How to Make a Photo Collage That Fits Instagram, Stories and Print
Make a photo collage sized for an Instagram post, a story or print: the right layout and shape, matched colour, well-cropped frames and a sharp export.
Updated September 15, 20266 min read
To make a photo collage, choose a layout, drop your photos into its frames, adjust the spacing and export one image. What separates a collage that looks considered from one that looks thrown together is decided before and after that: a shape that suits where it will be seen, photos that look as if they belong together, frames cropped with intent, and an export large enough to stay sharp.
Start from where the collage will be seen
Pick the shape first, because it decides everything else. At the time of writing, Instagram's help centre recommends feed photos at least 1080 pixels wide with an aspect ratio between 1.91:1 and 4:5; anything outside that range is cropped to fit. Meta recommends 9:16 at 1080 × 1920 or more for Stories. The full list for every platform is in our social media image sizes guide.
| Destination | Shape | Pixels | How to get there |
|---|---|---|---|
| Instagram feed, square | 1:1 | 1080 × 1080 | Square shape in the collage maker |
| Instagram feed, portrait | 4:5 | 1080 × 1350 | Portrait (3:4) collage, then resize with fill and crop |
| Instagram story | 9:16 | 1080 × 1920 | Collage, then the story preset with Contain |
| Any | As large as you can | Match my photos, PNG or high-quality JPG |
Our collage maker offers Square, Landscape (4:3), Portrait (3:4) and Wide (16:9) shapes, plus social layouts with their own fixed shapes: Instagram 3 is a 3:1 strip of three frames, Instagram Carousel is square, Facebook Cover is 16:9, Twitter Header is 3:1 and Pinterest is 2:3. It has no 4:5 or 9:16 shape, so for those make the collage first and fit it to the platform afterwards.
For a 4:5 feed post
Build the collage in Portrait (3:4), with a little outer margin. In the image resizer, set 1080 × 1350 with Fill & crop. That trims about 6% of the height, which your margin absorbs.
For a story
Open the social media image resizer, choose Instagram → Story (1080 × 1920), set the fit mode to Contain and match the background colour to the collage's. The whole collage stays visible, padded top and bottom.
Choosing a layout
There are 19 layouts in four groups, and the right one depends on how many photos you have and whether one matters more than the rest.
- Grid (2×2, 3×3, two or three side by side or stacked) when every photo carries equal weight — a set of products, a before and after.
- Featured (one large frame left, right, top or bottom, plus two smaller ones) when one photo is the story and the others are context.
- Magazine layouts, which sit in the Featured group, pair a large lead with a rail of supporting frames — for six or nine photos where one should dominate.
- Masonry (three or four columns) when your photos are a mix of portrait and landscape and you do not want any of them cropped. Each keeps its own proportions and the frames grow with the number of photos.
- Social for the fixed platform shapes above.
Drag one photo onto another to swap them, and drag the divider between two frames to resize them. Sizes are stored as proportions, so a frame you widened on screen stays exactly as wide in the exported file.
Make the photos look like one set
The most common giveaway is colour. A warm indoor shot beside three cool daylight ones looks like a mistake, however good each photo is on its own. Choose photos taken in similar light where you can, and correct the outliers before they go in — the batch image editor applies the same brightness and contrast adjustment across a whole set.
- Match exposure first, colour second. One dark frame pulls the eye more than one slightly warm frame.
- Apply any filter to every photo or none. A single black-and-white frame among colour ones reads as a feature, so do it deliberately or not at all.
- Take the background colour from the photos. White is the default and suits most sets; a colour picked from the photos makes the spacing look intended.
19 layouts, drag-to-swap, per-frame cropping and exports up to 4,096 pixels wide on the free plan. It all runs on your device, not our servers.
Make a collageCrop each frame deliberately
A frame is rarely the same shape as the photo inside it. Fill frame crops the photo to cover the frame and is right most of the time; Fit inside shows the whole photo with background around it; Stretch distorts and is almost never what you want. Select a frame in the preview to reframe just that photo: zoom up to 4×, move the crop across or down, or rotate it.
Put portrait photos in tall frames and landscapes in wide ones, and the crop has little to do. Keep faces clear of the frame edges, avoid cutting people at the joints, and give a subject room in the direction it faces. If a photo needs a very specific shape, trim it with the crop tool first — our guide to cropping to an aspect ratio covers the choices.
Spacing, borders and background
Spacing runs from 0 to 80 pixels between frames, with an outer margin of up to 120 and corner rounding up to 120. Borders can be solid or dashed, up to 40 pixels, in any colour, and there is an optional drop shadow.
Spacing is measured in pixels of the exported image, so the same number looks different at different sizes: 8 pixels is a clear gap on a 1080-pixel sheet and a hairline on a 4,096-pixel one. Judge it at the size you will export. Keep spacing and outer margin equal for a tidy grid, or make the margin larger to frame the whole set.
Export size, format and file size
With Match my photos switched on, the sheet is sized so each column is about as wide as your photos, so nothing is thrown away. Or set the width yourself. The free plan exports up to 4,096 pixels wide; Pro goes up to 16,384.
- JPG for photo collages you will post or send: far smaller than PNG for the same photos. The quality slider runs from 40 to 100%.
- PNG when the collage contains text or flat graphics, or when it will be edited again. Expect large files from a sheet of photos.
- WebP is usually smaller still at the same quality, but not every site or app accepts it.
For Instagram, anything at or above 1080 pixels wide is enough. For print, work out the size you need: at 300 pixels per inch, a 4,096-pixel sheet prints about 35 cm wide. The guide to image DPI for printing explains the arithmetic.
Free and Pro
| Free | Pro | |
|---|---|---|
| Photos per collage | Up to 10 | Up to 100 |
| Size per photo | Up to 25 MB | As large as your device can handle |
| Export width | Up to 4,096 pixels | Up to 16,384 pixels |
| Layouts, frames, borders, formats | All | All |
The collage maker opens JPG, PNG, WebP, AVIF, GIF and BMP photos. For a square post built around text rather than photos, the Instagram post maker is the better starting point.
Frequently asked questions
What size should an Instagram collage be?
1080 × 1350 pixels (4:5) for a portrait feed post, which takes up the most room in the feed; 1080 × 1080 for a square post; and 1080 × 1920 (9:16) for a story. Instagram crops feed photos taller than 4:5, so do not upload a taller collage and hope.
How many photos can I put in a collage for free?
Up to 10 per collage, each up to 25 MB; Pro takes up to 100. Most layouts have a set number of frames — a 3×3 grid holds nine — while the masonry layouts grow with the number of photos you add.
How do I make a collage without cropping my photos?
Use a masonry layout, where every photo keeps its own proportions, or set a frame to Fit inside so the whole photo shows with the background around it.
Why does my collage look blurry on Instagram?
Usually because it was exported too small or saved at a low JPG quality, or because it was taller than 4:5 and Instagram cropped and rescaled it. Export at least 1080 pixels wide, keep the quality high and fit the collage to 4:5 before you upload.