• Banner Image: 2048 x 1152 pixels

• Video Thumbnail Size: 1280 x 720 pixels

• Display Ads: 300 x 250 pixels

• Overlay Ads: 480 x 60 pixels

• Companion Banner Ads: 300 x 250 pixels

LinkedIn can be a valuable source of leads for your business, and one way to grab people's attention is by using high-quality images of the right size.

Listed below are LinkedIn's set of recommended image sizes:

• Personal Profile Image: 400 x 400 pixels

• Background Header/Cover Image: 1584 x 396 pixels

• Custom Modules: 502 x 282 pixels

• Company Photos: 900 x 600 pixels

• Post Image:

  • Square: 1200 x 1200 pixels
  • Portrait: 1080 x 1350 pixels

• LinkedIn Stories: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Blog Post Link Images/Shared Link Image: 1200 x 627 pixels

Company Pages:

• Company Logo Image: 300 x 300 pixels

• Company Cover Image: 1128 x 191 pixels

• Life Tab:

  • Main Image: 1,128 x 376 pixels
  • Company Photos: 900 x 600 pixels
  • Custom Modules: 502 x 282 pixels

• Square Logo: 60 x 60 pixels (minimum)

LinkedIn Ads Image Sizes

• Company Logo Ads: 100 x 100 pixels

• Spotlight Logo Ads: 100 x 100 pixels

• Spotlight Custom Background: 300 x 250 pixels

• Sponsored Content Images: 1200 x 627 pixels

• Sponsored Content Carousel Images: 1080 x 1080 pixels

Pinterest uses lots of different types of image sizes and aspect ratios in various areas of the platform. The website's best practice information makes it clear what the best size is for your images.

Pinterest’s recommended image sizes are as follows:

• Profile Image: 165 x 165 pixels

• Profile Cover Image: 800 x 450 pixels (minimum)

• Standard Pins: 1,000 x 1,500 pixels

• Square Pins: 1,000 x 1,000 pixels

• Long Pins: 1000 x 2100 pixels

• Infographic Pins: 1000 x 3000 pixels

• Story Pins: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Fleets: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Collections Pins: 1000 x 1000 or 1000 x 1500 pixels

• Board Display:

  • Large Thumbnail: 222 x 150 pixels
  • Small Thumbnail: 55 x 55 pixels

Pinterest Ads Image Sizes

• App Install Ads: 1000 x 1500 pixels

• Carousel Pins and Ads: 1,000 x 1,000 pixels, or 1000 x 1500 pixels

• Shopping Ads: 1000 x 1500 pixels

Like YouTube, Tik-Tok is all about videos, but they do have image guidelines for profile image sizes, which as follows:

• Profile Image: 200 x 200 pixels

Snapchat is a great platform for brands to tell stories via fun filters and engaging content that disappears after 24 hours.

Here are the platform’s image size guidelines:

• Shared Images: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Geofilters: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Stories: 1080 x 1920 pixels

Snapchat Ads Image Sizes:

• Snapchat Ads: 1080 x 1920 pixels

• Geofilter: 120 x 120 pixels (minimum)

Company logo, Cover photo, and Business photo: 720 x 720 pixels (250 x 250 pixels minimum resolution)

• Profile Image: 128 x 128 pixels

• Cover Image: 3000 x 1055 pixels

• Image Posts: 1280 x 1920 pixels

If you don't have the necessary photography and photo editing skills, never fear. There are image editing tools that simplify the process of sizing your images.

These include tools like:

Canva
A free, beginner-friendly image design tool with powerful online graphic design features for your website.

Adobe Spark
Now Adobe Express, this is another powerful image editing tool to help you stand out on social media.

Stencil
The web’s favorite online graphic design tool with basic and advanced features for image resizing.

Pablo
A quick and easy way to design engaging and visually appealing images for your social media campaigns.

PicMonkey
Design and edit images in real-time using simple drag-and-drop photo editing software.

Snappa
Quick and easy cloud-based graphic design software for beginners and experts alike.

These tools are designed for ease of use, and you'll be able to resize all your images quickly and easily even if you have zero technical experience. They come with drag-and-drop editors that you can use to not only change image sizes but also add filters, text, stickers, and overlays to help spice up your images.

Most of the platforms listed above offer a free trial so you can test out the platform before committing to a paid subscription.

In addition to image editing, some of the tools integrate with stock image libraries like Shutterstock to give you access to stock image galleries with millions of high-quality, royalty-free images to use for your social media campaigns.

This guide has all the information you need to ensure that you never upload a photo to your social media feed that doesn't look as good as it possibly can.

Some websites allow you to upload your images without adhering to a specific set of parameters. That's because they resize and compress the images in order to save space and bandwidth.

While this can save you a lot of time, it also means that the resize/optimization settings on the website or server are often set up for maximum efficiency rather than producing the best quality image output.

For this reason, it's best for you to follow the recommendations in this guide to prep your images at the recommended sizes for each website. This will help you avoid (or at least minimize) the loss of quality so that your images end up looking their best.

Over to you. Has this article helped you understand which image sizes are optimal for each social media site? Share your thoughts below!