Instagram, YouTube and X Image Sizes (2026)

The ratio decides whether you get cropped and the pixel count decides whether you get blurred — and every platform re-encodes whatever you upload regardless, so sending a 6,000-pixel image doesn't protect quality, it just means the platform's encoder downscales it instead of yours. Get the aspect ratio right and you have solved 90% of this problem; the pixel dimensions are a secondary concern with a wide margin for error.

On Android, Convertlix's Social Media Resizer has sizes for each platform and does the resize on the handset, so the image never leaves the device — no upload, no server-side copy, nothing to retain. The scope, up front: Android 8.0 or later, sign-in required (there is no guest mode), 25 MB per file and batches of 5 on the free tier against a server-set monthly allowance of conversions shown in the app, and the output lands in Downloads. The rest of this page is the ratios and the reasoning.

The ratios, which barely change

Platform specifications drift, but the aspect ratios they support have been stable for years because they are tied to phone screen shapes rather than to product decisions. These are the durable facts:

Commonly cited pixel dimensions, as of September 2026: 1080 × 1080 for a square post, 1080 × 1350 for 4:5, 1080 × 1920 for a 9:16 story, and 1280 × 720 for a YouTube thumbnail. Treat those as sensible defaults rather than gospel — every platform publishes its own current specs, they do change, and if you are about to spend money on a campaign, check the platform's own help page rather than any blog post. The ratio column above is the part that will still be right next year.

Why uploading a bigger image doesn't help

This is the misconception worth killing, because it makes people waste effort in exactly the wrong direction.

Every platform re-encodes uploaded images. They have to: they need predictable file sizes, consistent formats and multiple resolutions for different devices, so your upload is decoded and re-compressed on their servers with their settings. Your careful 95%-quality JPEG export becomes their encoder's output the moment it lands.

Two consequences:

• Uploading a 6,000 px image does not preserve detail. It gets downscaled by their encoder to whatever their display size is. You have handed the resizing decision to a system tuned for their bandwidth bill rather than your image.
• Downscaling it yourself first is usually better, because you control the resampling and can sharpen appropriately afterwards. Aim slightly above the display size — matching the commonly published dimensions is a good target — rather than massively above it.

There is one real exception: don't upload below the display size. Platforms will upscale a small image to fill the space, and upscaling has nothing to work with. A 600 px-wide image in a 1,080 px slot looks soft in a way that no setting fixes.

Why the text in your graphic goes fuzzy

If you have ever posted a quote card or a chart and watched the letters turn into a smear, there are two mechanisms stacking up.

JPEG chroma subsampling. JPEG stores brightness at full resolution and colour at half resolution in each direction, because human vision is less sensitive to colour detail. That is invisible on a photograph and very visible on coloured text and thin lines, which is where the artefacts collect.

The platform's re-encode. Their encoder applies its own compression on top of yours, and it is tuned for photographs — the overwhelming majority of what gets uploaded — not for hard-edged graphics.

So for text-heavy or flat-colour graphics, PNG or WEBP is the better upload format, because both store hard edges without chroma subsampling. PNG files are bigger, and if the byte size becomes a problem Make a PNG Smaller Without Losing Quality covers shrinking them without moving to a lossy format. For photographs, JPEG is correct and PNG just wastes bandwidth.

And if the source is an iPhone photo, it may be HEIC, which some upload forms and tools still refuse outright — HEIC to JPG on Android (Free, Offline) covers that conversion, and it has to happen before any resizing.

Safe zones: the crops people forget

Getting the ratio right stops the platform cropping your image. It doesn't stop the interface covering it.

• Profile pictures are displayed as circles. Square artwork loses its four corners. Anything in a corner — a logo edge, part of a word — is gone.
• Stories and Reels have UI over the top and bottom. The username, caption, buttons and progress bar occupy roughly the top and bottom 10–15% of a 9:16 frame. Keep text out of those bands.
• Feed previews crop to a different ratio than the full view. A 4:5 image often previews as a square in a grid, taking the centre. A face near the top edge survives the post and disappears from the grid.
• Link preview cards crop to landscape. A square image used as a link thumbnail loses top and bottom.

The rule that covers all four: put nothing you need inside 10% of any edge. It costs you a little composition and it survives every crop.

How to size an image for a platform

1. Decide which placement it's for. A feed post, a story and a thumbnail are three different ratios. One image cannot be correct for all three, and trying is how you get a letterboxed post.
2. Crop to the ratio before you resize. Ratio first, pixels second — cropping changes the composition and you want to see the framing decision before you commit to a size.
3. Resize to roughly the published dimensions for that placement. Slightly above is fine, massively above is pointless, below is the one genuinely bad option. In Convertlix, the Social Media Resizer has sizes per platform.
4. Choose the format by content, not habit. Photograph, JPEG. Text, chart, logo or flat colour, PNG or WEBP.
5. Check your safe zones on the actual platform. Post it, look at it in the feed and in the grid, and fix the crop if the interface ate something. This is the step everyone skips and it is the one that reflects reality.

When this doesn't work

• The specs in this post go stale. They will. The ratios should hold; the pixel numbers are dated to September 2026 for a reason, and a platform can change a placement at any time. Check the source before a campaign.
• Anything needing per-platform layout. If the text has to be repositioned for each ratio rather than just cropped, that is design work. Canva's free tier does multi-size layouts properly and a resize utility does not — use the right tool.
• Video. Aspect ratios carry over conceptually but video has its own codec, bitrate and duration rules per platform, and a still-image resizer doesn't apply.
• Ad formats. Paid placements have their own specs and review rules, including limits on how much of the image can be text. Read the ad platform's requirements directly.
• Anything where cropping loses the point. A wide landscape or a group photo forced to 4:5 loses the subject. Sometimes the answer is to post it in the ratio it wants and accept a smaller display size.

FAQ

Does uploading a bigger image improve the quality on social media?

No, past a point. Every platform decodes and re-compresses what you upload to produce its own set of display sizes, so a 6,000-pixel file is downscaled by their encoder rather than yours. Resizing to roughly the published display dimensions yourself gives you control over the resampling; the genuinely bad choice is uploading smaller than the display size, because upscaling has no detail to work with.

What ratio should I use if I'm only making one version?

4:5 for a feed still, or 1:1 if it will also be used as a grid thumbnail or a link preview. 4:5 takes the most vertical space a phone feed will show in full, which means more of the screen; 1:1 is the ratio that survives the widest range of crops without losing anything important. Keep your subject and any text out of the outer 10% either way.

Why does the text in my image look blurry after posting?

Two effects stack. JPEG stores colour at half resolution — fine for photographs, visibly damaging to coloured text and thin lines — and then the platform re-encodes your upload with settings tuned for photographs. Exporting text-heavy graphics as PNG or WEBP avoids the first problem entirely, and gives the platform's encoder a cleaner source for the second.

Does Convertlix upload my images?

No. The image is opened through Android's own picker, resized on the phone, and saved back to the device — nothing is sent anywhere, and the app has no storage permission, so it cannot read anything you did not hand it. Its network calls carry identity, licence, quota, configuration and payment data, never an image. Sign in once, switch on airplane mode, and the resizer still works.

Is there a free way to resize for social media?

Yes. Canva's free tier has per-platform sizes built in and is the better tool if the layout changes between ratios rather than just the crop — as of September 2026 it requires an account and stores your designs in the cloud. GIMP and ImageMagick both resize precisely and locally for free; magick in.jpg -resize 1080x1350^ -gravity center -extent 1080x1350 out.jpg crops and resizes in one command. If you only need byte size rather than dimensions, Resize a Photo to Under 100 KB for a Form covers that separate problem.

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If the image is on your phone and you'd rather not upload it twice to find out how it crops, get the ratio right on the device and check the safe zones once it's live.