Instagram image and video sizes

Instagram sizes at a glance

Instagram accepts photos and videos in a range of shapes and scales them to fit. When a file is outside that range, Instagram crops or shrinks it, and that is when heads get cut off and text gets blurry. Uploading in the right size avoids both. This guide lists the sizes for every format, with the official numbers taken from Instagram's and Meta's own help pages, and says plainly where Instagram does not publish an official size.

Feed photos

According to the Instagram Help Center, when you share a photo with a width between 320 and 1080 pixels, Instagram keeps its original resolution as long as its aspect ratio is between 1.91:1 and 3:4, which at 1080 pixels wide means a height between 566 and 1440 pixels. Wider photos are scaled down to 1080 pixels, narrower ones are enlarged to 320 pixels, and photos with a shape outside the range are cropped to fit (Instagram Help Center (opens in a new tab), checked November 2026).

In practice that gives three useful choices:

• Portrait, 1080 × 1350 (4:5) or the taller 1080 × 1440 (3:4). They take up the most space on a phone screen, which makes them the default choice for most posts. The 3:4 limit is the newer, taller one, so if you want the maximum height, use 1080 × 1440.
• Square, 1080 × 1080 (1:1). Still the safest shape for quotes, product shots and grids planned as squares.
• Landscape, 1080 × 566 (1.91:1). For wide scenes, but it appears small in the feed. Often a portrait crop or a blurred background works better.

Uploading a larger file, such as a 4000-pixel photo straight from a camera, is allowed; Instagram scales it down to 1080 pixels itself. Resizing it yourself with the image resize tool gives you control over sharpening and over where the crop falls.

Carousels

A carousel post can hold up to 20 photos and videos (Instagram Help Center (opens in a new tab), checked November 2026). All items share one shape: the orientation you choose, square, portrait or landscape, applies to every photo and video in the post, and each item is cropped to it. Prepare every slide in the same size before you upload, for example all at 1080 × 1350, so that nothing important is cut off on the later slides.

For a panorama that continues across slides, make one long image whose width is a multiple of 1080 and cut it into equal pieces. For collages inside a carousel, the collage maker exports in the same feed sizes.

Stories and Reels

Stories and Reels fill a vertical phone screen, so the size to aim for is 1080 × 1920 pixels, 9:16. For Reels, Instagram's Help Center gives the technical minimums: an aspect ratio between 1.91:1 and 9:16, a frame rate of at least 30 frames per second and a resolution of at least 720 pixels (Instagram Help Center (opens in a new tab), checked November 2026). A Reel can be up to 20 minutes long (Instagram Help Center (opens in a new tab), checked November 2026).

The same Help Center page recommends 420 × 654 pixels, a ratio of 1:1.55, for the Reel cover photo, and notes that the cover cannot be edited after upload, so prepare it before you share. Keep any title in the middle of the cover, where it stays visible when the profile grid shows a cropped version. The page also describes a setting worth turning on: in your profile menu, under Your app and media, open Media quality and switch on Upload at highest quality.

For Stories, 9:16 fills the screen. A photo in another shape can still be shared as a story; Instagram then places it on a background, which you can avoid by preparing the 9:16 frame yourself with story templates.

Safe zones

Instagram draws the profile name, buttons and caption over the top and bottom of Stories and Reels. Meta publishes exact margins for ads: keep about 14 percent at the top, 35 percent at the bottom and 6 percent on the sides free of important text (Meta Ads Guide (opens in a new tab), checked November 2026). There is no official safe zone for regular posts, but using the ad margins is a careful choice: on 1080 × 1920 that leaves the area between about 270 pixels from the top and 670 pixels from the bottom.

Profile picture and highlight covers

Instagram does not publish an official size for either. Both are shown as small circles, so detail does not matter much and the center matters most.

• Profile picture. Upload a square of 320 × 320 pixels or larger and keep the face or logo in the middle, away from the corners that the circle cuts off. The round corners tool can cut the photo to a circle to check what remains.
• Highlight covers. Covers come from a story in the highlight or from an image you pick. A 1080 × 1920 image with the icon in the center works for both routes, because Instagram cuts a circle from the middle. The highlight cover maker exports this size and a 320 × 320 square.

Video files: format and quality

MP4 with H.264 video and AAC audio is the format that every phone and Instagram handle without trouble. If a video looks blurry after upload, the usual causes are a low starting resolution, a frame rate under 30, or a file that was compressed several times before. Export once from your editor at 1080 pixels wide and 30 frames per second; the Instagram to MP4 converter does this in your browser.

For photos, Instagram's own advice for getting the full 1080-pixel width is to use the latest version of the app and to upload a photo at least 1080 pixels wide in a shape between 1.91:1 and 3:4. Carousels with several videos also take longer to upload, so share them on a reliable connection.

Size questions