Social Media Image Sizes That Actually Matter in 2026
Current image and video dimensions for Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook and X — plus the three rules that make a graphic work everywhere at once.
Updated August 11, 20265 min read
Every platform publishes its own dimension list, every list changes twice a year, and most of the differences do not matter. What does matter is that a graphic designed at the wrong aspect ratio gets cropped by the platform — usually through the most important part of your image. This page collects the sizes worth knowing and the three rules that let one design survive being posted in six places.
The sizes worth memorising
There are really only four shapes in social media. Learn these and you have covered almost everything.
| Shape | Pixels | Where it is used |
|---|---|---|
| Square 1:1 | 1080 × 1080 | Instagram and Facebook feed posts, LinkedIn |
| Portrait 4:5 | 1080 × 1350 | Instagram and Facebook feed — Instagram also takes 3:4 (1080 × 1440) since 2025 |
| Vertical 9:16 | 1080 × 1920 | Stories, Reels, TikTok, YouTube Shorts |
| Landscape 16:9 | 1920 × 1080 | YouTube thumbnails, X posts, LinkedIn video, website heroes |
If you only ever produce assets in those four sizes, you will never be badly cropped anywhere. The social media image resizer has presets for the square and vertical shapes (and 16:9 at 1280 × 720 for YouTube thumbnails); pick a preset, export, then switch presets for the next shape. It has no 4:5 preset, so set 1080 × 1350 in the image resizer.
Platform-specific dimensions
- Feed post: 1080 × 1080 (square), 1080 × 1350 (4:5 portrait) or, since 2025, 1080 × 1440 (3:4), which matches the 3:4 profile grid. The taller shapes occupy more vertical screen space, which is why most brands default to them.
- Stories and Reels: 1080 × 1920. Keep text out of the top 14%, the bottom 35% and about 6% on each side — Meta's safe zone, roughly the central 950 × 980 pixels — because the interface covers those bands.
- Profile picture: 320 × 320, displayed as a circle. Design for the circle, not the square.
YouTube
- Thumbnail: YouTube recommends 3840 × 2160 (minimum 640 wide), up to 50MB from a computer or 2MB from the mobile app; 1280 × 720 is still accepted. This is the single highest-leverage asset on the platform — see the thumbnail size guide for the design rules.
- Channel banner: 2560 × 1440, but only the central 1546 × 423 is guaranteed visible on every device. Everything essential goes in that safe area.
- Shorts: 1080 × 1920, same as every other vertical format.
LinkedIn, Facebook and X
- LinkedIn post image: 1200 × 627 for link previews, 1080 × 1080 for standalone images.
- LinkedIn cover: 1584 × 396 — an extreme letterbox that crops badly if you design at any other ratio.
- Facebook cover: shown at 820 × 312 on desktop and 640 × 360 on phones (minimum 400 × 150), so each screen crops it differently. Keep content centred.
- X post image: 1600 × 900 (16:9) displays without cropping in the timeline.
Pick a platform preset and export at the exact size. Runs on your device — nothing is uploaded.
Resize for every platformThree rules that beat memorising dimensions
Design at the largest size, export downward
Start at 1080 × 1350 or 1920 × 1080 and scale down for smaller placements. Scaling down preserves quality; scaling up invents pixels that were never there and looks soft.
Keep everything critical in the centre 80%
Every platform crops something — for a different aspect ratio, an interface overlay, or a circular avatar mask. Text and faces placed in the middle survive all of it. This one habit prevents most re-work.
Assume it will be re-compressed
Platforms re-encode every upload. Fine detail, thin text and subtle gradients degrade. Use bold shapes and text at least 40px tall in a 1080px-wide design, and upload the highest quality you can within the size limit rather than pre-compressing.
File size and format
Most platforms accept JPG and PNG, and several now accept WebP. Use JPG for photographs and PNG for graphics with flat colour and text — a PNG screenshot of a chart stays crisp where a JPG version develops halos around every line.
Upload limits are generous enough that pre-compressing usually hurts more than it helps: YouTube takes thumbnails up to 50MB from a computer (2MB from the app), and LinkedIn accepts media files up to 100MB. Since the platform will re-compress anyway, giving it a high-quality source produces a better final result than giving it something you already squeezed. The exception is anything destined for a chat app, where aggressive re-compression is the norm and starting smaller with the image compressor makes little difference to how it ends up looking.
Repurposing one asset across formats
The efficient workflow is not designing six graphics. It is designing one wide graphic with generous margins, then cropping outward from the centre for each placement. Shoot or design with more room around the subject than the final composition needs, and every reframe becomes a crop rather than a redesign.
The same applies to video. A 16:9 clip reframed to 9:16 loses two-thirds of its width, so anything at the edges disappears. The aspect ratio tool lets you choose where the vertical window sits rather than defaulting to a centre crop, which matters when your subject is off to one side.
Vertical formats have one extra constraint worth building into the design rather than discovering later: the top and bottom bands of a 9:16 frame are covered by interface elements — the profile row and caption at the top, the action buttons and progress bar at the bottom. Meta's guidance is to keep text out of the top 14%, the bottom 35% and 6% on each side — on a 1080 × 1920 frame, roughly a 950 × 980 area — so treat the outer bands as decoration rather than as space for anything a viewer needs to read.
For the other platforms and placements, the social media sizes hub links a preset resizer for each platform alongside the creator tools.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best image size for Instagram in 2026?
1080 × 1350 (4:5) or 1080 × 1440 (3:4) for feed posts. 3:4 is now the tallest feed shape and matches the 3:4 profile grid; 4:5 is still supported and loses only a sliver at the sides in the grid. Use 1080 × 1080 square when the same asset also needs to work on LinkedIn or Facebook, and 1080 × 1920 for Stories and Reels.
Why does my image look blurry after uploading?
Platforms re-encode everything you upload. If your source was already compressed, that second pass compounds the damage. Upload the highest-quality file within the size limit, avoid thin text and fine detail, and never upscale a small image to meet a dimension requirement.
Should I use PNG or JPG for social posts?
JPG for photographs, PNG for graphics with flat colour, logos or text. PNG keeps sharp edges crisp through the platform's re-compression, which JPG does not — text in a JPG often picks up visible halos.
Can I use one image for every platform?
One design, yes — one exported file, no. Design at 1080 × 1350 with everything important in the centre, then export square, vertical and landscape crops from it. A resizer with platform presets makes each crop one click rather than a manual edit.