Passport and visa photo sizes by country

Most rejected passport photos are not bad photographs. They are good photographs in the wrong size, or against the wrong background. The specifications are precise and they differ between countries, so the first question is never "how do I look" but "which document is this for".

Sizes by country

All pixel figures are the millimetre size rendered at 300 dpi, which is the resolution printing is done at.

• United States — passport and visa: 2×2 in (51×51 mm), 600×600 px, white background. Head height must be 1–1³⁄₈ in (25–35 mm), roughly half to two-thirds of the frame.
• United Kingdom — passport: 35×45 mm, 413×531 px, plain light background (light grey or cream is typical). Head height 29–34 mm.
• Schengen / EU visa — 35×45 mm, 413×531 px, light background, head occupying 70–80% of the height.
• Canada — passport: 50×70 mm, 591×827 px, white or light background.
• Australia — passport: 35–40 mm wide by 45–50 mm high, approximately 413×531 to 472×591 px, white background.
• India — passport and most visas: 2×2 in (51×51 mm), 600×600 px, white background. Indian application portals also impose file-size limits, commonly 10 KB to 1 MB and often 20–50 KB for signatures.
• Japan — passport: 35×45 mm, 413×531 px. Japanese visa: 45×45 mm, 531×531 px. White background in both cases.
• China — passport and visa: 33×48 mm, 390×567 px, white background.

Treat this as a starting point, not as authority. Agencies revise specifications, and the body processing your application is the only source that counts. If they quote millimetres, convert at 300 dpi; if they quote pixels, use those numbers directly.

The background colour is not a preference

White is the standard for the United States, China, India, Canada and most visa categories. The United Kingdom and many Schengen countries accept light grey or cream but not a brilliant white. Blue appears on some national documents, graduation and staff photographs; red on certain national ID cards.

Two things go wrong constantly here. The first is a background that is only nearly white — a pale wall, an off-white sheet, a shadow gradient. The second is clothing that matches the background, which makes the head appear to float. A plain dark top against a light background is the safest combination there is.

Head proportion, which people forget entirely

Every biometric standard specifies how much of the frame the head should occupy, and the range is usually quoted as a fraction: from around 50–69% for the United States to 70–80% for Schengen. This is why a photo that is technically the right size can still be refused — the frame is right but the person is too small inside it.

Practical guidance: leave 3–5 mm of clear space above the hair, and crop somewhere between the collarbone and mid-chest. Ears should be visible, and hair should not cover the eyebrows.

Five things that get photos rejected

• Shadows — a shadow on the face, or cast onto the background behind you. This is the most common failure with selfies.
• Glasses — permitted by some authorities and not others, and almost never with lens glare. Check before you keep them on.
• Expression — neutral for most documents. Teeth visible is a rejection in many systems.
• Resolution — a cropped-down selfie upscaled to 600×600 px will look soft and may fail an automated quality check.
• Dated photographs — several countries require the photo to have been taken within the last six months.

Turning the photo you have into the photo you need

Once you have a clean, front-facing, evenly lit headshot, the ID photo maker handles the rest. Choose a specification, swap the background to white or the colour your authority requires, frame the head against the release guide and render at 300 dpi. If a portal enforces a file-size ceiling — 200 KB and 50 KB are both common — the tool will compress to it automatically.

For several copies, "Generate print sheet" lays the photos out on a 6×4 inch page you can have printed in one go and cut apart. If your original photo has a messy background rather than a plain one, the background remover can clear it up first.

Everything runs in your browser, so the photograph is never uploaded and no account is involved.