Ever wonder what the best social media image sizes are for each social network?
Or how to make sure elements within your cover photos and posts meet the site specifications?
In a world where change is constant, keeping up can feel next to impossible.
But with the ever-increasing importance of visual marketing, staying up-to-date is a must.
Did you know that…
- Visual content receives 94% more views than content without an image?
- Tweets with images get 150% more retweets than those without images?
- 60% of consumers are more likely to interact with a company whose images appear in local searches?
That’s why I’ve put together a cheat sheet to social media image sizes for the top eight social networks.
You’ll also find best practices and examples of how to leverage your visual designs.
Just click on each link to skip to your favorite social network. Then save, embed or pin the Infographic via Make a Website Hub.
The Ultimate Guide to the Best Social Media Image Sizes
Skip to a Social Network
- Header Photo: 1500 x 500
- Profile Photo: 400 x 400
- In-Stream Photo Preview: 440 x 220
Your Twitter profile offers several ways to use images to stand out. First, you have your header photo. Just like your cover photo on Facebook and Google Plus, Twitter’s header image is your branding opportunity.
Use your header image to align your look and feel, marketing message and company tagline. And before you throw away a chance to brand your business, know the answers to a few questions.
- Who is your target market?
- How do you help solve their problems?
- What is your call to action and what next step do you want them to take?
Additionally, the Twitter in-stream photo is a great way to brand your tweets and grab the attention of your followers. Are you using images within your tweets? If not, now is the time to get started.
[clickToTweet tweet=” Are you using images within your tweets? If not, now is the time to get started! via @rebekahradice” quote=” Are you using images within your tweets? If not, now is the time to get started.”]
While the Twitter preview size is 440 x 220 (a 2:1 ratio), there have been major changes to the preview on desktop. David Boutin explained what you can test on your Twitter profile via the Social Quant blog.
- Square images are now displayed on desktop as 505 x 505 pixels. Larger squares can be uploaded but will still be displayed at 505 x 505 pixels. Smaller squares will be displayed per their actual dimensions.
- Portrait images 505 pixels tall or less will be displayed full size with extra space to the right. Portrait taller than 505 pixels images will still be cropped.
- Landscape images shorter than 505 pixels will remain unchanged; you’ll just see the whole thing now instead of the top/bottom possibly being cropped.
- To take advantage of every pixel of space Twitter affords you, make your images square and at least 505 pixels wide.
Want to make Twitter image creation easy? Use tools like Canva or Relay for pre-created templates that will help with text and element placement.
Here’s one I created for Influencer Chat and saved so I can easily create a similar design each week.
- UPDATED: Cover Photo Dimensions: 828 x 315 (note that size on Infographic is incorrect)
- Profile Image: 180 x 180
- Shared Images: 1200 x 630
- Shared Link: 1200 x 627
- Highlighted Image: 1200 x 717
Are you ready to turn up the volume on your business and gain the edge over your competition? Then get visual on Facebook!
Meaningful Facebook conversations begin with great content, this includes the images you share.
Use your Facebook cover photo and newsfeed images to connect fans to your brand.
Whether it’s a picture of your latest business offering or one that promotes your recent blog post, make sure the look and feel best represent who you are offline and online.
Google Plus
- Profile Image: 250 x 250
- Cover Image: 1080 x 608
- Shared Image: (in home stream and on page) 497 x 373
- Shared Image: (in the feed) 150 x 150
When was the last time you updated your Google+ profile or page? If your answer is, “I don’t know,” then now is the time.
Peg Fitzpatrick, author of “The Art of Social Media” and social media power user seconds that,
“You can’t be guaranteed a share if an image doesn’t pull through on the Pin it button or onto Facebook or Google+. Help people help you by providing an image that they can share. If people can look like a rockstar sharing your content, it’s a win!”
Just take one look at her beautiful images and it’s easy to see why her content gets shared.
- Profile Image: 110 x 110
- Photo Thumbnails: 161 x 161
- Photo Size: 1080 x 1080
With more than 400 million users, Instagram has become a visual marketing social leader.
Whether you’re sharing your latest blog post, business quote or helpful tip, Instagram has marketing super powers, no matter the industry or niche.
While completing your profile is incredibly important with any social network, this is especially true with Instagram since you’re limited in the amount of information you can share.
Spend time crafting the perfect bio to better connect with your audience, tell your story and brand your business.
My friend and Instagram expert, Sue B Zimmerman (@TheInstagramExpert) clearly states who she is, what she does and who she helps.
- Profile Image: 165 x 165
- Board Display: 222 x 150
- Pin Sizes: 236 / 600 width
Are you interested in marketing your business with Pinterest?
Not only can a persuasive Pinterest image attract attention, but also inspire action and drive traffic to your website or blog.
Don’t miss the opportunity to optimize your images for maximum engagement!
What you need to know:
Pins in the feed will have a width of 236 pixels and expanded pins have a minimum width of 600 with the length adjusted to scale.
As Sprout Social says,
When adding a pin to your board it’s important to remember that Pinterest puts a limit on the width of the image but not the length. This gives you the opportunity to add a photo that’s square or one that will scale to be even taller. Just remember to make sure you’re creating large images because they add more value, not just because you can.
I’ve had great success with larger images over the last several years, finding that vertical images receive more re-pins, likes and clicks.
My perfect size is 735 x1200. But don’t be afraid to mix it up and see what works best for you.
This image created for “10 Steps to Creating a Winning Social Media Strategy,” is 600 x 900 and still sits at the top of Pinterest search for the keyword “social media strategy.”
Tumblr
- Profile Image: 128 x 128
- Image Posts: 500 x 750
With over 280 million users and over 58 million posts per day, Tumblr is no lightweight when it comes to visual marketing.
So, what do you need to know?
Aside from the profile photo, which should be square, your second biggest concern should be the images you share.
Coca-Cola is a great example of a brand that understands the importance of creating network specific content. Rather than sharing the same piece of content across multiple platforms, Coca-Cola tailors their content for this specific audience.
Learn from their example. Whether sharing a photo, video or GIF, think engagement and awareness when sharing your business content on Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook, Google Plus or Twitter.
YouTube
- Channel Cover Photo: 2560 x 1440
- Video Uploads: 1280 x 760
Since YouTube is a video-sharing site and not a photo-sharing site, your graphic focus will be your channel’s profile image and cover photo.
What do you need to know about YouTube videos?
- In order to qualify as HD quality, they must be a minimum of 1280 x 760.
- Videos must maintain a 16:9 aspect ratio.
- Make it a point to choose the most catchy video thumbnail.
- Your videos tell a story. What are yours telling about you? Keep the most relevant videos at the forefront of your YouTube channel like my Post Planner Blab with Diana Adams and Scott Ayres.
LinkedIn’s continued growth and move towards visual marketing make this an important place for your business to be.
With 414 million members, LinkedIn is growing at a speed of more then 2 new members per second. Does that sound like a place you can afford to forget about?
Spruce up your LinkedIn profile by adding a new cover photo (did you even know they allowed cover photos now?) and add consistent status updates.
As Constant Contact points out,
While some may consider LinkedIn one of the least visual social networks, reports have shown that you can increase your LinkedIn views by 11 times when you include a photo. We have found that including a photo with the content we’re sharing on LinkedIn from the Constant Contact page typically doubles the engagement rate.
Neal Schaffer with Maximize Social Business and the author of Maximizing LinkedIn is an excellent example of making the most of this branding space.
Final Thoughts
How are you using visual marketing across social media?
No matter which social network, use them to brand your business in a consistent way.
But make sure you’re using the best social media image sizes for each channel.
With each one, you stand out online, create differentiation, and create a memorable experience.
Adapted and update from original social media image size post here on the blog.
Share the Infographic
Katrina Chua says
July 1, 2016 at 12:34 amThis is very useful. I know most of us are guilty of posting photos of varying sizes. No matter how insignificant it may seem, it really does a great difference if you are aware of this information. Thanks for sharing this.
Miranda says
March 25, 2016 at 3:02 amSuch an informative article. You have clearly shown how many factors we need to take into consideration in order to use social media in the most efficient way. It all adds up to social media being very important in advertising these days. This is what our service is encouraging. Have you ever tried Giveaway Service? We help brands connect with authors who blog and share content via social networks on http://www.giveawayservice.com. If you ever find the time to check out our website, we’d love to hear your take on it.
Miranda Mathews
Giveaway Service Rep
Doug says
March 20, 2016 at 1:38 pmI’ll have to readjust the sizing of my photos across all my social media profiles … thanks!
Sameer Panda says
March 20, 2016 at 5:33 amWow! great post Rebekah
A nice guide to using right image size on social media sites. I loved the infographics, saved to my system.
My favorite social network is Twitter, it works best for me. And use Photoshop for creating my images. It works well.
Thanks for sharing 🙂
Rebekah Radice says
March 27, 2016 at 9:20 pmHi Sameer! I’m with you on both of those — love Twitter (it was my first social love) and use Photoshop daily. Couldn’t live without it!
Michelle Piatkowski says
March 19, 2016 at 8:33 amRebekah,
I am a student current enrolled in a Social Media Marketing course and your handy “cheat sheet” will come in handy. In the past, I worked in marketing and know the frustration of creating graphics to fit collateral and advertising platforms such as newspaper articles. It can c get costly and wastes a lot of time.
Best regards, Michelle
NiaSweetz says
March 15, 2016 at 6:01 amIt looks like this guide covers it all – great resource! So, I’m curious Rebekah, what’s your process when creating graphics for your posts? Do you make a different one for each social media platform? + Have you pretty much memorized the dimensions?
Organizein-Losangeles says
March 14, 2016 at 1:11 amYou blog is really very good. It has cultivated a new sense of inspiration in me to start a setup of my own. I just love the way you described everything. After reading this blog I think anyone can achieve what they want.
Deepanker says
March 12, 2016 at 9:53 pmVery informative guide. I never took care of exact image sizes and this is the reason why most of the times, cropping or stretching reduced the image clarity. I will try to re-upload images with the given sizes.
Thanks for the awesome research and then putting everything on the single guide,
Shantanu Sinha says
March 10, 2016 at 11:42 pmHello Rebekah Radice,
That’s very helpful post.
These are some great tips to add up on any picture and to resize them.
Thank you for sharing this among us.
Shantanu sinha.
Ellie says
March 10, 2016 at 5:04 amThank you for sharing, this is such a useful page to bookmark!
Doug says
March 9, 2016 at 10:50 amGreat infographic! Thanks!
Mansi Padhya says
March 3, 2016 at 8:56 pmHey Rebekah,
Awesome post. I love that you organized your post into a handy Infographic. Thanks for sharing this informative post.
Sherman Smith says
March 2, 2016 at 4:42 pmHey Rebekah,
It is about that time for me to spruce up my pages and profiles. I really appreciate this cheat seat which gives me an idea of where I can work from. Especially putting it on an infographic so I can see the big picture.
Thanks for sharing Rebekah! Have a great rest of the week!
Jamesk Keru says
March 1, 2016 at 12:33 amNice read. I normally use 504×504 or 1008×1008. Also I nolonger use Jpeg images I use .png for high visual quality. I will now incorporate your nice ideas into my work.
Mona AlvaradoFrazier says
February 29, 2016 at 11:56 amI love that you organized your post into a handy infographic. Thanks for sharing the information.
Another handy tool to use, when you can’t remember the optimum media sizes, is Canva.com. They have a “sizer” right on the page.
Rebekah Radice says
February 29, 2016 at 1:25 pmHi Mona – Canva is a great tool! I’m a big fan and did mention them and Relay as great alternatives when you don’t want to figure out sizes or are short on time for design. So many ways to make those perfectly sized images.