Instagram Post Size Guide 2026: Dimensions, Ratios, and Specs for Every Format

Getting your Instagram post size right isn't just a technical detail — it's the difference between a clean, sharp visual and one that gets awkwardly cropped or softened by Instagram's compression. This guide covers every format: feed posts, Stories, Reels, carousels, and profile photos.

Quick Answer: Instagram Post Sizes at a Glance (2026)

Here's the full reference table. If you're in a hurry, this is all you need.

Post Type	Aspect Ratio	Recommended Size	Min Resolution	Max File Size
Square Feed Post	1:1	1080 × 1080 px	320 × 320 px	8 MB (photo)
Portrait Feed Post	4:5	1080 × 1350 px	320 × 400 px	8 MB (photo)
Landscape Feed Post	1.91:1	1080 × 566 px	600 × 315 px	8 MB (photo)
Instagram Stories	9:16	1080 × 1920 px	500 × 889 px	4 GB (video)
Instagram Reels	9:16	1080 × 1920 px	500 × 889 px	4 GB (video)
Reels Cover/Thumbnail	9:16	1080 × 1920 px	—	8 MB
Carousel (follows first image)	Matches first slide	1080 × 1080 / 1350 / 566 px	Same as feed	8 MB per image
Profile Photo	1:1	320 × 320 px	110 × 110 px	—

Supported photo formats: JPG, PNG, BMP, non-animated GIF Supported video formats: MP4, MOV

Upload at the recommended size. Instagram will still accept smaller images, but it applies compression that softens detail — especially noticeable on text-heavy graphics.

What's New With Instagram Sizes in 2026?

Grid Format Change — The 3:4 Profile Grid

The most practically relevant change in recent memory is Instagram's shift to a 3:4 aspect ratio for the profile grid.

As reported by TechCrunch, Instagram has continued to evolve how content appears on profile pages, moving away from the classic square format to better accommodate the vertical content that now dominates the platform. Your actual post dimensions haven't changed — you can still upload at 4:5, 1:1, or 1.91:1. What changed is how those posts preview on your profile page.

In practice, this means the grid now shows a taller crop of each post. Anything sitting too close to the left or right edges of a square or portrait image can get cut off in the grid view. Keep your subject centered.

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What Has Not Changed Since 2025

The core pixel dimensions — 1080 × 1080, 1080 × 1350, 1080 × 1920 — remain the same. File format support is unchanged. The 9:16 standard for Reels and Stories hasn't shifted. What trips people up is usually outdated guides still referencing the old square-only grid or incorrect profile photo minimums. More on that below.

Understanding Aspect Ratios and Pixels on Instagram

What Is an Aspect Ratio?

An aspect ratio describes the shape of your image — the relationship between its width and height, written as width:height.

• 1:1 = perfectly square
• 4:5 = taller than it is wide (portrait)
• 9:16 = very tall and narrow — full-screen vertical, standard for Stories and Reels
• 1.91:1 = wider than it is tall (landscape)

You don't need to memorize these. What matters is knowing which shape fits which format.

What Are Pixels and Why Resolution Matters

Pixels are the individual dots that make up a digital image. More pixels = more detail = sharper image, especially on high-resolution phone screens.

Instagram's recommended dimensions (like 1080 × 1350 px) are the pixel counts that match its display size without upscaling. Upload smaller, and Instagram stretches the image to fill the space — which softens edges and blurs fine detail.

Minimum vs. Recommended Resolution — What's the Difference?

The minimum is what Instagram will accept without rejecting your upload. The recommended size is what actually looks sharp. Think of minimum as the floor, not the target.

Uploading at exactly the minimum (say, 320 × 400 px for a portrait post) will technically work. It just won't look as clean — particularly on newer phones with high pixel-density screens.

What Happens If You Upload Below the Minimum?

Instagram will either reject the upload outright or scale it up aggressively. Scaling up a low-resolution image creates visible pixelation. Teams who manage brand accounts commonly report this as one of the most frequent quality issues — an image that looked fine on a laptop preview appears noticeably blurry once posted.

Does Instagram Compress Images After Upload?

Yes. Instagram applies its own compression to every image. Uploading at the recommended pixel dimensions reduces how much work Instagram's compression has to do, which preserves more of your original quality.

What's often overlooked is that compression affects text and sharp edges more than it affects natural photos. If your post contains fine-print text, logos, or graphic elements with sharp borders, upload at the full recommended resolution — not just the minimum.

Instagram Feed Post Size

Feed posts are what most people think of when they imagine an Instagram post. You have three shape options, and each one changes how your post fills the feed.

Square Feed Post — 1080 × 1080 px (1:1)

The original Instagram format. Still widely used for product photos, quote graphics, and symmetrical compositions. At 1080 × 1080 px, it sits neatly in the feed without any cropping.

Worth noting: on the new 3:4 grid, square posts appear slightly cropped at the top and bottom in the profile preview. Keep the main subject centered rather than near any edge.

Portrait Feed Post — 1080 × 1350 px (4:5)

This is the format Instagram itself recommends for feed posts, and there's a practical reason for it. Portrait images take up more vertical screen space in the feed, which means they hold a viewer's attention slightly longer as they scroll. More real estate, more visibility.

It's the go-to format for portraits, lifestyle photography, and any image where the vertical dimension helps tell the story.

Landscape Feed Post — 1080 × 566 px (1.91:1)

Landscape posts take up less vertical space in the feed — the trade-off for the wide frame. Best suited for sweeping scenic shots, architecture, and group photos where width matters more than height.

In practice, landscape posts tend to get slightly less engagement than portrait ones simply because they occupy less screen space. Not a rule — just a pattern worth knowing.

Which Feed Format Does Instagram Recommend?

Instagram's own guidance points to 4:5 portrait as the preferred feed format. That said, the "right" format depends entirely on what you're posting. Forcing a landscape shot into a portrait frame rarely improves it.

How the 3:4 Profile Grid Crops Your Feed Posts

Whatever aspect ratio you post in, your profile grid shows a 3:4 crop of it. This is a tighter crop than the old square grid. For portrait posts at 4:5, the crop is close enough that most images survive fine. For landscape posts, more gets trimmed.

Before posting anything where edge placement matters, mentally check: does the important content sit within the central 3:4 zone? If not, reframe before uploading.

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A Note on Compression for Feed Images

Upload as a high-quality JPG. Heavily compressed JPGs — the kind that come out of WhatsApp or heavily edited previews — lose sharpness before they even reach Instagram's own compression pass. Start with the highest quality file you have, then let Instagram do the rest.

Instagram Carousel Post Size

Carousels are one of the more misunderstood formats when it comes to sizing. The logic is a bit quirky.

How Instagram Sets Carousel Dimensions

Instagram reads the first image or video in your carousel and uses its dimensions for the entire post. If your first slide is portrait (4:5), all subsequent slides display in portrait. First slide is square? The whole carousel goes square.

Mixed Dimension Carousels — What Actually Happens

You can upload slides with different dimensions within one carousel. But Instagram doesn't neatly handle the mismatch.

What actually happens:

• Portrait slides display at 4:5
• Square slides get letter-boxed (blank space added above and below)
• Landscape slides get letter-boxed with even more blank space

It doesn't look broken, but it looks inconsistent. Most content teams avoid mixed dimensions for exactly this reason.

Carousel Videos — How They Override Photo Dimensions

Add a video to a carousel, and Instagram switches the entire carousel to portrait (4:5) dimensions — even if your first slide was square or landscape. This catches a lot of people off guard. If you're mixing photos and videos in one carousel, design everything for portrait dimensions from the start.

Why You Should Always Crop Manually Before Uploading

If Instagram auto-crops your carousel images on upload, you cannot go back and adjust those crops later. Not during upload, not after posting. The crop is locked in.

Crop every slide manually before you upload. Takes an extra two minutes, saves a lot of frustration.

Instagram Stories Size

Stories are full-screen vertical content. They're designed to fill the entire phone screen — nothing more, nothing less.

Recommended Story Dimensions — 1080 × 1920 px (9:16)

Upload at 1080 × 1920 px and your Story fills the screen cleanly. Anything smaller gets scaled up; anything with a different aspect ratio gets letterboxed with a blurred background fill.

Safe Zone for Text and Logos — 250 px Top and Bottom

Instagram overlays your profile photo, username, and action buttons over the top and bottom of every Story. These UI elements cover roughly 250 pixels at each end.

Place any important text, logos, or call-to-action elements in the middle 1,420 pixels of the vertical frame. Content in the top or bottom 250 px zone risks being hidden behind Instagram's own interface.

Story Duration and Video File Size Limits

• Photo Stories: Display for 5–7 seconds
• Video Stories: Up to 60 seconds per clip (longer videos are split into segments automatically)
• Maximum video file size: 4 GB
• Accepted video format: MP4 or MOV, H.264 codec recommended

Using Square or Landscape Images in Stories

You can post square or landscape images in a Story. Instagram fills the unused vertical space with a blurred version of your image as a background. It works, and some creators use it deliberately for a stylistic effect. But if you're posting branded content, it's cleaner to design at 9:16 from the start.

Story Highlight Cover Size and Where It Appears

Story Highlight covers live on your profile permanently, just below your bio. They display as small circles — about 50–55 px in the interface — but upload them at 1080 × 1920 px to ensure they look sharp when tapped and expanded.

Instagram Reels Size

Reels follow the same vertical format as Stories but behave differently in terms of where and how they're displayed.

Recommended Reels Dimensions — 1080 × 1920 px (9:16)

Upload Reels at 1080 × 1920 px. This is the full vertical format that fills the screen when someone watches in the Reels tab or on the Explore page. Uploading at a lower resolution or incorrect ratio means Instagram will either letterbox the video or scale it — both reduce visual quality.

Reels Cover Photo and Thumbnail — What Size Works Best

Your Reel cover appears in two places: on your profile grid and under the Reels tab. For both, 1080 × 1920 px is the correct upload size.

You have two options for the cover:

1. Select a frame from the Reel itself
2. Upload a custom image from your camera roll

Custom covers give you more control over grid aesthetics. If you're curating a consistent profile look, a custom cover is worth the extra step.

How Reels Display on the Profile Grid (3:4) vs. Reels Tab (9:16)

This is where it gets slightly confusing. On the main profile grid, Reels thumbnails are cropped to 3:4. Under the Reels tab, they display at the full 9:16 ratio.

Designing your cover to look good at both means keeping the key visual content within the central 3:4 zone — especially faces, text, or any focal point you want visible from the grid view.

Video Duration Limits for Reels

• Minimum: 3 seconds
• Maximum: 90 seconds (as of 2026; Instagram has expanded this limit over time)

Maximum Video File Size for Reels

Instagram accepts Reels up to 4 GB. In practice, a well-compressed 1080p video won't get anywhere near this limit — but it's useful to know when exporting from professional editing software.

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Instagram Profile Photo Size

Recommended Dimensions — 320 × 320 px (1:1)

Upload your profile photo as a square image at 320 × 320 px. Instagram displays it as a circle, so corners are always cropped out.

Canva Says 110 × 110 px — Which Is Correct?

You may notice Canva lists 110 × 110 px as the profile photo size. That's the display size — how large the circle appears on screen. It is not the upload target.

Uploading at 110 × 110 px and relying on Instagram to scale it up results in a noticeably blurry profile image, particularly on higher-resolution screens. Upload at 320 × 320 px minimum. If you have a higher-resolution square image available, use that — Instagram will scale it down cleanly.

Circle Crop Behavior — What Gets Cut Off

Instagram crops the profile photo into a circle automatically. Anything near the four corners of your square image disappears. Keep your subject — face, logo, or icon — centered, with a margin from all edges.

A common mistake is uploading a logo that extends to the corners of the frame. The circle crop removes those corners, and suddenly the logo reads differently. Always preview the circle crop before finalising your profile image.

Instagram Ad Sizes vs. Organic Post Sizes

Ad dimensions on Instagram aren't identical to organic post dimensions, especially at higher quality settings.

Single Image and Video Story Ads — 1080 × 1920 px

Story ads fill the same full-screen vertical frame as organic Stories. The dimensions match: 1080 × 1920 px.

Carousel Story Ads — 1080 × 1920 px (2–10 Cards)

Each card in a carousel Story ad uses the same 1080 × 1920 px vertical format. Unlike organic carousel posts, Story ad carousels don't inherit their format from the first card — each card is independently vertical.

Key Differences Between Ad and Organic Dimensions

The core dimensions are often the same, but Instagram and Meta recommend higher resolution files for ad placements. Ads go through additional quality checks, and low-resolution creative gets flagged or softened more aggressively.

If you're repurposing an organic post as an ad, check that your source file is at full resolution — not a compressed download or screenshot of the original.

Where to Find Meta's Official Ad Specs

Meta publishes its full ad specifications — including file sizes, resolution requirements, and format guidance — at Meta's Business Help Center. This is the authoritative source, and it's updated whenever Instagram's ad platform changes.

Supported File Formats and File Size Limits

Accepted Photo Formats

Instagram accepts the following image formats:

• JPG / JPEG — most common, good compression-to-quality balance
• PNG — better for graphics with transparency or sharp edges
• BMP — accepted but rarely used; large file sizes
• Non-animated GIF — accepted as a static image, not as animation

For most posts, JPG at high quality (90%+) is the practical standard.

Accepted Video Formats

• MP4 — recommended, widely supported, efficient compression
• MOV — accepted, common on Apple devices

Instagram recommends H.264 video codec and AAC audio codec at 3,500 kbps for best results.

Maximum File Size Per Format

Content Type	Maximum File Size
Photos (all formats)	8 MB
Videos (Reels, Stories)	4 GB
IGTV / Long-form video	3.6 GB

A Note on IGTV Cover Photos

Is IGTV Still Active?

IGTV as a standalone section was largely folded into Instagram's general video and Reels ecosystem.

 As reported by TechCrunch, Meta discontinued the separate IGTV app in 2022, removing it from app stores in mid-March of that year and shifting its focus entirely to Reels. Long-form video content now lives under the general video section of a profile.

Some older tools still list an IGTV cover photo size (commonly cited as 420 × 654 px). If you still see this option in a third-party tool, it's referencing legacy functionality. For current long-form video uploads, the standard cover image specs apply: 1080 × 1920 px at 9:16 for vertical, or the native aspect ratio of the video for horizontal uploads.

Common Instagram Sizing Mistakes to Avoid

These are the errors that come up repeatedly — not hypothetical edge cases, but actual issues that affect how posts look once they're live.

Uploading Below the Minimum Resolution

Instagram accepts low-resolution images, but it scales them up to fill the display size. The result is visible softness or pixelation. If your image looks sharp on a phone screen before upload and noticeably worse after, low resolution is usually the cause.

Ignoring the 3:4 Grid Safe Zone

Since the grid shifted to 3:4 previews, posts designed for a square grid now show a taller crop. Text or logos sitting in the left or right margins of a 1:1 image may still appear fine in the feed but get partially cut off in the grid view.

Letting Instagram Auto-Crop Your Carousel

Instagram's automatic carousel cropping is not undoable. Once Instagram crops a slide, that's the permanent state of the image in the post. Always prep carousel images at the correct dimensions before uploading — especially if the first slide sets a portrait or square format.

Placing Text or Logos in the Story Safe Zone

The top and bottom 250 px of a Story are covered by Instagram's UI. It's easy to forget when designing on a desktop, where the UI overlay isn't shown. Use a template with safe zone guides, or leave those areas blank by default.

Using Outdated Dimensions from Old Guides

Instagram has changed its grid format, deprecated IGTV, and adjusted its recommended specs at various points. Guides written before 2023 may still reference the old square grid or incorrect profile photo minimums. When in doubt, verify against Meta's current documentation or a recently updated source.

Tools to Resize Images for Instagram

You don't need specialised software to get Instagram sizing right.

Free Online Tools

Canva offers Instagram-specific templates pre-sized at every recommended dimension. You design directly at the right size — no manual resizing needed. Snapseed (mobile) handles cropping and aspect ratio adjustments well for photos. Simple Image Resizer is a lightweight browser tool for quick resizing without installation.

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Scheduling Tools That Handle Sizing Automatically

Tools like Buffer let you preview how an image will appear on your profile grid before it goes live. If you schedule content in advance, these previews are useful for catching crop issues before they become published mistakes.

How to Check Sizing Before You Post

The fastest check: open the image file properties and confirm the pixel dimensions match the target before uploading. On most phones, long-pressing an image and checking its info shows dimensions. On desktop, right-click → Properties (Windows) or Get Info (Mac).

For reference, Instagram's official developer and creator documentation is maintained at Instagram's Help Center, which covers current upload requirements.

Conclusion

For most posts, the three numbers worth memorising are 1080 × 1350 (portrait feed), 1080 × 1080 (square feed), and 1080 × 1920 (Stories and Reels). Keep subjects centered for the 3:4 grid crop, stay out of the top and bottom 250 px in Stories, and always crop manually before uploading carousels.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the correct Instagram post size in 2026?

The recommended Instagram post size depends on format. For portrait feed posts, use 1080 × 1350 px (4:5). For square posts, 1080 × 1080 px (1:1). For landscape, 1080 × 566 px. Stories and Reels both use 1080 × 1920 px (9:16).

What size should Instagram Stories be?

Instagram Stories should be 1080 × 1920 px with a 9:16 aspect ratio. Keep important content away from the top and bottom 250 px, which Instagram's UI covers.

What are the correct Instagram Reels dimensions?

Reels should be uploaded at 1080 × 1920 px (9:16). The cover thumbnail uses the same dimensions. Reels appear cropped to 3:4 on the main profile grid but display at full 9:16 in the Reels tab.

What size is the Instagram profile picture?

Upload your profile photo at 320 × 320 px minimum. Instagram displays it as a circle, so keep the subject centered. Some sources cite 110 × 110 px — that's the display size, not the upload target.

What file formats does Instagram accept?

Instagram accepts JPG, PNG, BMP, and non-animated GIF for photos. For videos, MP4 and MOV are supported. The maximum file size is 8 MB for photos and 4 GB for videos.