Meta gives exactly one figure for the Facebook profile picture size, and it is not 170, 180 or 720. Its help page on Page dimensions says the picture “Should be 320 pixels wide and 320 pixels tall for best quality”, that it “Displays at 176 x 176 pixels on your Page on computers, 196 x 196 pixels on smartphones and 36 x 36 pixels on most feature phones”, and that it “Is cropped to a circle”.
This page opens with 320 in both boxes and Crop to fill switched on, so a tall selfie or a wide group shot comes out as an exact 320 × 320 square, trimmed evenly from the two long ends. The figure is Meta’s guidance for Pages; the help centre publishes no separate size for a personal profile, so the Page number serves both.
Before and after
2400 × 3600 px582 KBJPG
320 × 320 px20 KBJPG
The dashed frame on the left marks the part that fits the new shape. It was scaled to exactly 320 × 320 px, and the top and bottom outside the frame were trimmed.
The file went from 582 KB to 20 KB.
The image on the right is the actual file the tool above produced.
How to use it
- Choose a picture with the face or logo near the centre. If the head sits high in the frame, or the person you want stands at one end of a row, draw the square around them on the crop page and start from that.
- Leave the boxes as they are: the square is cut the moment the file arrives. For a sharper view when someone taps the picture open, type 1000 in both boxes instead.
- Picture a circle drawn inside the preview. The corners are never shown on a profile, so if an ear, a hat brim or the edge of a logo lands in one, crop looser and run it again.
- Download the square and upload it where you change the picture on your Page or profile.
Display size and upload size on Meta’s help page
The figures above come from Meta’s article on Page profile picture and cover photo dimensions. It describes two things: how large the picture is drawn on each screen, 176, 196 or 36 pixels a side, and how large the upload should be, 320 a side. The upload is larger than any display so that it is only ever scaled down, never up.
It sets no file-size cap and lists no formats, saying only that a picture with a logo or text “may get a better result by using a PNG file”. For a personal profile it gives no figure, and the article on changing one has no dimensions at all. Guides that give 170 × 170, 180 × 180 or 720 × 720 show no source for the figure; a larger square is not wrong, just more than Meta asks for.
How the square is cut from a phone photo
An upright phone photo has a 3:4 frame. Made square, it keeps the whole width; what goes is a quarter of the height, as equal bands from top and bottom. On a full-length picture it is feet and sky, and the face is left small in the centre, so crop to head and shoulders first.
A landscape photo gives up far more. A 4:3 holiday shot keeps three-quarters of its width, a 16:9 screenshot little more than half, so two people standing apart can both be clipped. Lock aspect ratio avoids trimming, but the result is a rectangle, and Facebook then centres its circle on a frame you did not choose.
Formats are kept: JPG returns as JPG, a PNG logo keeps its transparent background, and an iPhone HEIC becomes a JPG. A 320-pixel JPG from a phone photo usually weighs 20 to 60 KB, so nothing needs compressing afterwards.
Ratio, inches, mobile and the other things people type
The ratio is 1:1. A profile picture has no inch or centimetre size, since a screen is the only place it appears; should a design program demand a physical unit, 320 pixels at 96 DPI works out at a little over 8 centimetres, roughly three and a third inches.
“For mobile” and “for desktop” are one file. Facebook draws it at 196 pixels on a smartphone and 176 on a computer; there is no second version to prepare. “For business page” and “for logo” are the same square too; a logo just needs clear space around it so the curve does not shave its edges. If the file itself must be round, use the circle crop page.
Frequently asked questions
- What is the official Facebook profile picture size?
- For a Page, Meta’s help centre says 320 pixels wide and 320 pixels tall for best quality, displayed at 176 × 176 on computers, 196 × 196 on smartphones and 36 × 36 on most feature phones. No figure is published for a personal profile; the same square is what to upload.
- Is fb dp size the same thing as the profile picture size?
- Yes. DP is short for display picture, a common name in India for the profile photo. Fb dp size, facebook dp size, facebook profile photo size and a facebook profile picture resizer all describe one wish: a square of 320 × 320 or more.
- Should I upload something bigger than 320 × 320?
- You can. 320 is what Meta names for best quality on a Page, but a tapped-open picture is shown larger, and a 1000 × 1000 square from a good original looks cleaner there. Type it in both boxes; the trim stays the same.
- Why does my face get cut off on my profile?
- Because the square is centred on the photo and the circle then removes its corners. A face high in a tall picture loses its hair; a face near one side of a wide picture loses an ear. Crop a square around the head first, with room on all sides.
- Does the picture lose quality at 320 pixels?
- Shrinking to 320 throws away most of a phone photo’s pixels, yet 320 is still more than the 196 Facebook draws on a smartphone, so it stays crisp. A soft result means the source was already under 320 pixels, a chat thumbnail for instance, and had to be scaled up.