Other websites say a PAN photo can be 50 KB. Which figure is right?

Both numbers come from Protean’s own site: 20 KB for the photo and 10 KB for the signature in its guidelines table, and 50 KB in an explainer article about the e-Sign route. If you are not sure which route your application uses, keep the photo under 20 KB and the signature under 10 KB; those files pass either limit.

How do I get the signature under 10 KB on this page?

Replace 20 with 10 in Maximum file size, then add the signature picture. Dark ink on clean white paper normally fits without losing any pixels. A grey, shadowy phone shot of the paper costs far more bytes and may come back smaller and fainter, so retake it in daylight if the strokes look weak.

Is there a minimum file size for the PAN photo or signature?

Protean’s table lists maximums only. Leave “My form also has a minimum size” unticked unless the screen you are uploading to names a lower limit of its own.

Does the photo have to be in colour?

Protean lists both the photograph and the signature as colour JPEGs and asks for black and white only on the supporting documents. This page keeps whatever colours the original has, so start from a colour photo.

Do I need to upload a photo if I apply through Aadhaar e-KYC?

According to Protean’s explainer, the e-KYC mode uses the photo already held with Aadhaar, so there is nothing to choose or upload. These two files are needed on the routes where you submit scanned images.

Can this page make the PDF of my proofs smaller?

No, it writes JPG only. Protean takes supporting documents as PDF/A or JPEG up to 300KB per page, so scan each page in black and white with your scanner app and compress the JPEG on the 300KB page instead.

PAN Card Photo and Signature Resize: 20KB and 10KB

An online PAN application wants two small JPG files, your photograph and your signature, and each one has its own weight limit. The guidelines of Protean (formerly NSDL e-Gov) cap the photo at 20 KB and the signature at 10 KB, while a picture taken on a phone is usually a few megabytes. That gap is why the first upload attempt so often fails, for people applying themselves and for service-counter agents alike.

This page is set to the photo limit and starts the moment a picture arrives: it looks for the best JPG quality that fits under 20KB and only takes pixels away when it must. The signature needs a second, separate run with the limit changed to 10.

A clear plastic ballpoint pen lying on a blank white spiral-bound notebook on a grey fabric surface, seen from above

How to use it

Take the photo against a plain light wall in daylight, crop it to head and shoulders in your phone’s editor, then add it here; the 20KB JPG is made straight away.
Check that the result card shows 20KB or less, download the file and give it a name you will recognise, such as pan-photo.jpg.
Sign on plain white paper with a dark pen, photograph or scan it, and crop tight around the ink. Back on this page, type 10 in Maximum file size and add the signature picture.
Download the second JPG and put each file in its own upload box. Your proofs of identity, address and date of birth go in separately.

Protean’s size table for the PAN photo and signature

Protean’s guidelines for a new PAN applied for online with a digital signature certificate (DSC) set out the scanning rules in one table. Photograph: 200 DPI, colour, JPEG, Max. 20 KB, 3.5X2.5 cms. Signature: 200 DPI, colour, JPEG, Max. 10 KB, 2X4.5 cms. Supporting documents: 200 DPI, black and white, PDF/A or JPEG, Max. 300KB/per page. Only upper limits are given, so there is no floor to reach.

The centimetre figures make most sense read as height by width, since a signature is a wide strip: the photo is a portrait 2.5 cm across and 3.5 cm tall, the signature 4.5 cm across and 2 cm tall. At 200 DPI that comes to roughly 197 × 276 pixels for the photo and 354 × 157 for the signature. Protean states centimetres and DPI rather than pixels, so take those numbers as arithmetic, not as a rule printed by the portal. To match them, use the resize tool in centimetres with DPI 200 and Crop to fill; files that small are often light enough already. If one is still too heavy, finish it here, and if the upload screen insists on 200 DPI, stamp the value back with the DPI tool, because this page saves a plain JPG without one.

Protean also publishes an explainer article on the e-Sign route with scanned images, and that article gives 50 KB for both pictures. The table above is the stricter of the two. A photo under 20 KB and a signature under 10 KB are under 50 KB as well, so one pair of files made to the tighter figures works whichever of the two routes your application takes.

UTIITSL, the 2026 form numbers and your proofs

The PAN forms were renumbered when the Income-tax Act, 2025 and the IT Rules, 2026 took effect on 1 April 2026. UTIITSL states that the old Form 49A and Form 49AA will not be accepted after 31.03.2026, and Protean’s online application now offers Form No. 93 for Indian citizens and Form No. 95 for foreign citizens. Protean’s guidelines page, already carrying the new numbers, still shows the photo and signature limits quoted above.

UTIITSL’s online guidelines describe a different route altogether: you fill in the form online, pay, print it, paste two (same) photographs of 4.5cms X 3.5cms, sign across the left-hand one and in the box at the bottom right of page 2, then send the set with your proofs. Those pages name neither a file weight nor a pixel size. The square 213-pixel figure that circulates on resizer sites does not appear in them, so when a UTIITSL screen does ask for an upload, follow the limit shown on that screen.

Frequently asked questions

Other websites say a PAN photo can be 50 KB. Which figure is right?: Both numbers come from Protean’s own site: 20 KB for the photo and 10 KB for the signature in its guidelines table, and 50 KB in an explainer article about the e-Sign route. If you are not sure which route your application uses, keep the photo under 20 KB and the signature under 10 KB; those files pass either limit.
How do I get the signature under 10 KB on this page?: Replace 20 with 10 in Maximum file size, then add the signature picture. Dark ink on clean white paper normally fits without losing any pixels. A grey, shadowy phone shot of the paper costs far more bytes and may come back smaller and fainter, so retake it in daylight if the strokes look weak.
Is there a minimum file size for the PAN photo or signature?: Protean’s table lists maximums only. Leave “My form also has a minimum size” unticked unless the screen you are uploading to names a lower limit of its own.
Does the photo have to be in colour?: Protean lists both the photograph and the signature as colour JPEGs and asks for black and white only on the supporting documents. This page keeps whatever colours the original has, so start from a colour photo.
Do I need to upload a photo if I apply through Aadhaar e-KYC?: According to Protean’s explainer, the e-KYC mode uses the photo already held with Aadhaar, so there is nothing to choose or upload. These two files are needed on the routes where you submit scanned images.
Can this page make the PDF of my proofs smaller?: No, it writes JPG only. Protean takes supporting documents as PDF/A or JPEG up to 300KB per page, so scan each page in black and white with your scanner app and compress the JPEG on the 300KB page instead.