Social media image sizes 2026: avoid ugly crops

Ever posted a "perfect" graphic... and it lands like a wet napkin? Not because the idea's bad. Because the platform quietly mangled it. Cropped the headline. Compressed the details. Turned your sharp design into mush.

Image sizes aren't glamorous. They're just one of those boring levers that decides whether your work looks premium or... accidentally amateur.

What happened

The big social platforms have basically settled into a pattern for 2026: 1080px-wide assets still sit in the sweet spot for most feeds, while vertical, mobile-first formats keep winning placement and attention.

Translation: square posts aren't "dead," but they're rarely the best default anymore. Full-screen and tall posts (think 4:5 and 9:16) get more real estate on a phone, and the apps are built for phones. Shocking, I know.

Some concrete specs creators keep tripping over:

Instagram feed still likes 1080×1350 (4:5) for vertical, and Stories/Reels are 1080×1920 (9:16). The grid keeps pushing everything into a vertical crop, so your "perfect" square composition can look weird on your profile.

Facebook is similar: feed posts commonly land around 1080px wide, with vertical posts at roughly 4:5 and Stories/Reels at 1080×1920. Cover images and desktop/mobile differences still cause surprise crops.

X is leaning harder into media (including a dedicated video surface) and still behaves best when you respect its safer shapes: landscape and square. Common in-stream targets: 1280×720 (16:9) and vertical 720×1280. Headers still get unpredictably clipped depending on device.

LinkedIn remains the odd one out: 1200×627 is the classic link-preview shape, while 1200×1200 is a solid square post default.

TikTok stays firmly vertical: 1080×1920 for video and carousels. If you don't fill the screen, you get the dreaded bars or awkward framing.

YouTube still lives and dies by the thumbnail: 1280×720 (16:9). Shorts are vertical, but thumbnails for long-form are still the click-tax collector.

Newer-ish places creators actually use: Threads leans into taller images (native-ish 3:4, with recommended uploads up to 1440×1920), and Bluesky caps stored image sides around 1000px with small per-image limits - great for speed, not great for tiny text.

Here's the annoying truth: the "right size" isn't about pixels. It's about not getting cropped in the one place people actually look.

Why creators should care

Attention: Vertical wins because it occupies the screen. On mobile, screen space is oxygen. If your post shows up smaller than the next one, you're starting the race behind.

Distribution: Platforms don't "punish" you for the wrong dimensions out of spite. They just auto-crop and compress, and your post performs worse because it looks worse. Ugly thumb = fewer taps. Blurry detail = fewer saves. Cropped hook = scroll.

Monetization: If you sell anything - courses, coaching, sponsorships, products - your creative is the top of your funnel. If the CTA gets covered by UI buttons or chopped off in a feed preview, congrats, you just bought yourself lower conversion with your own time.

Workflow: The hidden cost isn't resizing once. It's redesigning because you baked text into the wrong area, or because your "universal template" doesn't survive Stories, Reels, Threads, and LinkedIn without looking like a ransom note.

What to do next

Pick two "master canvases" and stop improvising. Build everything from 1080×1350 (feed portrait) and 1080×1920 (full-screen). From there you can crop down to square/landscape when needed, instead of stretching up and losing quality.
Design for the safe zone, not the full frame. On full-screen formats, assume the top and bottom will get covered by UI. Keep faces, headlines, and pricing away from the edges. Center your "meaning," not your background.
Make text bigger than you feel comfortable with. If your design relies on small type, it'll die on TikTok, Stories, Threads, and anywhere that compresses aggressively. If it can't be read at arm's length on a phone, it's decoration.
Create one template per job, not per platform. Example: "announcement," "carousel lesson," "testimonial," "offer." Then adapt crops. Your brain should think in content types, not in 14 different export presets.
Do a monthly 'profile + feed audit' on your phone. Check your grid, your last 9 posts, and how link previews render. Fix the templates once, then enjoy not bleeding reach for dumb reasons.