Social media image sizes: two files cover almost all of it
Every size guide hands you a table of thirty numbers. Almost all of them collapse into two files, 1080x1350 and 1080x1920, which post to Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok and Shorts without a second export. Here is the table anyway, and the two platforms the shortcut does not cover.
Make two files. 1080 x 1350 for anything that goes in a feed, and 1080 x 1920 for anything full screen. Those two cover Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok and YouTube Shorts, which for most small businesses is all of it. The table further down has every other number in it, but you will use it about twice a year, and both times for a banner rather than a post.
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The two files, and where each one goes
The reason a size cheat sheet feels overwhelming is that it is sorted by platform, so the same number appears seven times and looks like seven facts. Sorted by file instead, it is much shorter.
| File | Ratio | Posts to | Where it does not work |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1080 x 1350 | 4:5 | Instagram feed, Facebook feed, LinkedIn feed, X post | Pinterest, which wants taller |
| 1080 x 1920 | 9:16 | Instagram stories and reels, Facebook stories, TikTok, YouTube Shorts | Nowhere in a feed |
| 1080 x 1080 | 1:1 | Everything above, worse | Weakest on Instagram since the grid changed |
The full table, by platform
For the twice a year you need it. Everything here was cross-checked on 31 August 2026 and every one of these platforms has changed a number without announcing it before.
| Platform | Feed post | Full screen | Banner or cover |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1080 x 1350 | 1080 x 1920 | Profile photo 320 x 320 | |
| 1080 x 1350 | 1080 x 1920 | Cover 851 x 315 | |
| 1080 x 1350 | not applicable | Profile banner 1584 x 396, company cover 1128 x 191 | |
| X | 1600 x 900 or 1080 x 1080 | not applicable | Header 1500 x 500 |
| TikTok | not applicable | 1080 x 1920 | Profile photo 200 x 200 |
| YouTube | Thumbnail 1280 x 720 | Shorts 1080 x 1920 | Channel banner 2560 x 1440 |
| Pin 1000 x 1500 | not applicable | Profile photo 165 x 165 |
The two platforms the shortcut does not cover
Pinterest wants 2:3, which is 1000 x 1500. A 4:5 file will post and will look slightly stubby next to everything around it. If Pinterest matters to you, it is worth its own export, and it is the only feed on this list where that is true.
X is the other one, and it goes the opposite way. Its feed still favours landscape at 1600 x 900 or square, and a tall portrait image gets cropped in the timeline with a tap needed to see the rest. If X is a real channel for you, make the landscape version. If it is a channel you post to because it exists, the 4:5 file is fine and the crop is survivable.
Banners and profile pictures: set once, then forget
Half of any size cheat sheet is furniture. A Facebook cover, a LinkedIn header, a YouTube channel banner: you make each of these once, and then you do not think about them again for two years. The one landscape file you do remake every time is the YouTube thumbnail, and its recommended size changed recently enough that most guides have not caught up. The YouTube banner is the opposite case, set once and then forgotten, and it is the only image here where most of the canvas is not guaranteed to be seen at all. They are worth doing properly precisely because they are permanent, and they are not worth memorising.
The Facebook cover is the one that catches people out, because the number everyone quotes is not the number that is always visible. Desktop and mobile crop the same upload differently, and only the overlap survives both. That has its own page, with the safe area drawn out. LinkedIn catches people out the opposite way: a personal banner and a company cover are two different rectangles, and the safe area advice everybody copies from Facebook is wrong there, which the LinkedIn page works through.
Why every width on this page is 1080
Because that is the ceiling. Instagram and Facebook do not display a feed image wider than 1080 pixels, so a 4000 pixel export is not a sharper post, it is a larger file for the platform to compress down to 1080, and the compression is not always kind. Exporting at 1080 means you made the resizing decision rather than handing it over.
- Width: 1080. More is discarded, less is upscaled and looks soft.
- Format: JPEG for photographs, PNG where there is flat colour or crisp type.
- Colour: sRGB. A wider colour space can come back visibly duller after conversion.
- File size: under about 1MB. Past that you are mostly buying heavier compression.
Every image in this article is a real post out of the gallery, made at the sizes it argues for. If you would rather see a month of them made for your own business than build the templates yourself, that is what the product does.
Frequently asked questions
What size should social media posts be?
1080 x 1350 pixels for feed posts and 1080 x 1920 for stories, reels and short video. Those two files cover Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok and YouTube Shorts. Pinterest wants 1000 x 1500 and X prefers landscape.
Is one image size enough for all social media?
Close to it. A 1080 x 1350 portrait posts to Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and X without re-export. It is not ideal on Pinterest, which wants a taller 2:3, and it gets cropped in the X timeline, which favours landscape.
Is 1080 x 1080 still a good size for social media?
It works everywhere and is nobody's best option. Square takes the least vertical space in a feed and loses 12.5% off each side in the Instagram profile grid. Use it when the same artwork also has to go somewhere non-social.
What size should a social media banner be?
They all differ: Facebook cover 851 x 315, LinkedIn profile banner 1584 x 396, X header 1500 x 500, YouTube channel banner 2560 x 1440. You set each one once, so look it up rather than memorising it.
Do bigger images look better on social media?
No. Instagram and Facebook cap a feed image at 1080 pixels wide, so anything larger is downsized on upload and compressed in the process. Exporting at 1080 gives you control of the resize instead.
How we researched this
- This started as the usual table and turned into an argument against tables. Laying every platform's recommended sizes next to each other, the thing that stands out is not how many there are but how much they repeat: five of the seven networks below take the same portrait file, and five take the same vertical video file. The article leads with that because it is the finding, and prints the full table underneath because some people came here for the table.
- Numbers were cross-checked against Buffer's size guide, which is the most consistently maintained public reference we know of, opened on 31 August 2026 and linked below. Where our own reading of a platform disagreed with it, the article says which and why rather than picking one silently.
- The Instagram figures come from our own longer piece on feed sizes, which is sourced separately and includes the 2025 change to the profile grid that dates most of the guides still in circulation.
- No number here is presented as permanent. Every platform in this table has changed at least one of its sizes in the last three years and none of them announce it. The date this page was last checked is at the top, which is the only honest way to publish a specification.
- We sell a tool that renders posts at these sizes. That is disclosed at the point it becomes relevant.
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