REVIEWS & TIPS PLACES LIGHTROOM

GOPRO PHOTOS !

" REVIEWS # GOPRO $ LIGHTROOM

% WORDPRESS & SOCIAL MEDIA

' BOOKS

Facebook Photos
Size Guide | 2017
Ever tried using photos or graphics on your
Facebook page? It can be frustrating. So here's an
up-to-date, unocial guide to what's what, what's
where, and how big.
 SOCIAL MEDIA // FACEBOOK
LAST UPDATED ABOUT 5 DAYS AGO

In its early days, Facebook was all about

text and links. But as it has grown up,
images have become more and more
important. Theyre now more important
for design and identity on the user
interface, like your prole picture or
cover photo. And its a great way to
share photos in galleries and on the
timeline. Facebook photos are now a
huge part of the sites appeal even as
dedicated image apps like Instagram
have become hugely popular as well.

Ad closed by
Photo Compression
Report this ad

Program
AdChoices

Easily compress and

convert images and photos
on Windows and Mac.
NCH Software

If youve come across this page, youve

no doubt found out for yourself that
Working out what image sizes to use on
Facebook isnt as easy as it could be. It
involves some wrangling to get the
results you want. Each type of image on
a page, prole, and timeline has its own
size and quirks. And Facebook never
has been very good about making its
help pages easy to nd.

Making things even more fun is that

Facebook changes things from time to
time. Sometimes its a small, incremental
tweak. Sometimes its an entire overhaul
(such as when timelines were introduced
and again when they were changed from
two columns to one column). So its
always a bit of a moving target. And
there always seems to be a new system
just around the corner.

So heres my freshly updated 2017

version of the unocial guide for the
sizes of Facebook photos on the various
parts of the site.

I try to keep this as up-to-date as

possible, but Facebook has a nasty
habit of making unannounced changes
and then rolling them out gradually to
users so that not everyone gets them at
once. If youve noticed something thats
changed, please let me know in the
comments so I can update it.

Ad closed by
Photo Compression
Report this ad

Program
AdChoices

Easily compress and

convert images and photos
on Windows and Mac.
NCH Software

Facebook Cover
Photo Size
The Facebook Cover Photo is the large
panoramic image space at the top of the
timeline.

Its now displayed at 820px wide by

312px high on computers and 640px by
360px on smartphones.
The image you upload must be at least
399px wide and 150px tall. I recommend
uploading ones that are at least 1640px
wide and 624px high. Heres a detailed
post explaining why.

You can only designate one photo as

your Cover Photo. Panoramas are ideal.
Simple crops also work.

And theres nothing stopping you from

assembling a collage in your imaging
software, saving it as a single image le,
and uploading that. Heres an example
using TurboCollage (see Creating a
Photo Collage with TurboCollage for
step by step instructions).

And heres an example using Lightroom

(see How to Make a Facebook Cover
Photo Collage with Lightroom for step
by step instructions).

If youve just set up a new Facebook

prole or page and dont yet have a
cover photo, just click on the Add
Cover Photo button at the top of the
page where the Cover Photo will go.
Youll then get this warning popup:

Once youve added your photo, you can

change it easily.When youre logged in
to your account and on the Timeline
view, click on the camera icon at the
bottom right of the cover photoyoull
get a yout link for change photo. If
you decide you want to reposition or
remove the photo, you can use the same
menu.
Facebook Prole
Picture Size
The Prole Picture is the smaller, square
at bottom thats to the left of the cover
photo. It used to overlay the cover
photos bottom left corner, but in the
latest layout it has been moved to its
own spot in the top left of the page.

Whatever shape image you upload, it will

be cropped to a square.

It displays at 170px by 170px on

computers and 128px by 128px on
smartphones.

If you use a photo thats not square, you

have some control over which part of the
image to use for the crop. When youre
logged in, click on the small camera icon
at the bottom right of the prole
pictureas you hover it will overlay to a
change image link.
Tip: If you nd that your resulting prole
picture, after its downsized in Facebook,
is blurry, try uploading an image twice
the size of the downsized image (that is,
an image that is 340px by 340px). That
should give a sharper result.

Prole Picture on
the Timeline
The prole image that appears next to
your name on comments and posts is
the same image but is automatically
scaled down to 40px by 40px.

Shared Link
Thumbnails
Some things got simplied in the new
layout. Shared link thumbnail images
didnt. But theyve been improved on the
previous version, and we also get some
nifty new features like being able to
upload a dierent thumbnail image and
use multiple thumbnails that all link back
to the shared URL. (I have a separate
post on how to use them.)

The simplest layout is with a single

image. Its scaled to ll a box 476px by
249px. Like this:

A new feature is that you can include

multiple thumbnails, each of which is
linked back to the URL youre sharing.
Theyre cropped to squares that are
300px by 300px and displayed as
horizontal carousel. Like this:
One Photo on
the Timeline
When you upload an image to the
timeline, a thumbnail is generated
automatically to t within a box that is
476px wide and up to 714px tall. So if
you want to use the maximum space
available, upload an image in portrait
orientation (vertical) that is in the ratio of
3:2.
If you upload a landscape (horizontal)
image, it will be scaled to 476px wide
and retain its shape. This, for example, is
a rectangle in landscape orientation
thats in the aspect ratio of 3:2. The full
area of the image appears.
This is another rectangle in landscape
orientation, but its a much narrower
aspect ratio like a banner or panorama.
The width is again 476px and the image
is scaled so that the entire image area
appears.

If you upload that same image rotated

90 degrees, so that its tall rather than
wide, it will be cropped to the maximum
available area of 476px by 714px.

And if you upload a square, the whole

image will be displayed, with the width
at 476px.
Uploading
Multiple Images
to a Page
Timeline
You can upload multiple photos at once
to the timeline. How theyre displayed
depends on how many images youre
uploading and the orientation of what I
will call the primary image.

The primary image is what Im calling the

one that displays rst in the uploading
popup, and it also displays larger in
some of the layouts. So far as I know
theres not an ocial name for it, but Im
going to go ahead and use primary
image.
As well as displaying rst, the primary
image has another important role. It
determines the layout you get. If you
upload 3 images with a square primary
image youll end up with a dierent
layout than if you upload 3 images with a
rectangular primary image.

The easiest way to select which image

serves as the primary image is to drag it
to the left in the upload dialog.

Heres an example of what I mean. In

this one, Im uploading two images, a
red square and a green portrait
rectangle. If the red square is in the rst
position, like this:

it posts like this:

Uploading exactly the same two images
but reversing them, so that the portrait
rectangle is rst, like this:

displays like this:

The same principle applies if youre
uploading two, three, or four imagesthe
layout will always take its cue from the
primary image.

2 Images With Horizontal

(Landscape) Primary Image
The full width becomes 476px and the
height is cropped to 237px.

2 Images With Vertical

(Portrait) Primary Image
2 Images With Square
Primary Image

3 Images With Horizontal

(Landscape) Primary Image
Because the layout takes its cue from
the primary image, you can mix and
match the orientations of the
non-primary imagestheyll still display
the same.

3 Images With Vertical

(Portrait) Primary Image
3 Images With Square
Primary Image

4 or More Images with a

Horizontal (Landscape)
Primary Image
You can mix and match the orientations
of the non-primary imagestheyll still
display the same.

If you upload 5 images or more, it

displays only the rst 4 images but will
add an overlay to the bottom right
thumbnail with the number of images
that are not displayed (eg. +2 or +4, etc).
Like this:

4 or More Images with a

Vertical (Portrait) Primary
Image

4 or More Images with a

Square Primary Image
Full-Width
Photos on the
Timeline
Yes, they were cool. The image spanned
both columns. But Facebook did away
with them in their redesign in mid-2014.
Your updates now only show in a single
column, and theres no way to make
photos wider than that column.

Metadata
While not specically related to image
sizes, it is worth knowing that Facebook
strips out all metadata from your images.
That includes all GPS, camera type, and
other data that your camera might
embed, as well as anything like
keywords or copyright information you
might have added. (An exception is if
youre in Germany).

Facebook Photos
Cheat Sheet /
Computer
Displays
Width Height Notes

Cover
820px 312px
Photo

Prole
Must be uploaded
Picture in 170px 170px
at 180px by 180px
Header

Same image as
Prole main Prole

Picture on 40px 40px Picture,

Timeline automatically

downscaled

Only for single

thumbnails.

Multiple
Shared Link
476px 249px thumbnails are
Thumbnail
cropped to

squares 300px by

300px.