Facebook Image Sizes Guide (2026): Complete Dimensions for Posts, Cover Photos, Profile Pictures & Ads

Facebook has more image slots than any other platform: profile pictures, two kinds of cover photo, feed posts in three shapes, link previews, Stories, Reels, event banners, group headers, Marketplace listings and half a dozen ad placements. Each one has its own dimensions, several get cropped differently on phones than on desktop, and Facebook compresses everything you upload harder than almost any other platform.

This guide lists every Facebook image size that applies in 2026, verified against current specs, plus the handling rules that decide whether your upload stays sharp. The workflow sections are measured rather than theoretical: I built a real cover photo with the free tools on this site and recorded the file size at each step, including the one result that surprised me, a finished cover landing at 65.2 KB, well under the 100 KB threshold Facebook itself recommends.

Why Facebook image sizes matter

Three behaviors make Facebook stricter about sizing than it first appears:

• Aggressive recompression. Every upload is re-encoded on Facebook's servers, and the compressor is tuned for bandwidth, not beauty. The larger and heavier your file, the more the compressor has to throw away. Uploads that are already at the display size and efficiently encoded pass through with the least visible damage, which is the core trick behind everything in this guide.
• Fixed frames, automatic crops. Each slot has a fixed shape. Give it a different shape and Facebook center-crops to fit, whether or not the crop beheads your text. Covers, group headers and event banners also render differently on desktop and mobile, so the same upload gets two different crops.
• One image, many renders. A profile picture appears at 170 pixels on your profile and 40 pixels next to comments. A post photo appears in the feed, the lightbox and the photos grid. The upload must carry enough resolution for the largest render while staying legible at the smallest.

It helps to know what happens to a photo the moment it lands on Facebook's servers. The original is never served to anyone: Facebook stores a master capped at 2048 pixels on the long edge, then generates a stack of scaled copies from it, one per render size, each recompressed. Anything you upload beyond 2048 pixels is discarded immediately, so a 6000-pixel camera export buys nothing except a heavier upload and a harsher first compression pass. The best input you can give the pipeline is a file already at or near the size it will display, encoded cleanly, in sRGB.

Facebook profile picture size

Profile pictures are square, minimum 180×180 pixels, maximum 2048×2048. Upload around 1000×1000 and you cover every case: the image displays at roughly 170 pixels on desktop profiles, 128 on phones, and shrinks to about 40 pixels next to your comments, while the click-to-enlarge view uses the stored high-resolution copy.

Facebook masks profile pictures into a circle everywhere, so the corners of your square upload never survive. Two practical consequences:

• Center the subject and leave margin. A logo that touches the square's edges loses its extremities to the circle.
• Design for the 40-pixel comment render. Faces should fill most of the frame; logos work best as a simple mark on a flat color. Fine text in a profile picture is invisible in every context that matters.

Two lesser-known behaviors worth planning around. First, the same profile picture follows you into Messenger, comments on other pages, search results and ad attributions, always as a circle and usually tiny, which is why brands that use a wordmark as their profile picture are unrecognizable in most placements; a standalone icon works everywhere. Second, on personal profiles, profile picture updates are posted publicly by default and old profile pictures stay in a public album unless you delete them individually, so the upload is more permanent than it feels.

Facebook cover photo size

The cover photo is the most complained-about image slot on Facebook, and the numbers explain why:

The trap is not the upload size; it is the render. Desktop shows the full width of the cover. Phones crop roughly 100 pixels off each side and display a taller center slice. Any text or logo placed near the left or right edge is visible on desktop and silently missing for the majority of visitors who arrive on mobile. The round profile photo also overlaps the lower-left corner on both surfaces:

Facebook's own help documentation adds the performance detail most guides skip: covers load fastest as an sRGB JPG at 851×315 under 100 KB. Stay under that and Facebook serves your file with minimal further compression; go heavily over and the recompressor does the shrinking for you, with visible artifacts on text and gradients.

Here is the full cover workflow I measured, starting from a 4000×3000 photo. The 2.7:1 cover ratio has no preset anywhere, but the free image cropper takes exact pixel coordinates: I typed width 4000, height 1481 (that is 2.7:1) and Y 759 to center the band vertically, then dragged to taste and downloaded:

The crop tool exports lossless PNG, and at 4000×1481 that file was 7.87 MB. One pass through the PNG to JPG converter at quality 85 brought the identical-looking master to 834.8 KB, 89.6 percent smaller. Then the image resizer in exact mode, 851×315, produced the finished cover at 65.2 KB:

That last number is the useful lesson: at the correct pixel size, a quality-85 JPG photo is usually under 100 KB by itself. The official tip mostly takes care of itself once the dimensions are right.

Pages also accept a cover video in place of the static image: 20 to 90 seconds, at least 1080×312 pixels, though in practice a standard 16:9 video gets center-cropped into the slot, so the same edge-safety rules apply with extra force. Cover videos autoplay muted; they earn their complexity for pages with strong motion content and are a maintenance burden for everyone else. A sharp static cover under 100 KB loads faster and never plays the wrong frame when a visitor lands.

Facebook post image size

Feed photos work in three shapes, and all three share the 1080-pixel width standard:

The feed accepts ratios between 1.91:1 and 4:5 and center-crops anything outside the range, exactly like Instagram, which is no coincidence since both run on Meta's pipeline. Multi-photo posts are their own case: Facebook tiles 2 to 5+ images into a collage whose layout depends on the count and the first image's orientation, so when a multi-photo post matters, upload same-shape images (all square is the most predictable) and check the preview before posting.

One nuance the 1080 standard hides: the feed render is not the only render. When someone taps a photo, the lightbox view scales up to the stored maximum, and on a desktop monitor that view exposes a 1080-pixel upload as slightly soft. If a post's photo deserves close inspection, product shots, art, detailed infographics, upload at 2048 pixels on the long edge instead; the feed looks identical, and the tap-to-zoom view gets the extra resolution. That is the one Facebook slot where uploading larger than the display size pays off, because the display size varies with the viewer's action.

Facebook shared link image size

When someone shares a URL, Facebook builds the preview card from the page's og:image tag: 1200×628 pixels at 1.91:1, minimum 200×200, maximum 8 MB. This is the size that matters to anyone running a website, because it decides how your articles look every time they are shared.

• Below about 600 pixels wide, Facebook demotes the preview to a small square thumbnail beside the headline instead of the full-width card. Always provide at least 600, ideally 1200.
• The card crops edges slightly at some render sizes, so keep titles and faces away from the borders.
• Facebook caches link previews. If you change the image, re-scrape the URL in Meta's Sharing Debugger to refresh it.

If your site's shared links show no image or the wrong one, the fix is an og:image meta tag pointing at a 1200×628 JPG. Every post on this site uses exactly that setup, and the whole implementation is three lines in the page head:

<meta property="og:image" content="https://example.com/images/share-card.jpg">
<meta property="og:image:width" content="1200">
<meta property="og:image:height" content="628">

The width and height tags are optional but worth including: they let Facebook render the full-size card on the very first share instead of showing a degraded preview until its crawler has fetched the image. The same og:image serves Messenger, WhatsApp link previews and most other platforms that read Open Graph tags, so one correct 1200×628 card covers your sharing appearance almost everywhere at once.

Facebook Story size

Stories are 1080×1920 pixels, 9:16, full screen on phones. Facebook's interface overlays the top and bottom of the canvas: your profile ring and name at the top, the reply and reaction controls at the bottom. Keep text and critical content inside roughly the central 1080×1420, which in practice means leaving about 250 pixels clear at each end.

Uploads in other shapes get letterboxed over a blurred fill or zoomed to cover, and the zoom crop is automatic. Since phone screens are taller than 9:16 these days, a full-screen phone screenshot is taller than the Story canvas and loses its top and bottom edges when zoomed, the same gotcha covered in the Instagram sizes guide, and it applies unchanged here because Stories are shared across both apps.

If you cross-post Stories between Facebook and Instagram, design once for the stricter constraint set: both platforms overlay the same regions, so a Story that respects the 1080×1420 center works identically on both. Interactive elements you add in the app, polls, links, stickers, land on top of your image wherever you drag them, so leaving one deliberately quiet area in the design gives them somewhere to live without covering your subject.

Facebook Reels cover size

Reels use the same 1080×1920 canvas, and the cover image you pick or upload follows it. The catch is where covers actually render: in feeds and profile grids, Reels show as center-cropped tiles, often square or 3:4, so a cover designed edge-to-edge at 9:16 loses its top and bottom in exactly the places people browse. Put the title text and the key face in the middle band of the cover, roughly the central square, and it survives every render.

Reels shared from Instagram keep their covers, so one correctly designed 1080×1920 cover serves both platforms.

Facebook event cover size

Event covers render at 1920×1005 pixels, about 1.91:1. The same size works for the event card in feeds, the event page header and the invite preview, but each of those crops slightly differently, and on phones the header shows a narrower slice.

Working rules that survive all the crops: keep the event name and date in the middle 60 percent of the canvas, treat the outer edges as decoration only, and remember the text on the image duplicates what the event listing already shows, so use the cover for atmosphere and branding rather than logistics. Facebook renders event details as text below the cover on every surface; the cover does not need to carry them.

The event cover also becomes the event's share image: when someone posts the event to their timeline or sends it in Messenger, the cover renders as a link-preview-style card at roughly og:image proportions. That is the render where edge text gets cut hardest, and it is the render most potential attendees actually see, since events spread by sharing. Judge your cover as a small card first and a page header second.

Facebook group cover size

Group covers upload at 1640×922 pixels, 16:9, and are the worst crop offenders on the platform: desktop shows a wide center band, mobile shows a slightly different one, and both trim generously. Facebook lets you drag to reposition after upload, which helps, but the reliable approach is the same center-safe rule: group name, key faces and any text inside the middle 60 percent, nothing that matters within about 200 pixels of the top and bottom edges.

Groups also show the cover small in search results and the groups directory, so the readability-at-thumbnail-size rule from profile pictures applies here too: one clear subject beats a collage.

Facebook Marketplace image size

Marketplace photos display square, 1:1, and 1200×1200 is a comfortable upload that stays sharp in the grid and the zoomed view. Listings allow multiple photos, but the first one is the grid thumbnail that decides whether anyone taps, so it earns extra care:

• Shoot or crop the lead photo square yourself rather than letting Marketplace crop your rectangle; the auto-crop regularly cuts the product.
• Fill the frame with the item on a plain background; grid tiles are small and busy backgrounds swallow the product.
• Shops and catalog listings formally require square images, minimum 1024×1024.

Facebook ad image sizes

Ad placements reuse the organic dimensions, so the table is mercifully short:

Meta's ad system flags creatives below about 600 pixels on the short side as low resolution, and low-resolution warnings correlate with worse delivery. The old rule that rejected ads with more than 20 percent text is retired, but the underlying signal is not: text-heavy ad images still tend to underperform, and Meta's own guidance keeps recommending text-light creative with the message in the copy fields instead.

The efficient way to cover every placement is not one image per row of that table. Ads Manager supports placement asset customization, which means two masters cover everything: a 1080×1080 square for feeds, carousels and Marketplace, and a 1080×1920 vertical for Stories and Reels. Prepare both from the same design, assign each to its placements, and skip the letterboxed look of a square ad stretched into a Story slot. Both masters come out of the same crop-resize-compress pipeline used for the cover photo above, just with different numbers typed in.

Best image formats

Facebook accepts JPG, PNG, GIF, BMP and TIFF, but only two matter:

• JPG for photographs, exported at quality 80 to 85 in sRGB. Wide-gamut exports (Display P3, Adobe RGB) desaturate when Facebook flattens the profile, which is where washed-out uploads come from.
• PNG for graphics, logos and text-heavy designs, including cover photos that are mostly typography. PNG hands Facebook's recompressor cleaner input, and text edges survive noticeably better.
• WebP, AVIF and HEIC cannot be uploaded. iPhones convert HEIC automatically during upload, but files saved from websites or AI tools in WebP need converting first; the converters here handle both directions, and the JPG to PNG converter covers the reverse trip when a graphic only exists as a JPG.

Keep photo uploads to a few megabytes at most. The documented limits are generous (8 MB for link preview images, for example), but Facebook's recompression grows more aggressive with file weight, and nothing above 2048 pixels survives at full resolution anyway.

Compression tips

The goal on Facebook is specific: hand the recompressor a file so close to final that it has nothing to do. That means right dimensions first, sensible encoding second:

1. Resize to the target dimensions before anything else. My cover test made the point: the correctly sized 851×315 JPG came out at 65.2 KB, under Facebook's 100 KB cover threshold with no compression step at all.
2. Use a target only at the final size. As a deliberate wrong-way test, I gave the compressor my full 4000×1481 master with a 100 KB target. It technically succeeded, 97.2 KB, but had to drop to quality 34 and shrink the image to 2185×809 to get there. Forcing a full-resolution file under a small cap costs quality that resizing first gives you for free:

3. Sweet spots by slot: covers under 100 KB, feed photos 100 to 400 KB at 1080 wide, Stories under 500 KB at 1080×1920, og:images under 300 KB. All of these fall out naturally from quality 80 to 85 at the right dimensions.
4. Never recompress a downloaded Facebook image. Files saved back off Facebook have already been through the platform's compressor once; editing and re-uploading them compounds the damage. Keep your own masters.
5. Batch the whole set in one pass. A page refresh usually means several slots at once: cover, profile picture, a few post images, an og:image. The compressor and resizer accept multiple files in one drop, apply the same steps to all of them, and return a ZIP, so preparing a full brand kit is one run per target size rather than one export per image.

Common mistakes to avoid

Text at the cover photo's edges. The single most common Facebook image mistake. Desktop shows it, phones crop it, and the page owner checking on desktop never notices. Keep text in the central 640×312.

Using one cover design for profiles, groups and events. Three different ratios (2.7:1, 16:9, 1.91:1) with three different crop behaviors. A cover that fits one slot loses content in the others; re-crop per slot from your master.

Letting Facebook do the cropping. Any out-of-range ratio gets center-cropped without asking. Thirty seconds in the cropper decides the crop yourself.

Uploading wide-gamut color. Vivid on your screen, muted on Facebook. Export sRGB, always.

Logos and text near the profile picture's corners. The circle mask eats them. Center the mark, leave margin.

Re-uploading images saved from Facebook or WhatsApp. Both have already compressed the file once; the second pass through Facebook's compressor produces the smeared, blocky look people blame on the platform.

Ignoring the link preview image. A page without a proper og:image gets a random or missing thumbnail on every share, forever. One 1200×628 image per page fixes it permanently.

Checking renders only on desktop. Most Facebook traffic is mobile, and every crop complaint in this guide, cover sides, group bands, event cards, hits mobile hardest. After changing any cover or banner, spend thirty seconds opening the page in the phone app before calling it done; it is the only render most of your audience will ever see.

Conclusion

Facebook's image system reduces to a handful of numbers and one habit. The numbers: 1000×1000 profile picture, 851×315 cover with a center-safe design, 1080×1080 or 1080×1350 posts, 1200×628 link previews, 1080×1920 Stories and Reels. The habit: size the image for its slot before uploading, as an sRGB JPG around quality 85, so Facebook's compressor has nothing left to ruin.

Every measurement in this guide came from running the free tools on this site: the cropper for exact ratios including the presetless 2.7:1, the resizer for final dimensions, the compressor for the file caps, and the format converters in between. All of them run in your browser with nothing uploaded to any server.

This guide is part of a series covering every major platform: the Instagram image sizes guide and YouTube thumbnail size guide go equally deep on their platforms, and the complete image size cheat sheet compresses every network into one reference table.