How to Make a Photo in Passport Size for a US Application

Making a photo in passport size means fitting one recent face into the exact frame a US passport or visa application expects. For a US passport that frame is a square, 2×2 inches when printed, with the head occupying a set share of the height and a plain white or off-white background behind the person. A smaller thumbnail, a square Instagram crop, or a 35×45 mm image used in other countries is a different product.

People usually start with a phone snapshot that is tall, slightly tilted, and full of kitchen cabinets or a living-room wall. The work is not a simple resize. You crop to a square, slide the face until the chin-to-crown measurement lands in range, replace or clean the background, then export a JPEG that online portals can accept. Skip any of those steps and the file can look fine on a phone and still fail a size or background check.

GetPassPhoto does that conversion from one upload at /upload. You see a preview of the passport-size result before you pay. A digital file is $14.99. Digital plus a 4×6 print sheet with six 2×2 copies is $17.99. Formatting to the published size rules is what the tool is for. It does not decide whether the State Department or a visa officer accepts your application.

US passport photos are supposed to show how you look now. The State Department asks for a photo taken within the last six months, and the same recency idea applies to the DS-160 visa photo, which uses the same 2×2 specification. An old graduation portrait, a filtered social photo, or a scan of your last passport picture is the wrong source even if you crop it perfectly.

Look at hair, facial hair, weight in the face, and whether you now wear a religious head covering you did not wear in the old photo. Examiners compare the picture to the person at the window or to the image on file. A technically perfect crop of an outdated face creates a different problem than a sizing error, and no editor can invent a recent likeness.

Take a new photo in even indoor light, facing the camera, with both eyes open. Stand a few feet from a plain wall if you have one, or plan to replace the background later. GetPassPhoto can format a recent phone photo. It should not be asked to rescue a picture that no longer looks like you. If you are unsure the source is recent enough, retake it before you crop.

Printed US passport photos measure 2 inches by 2 inches, about 51×51 millimeters. Digital uploads, including many DS-82 online renewals and DS-160 visa forms, expect a square JPEG of at least 600×600 pixels. Those are two deliveries of the same composition, not two optional crops. A file that is 600 pixels wide but rectangular will not do, and a print that measures 1¾ inches on a ruler will not do either.

At 300 dots per inch, 600×600 pixels lines up with a 2×2 inch print. Online portals mainly check pixel dimensions and file type, not the DPI label inside the JPEG. Problems show up when someone enlarges a tiny crop until the pixel count looks right. The face goes soft, and a person reviewing the photo can reject it even if an automated size check passes.

Phone cameras already capture far more than 600 pixels on a side, so resolution is rarely the limit. Export settings are. Native photo apps often save HEIC on iPhone or an arbitrary square such as 1080×1080. For a full pixel and DPI breakdown, see the passport photo size in pixels page. When you upload at /upload, GetPassPhoto exports a 600×600 JPEG aimed at digital submission and, on the print package, a 4×6 sheet laid out with 2×2 copies.

The head, measured from the bottom of the chin to the top of the hair, must be between 1 inch and 1⅜ inches tall on a 2×2 print. That is 50% to 69% of the image height. Eyes are typically expected about 1⅛ to 1⅜ inches from the bottom of the photo. These measurements are why a centered selfie so often fails: the face sits too low, and the empty band above the hair makes the head too small.

Hair counts. A high bun, a tall fade, or volume at the crown is part of the head height. Do not crop through the forehead to force the number, and do not leave a huge white gap above the hair to shrink the head. Religious or medical head coverings can stay if they are worn daily and the full face stays visible from chin to forehead, with no shadow across the eyes.

Manual editors rarely show a 50–69% guide. A paper template helps: print a true 2×2 square, mark the 1 inch and 1⅜ inch lines, and hold it over a test print. On screen, guesswork is slower. Upload at /upload and GetPassPhoto measures chin-to-crown against the frame before you pay. If the source is too far away or the top of the head is cut off, the preview is the moment to retake, not after you have printed a stack of copies.

The background should be plain white or off-white, with no pattern, furniture, doorway, or second person. Color casts from a yellow wall or a blue LED lamp are a common reason a home photo looks unofficial. Shadows behind the head, under the chin, or across one cheek also fail the plain-background rule even when the wall itself is white.

Stand a step or two away from the wall so your shadow does not fall on it. Face a window or a lamp in front of you, not a window behind you. Glasses are a separate rule, covered below, but glare and shadow are lighting problems you can fix before you crop. If the wall is not white, background replacement is legitimate. Smoothing skin, changing face shape, or adding a beauty filter is not.

A rough cutout leaves a halo of the old wall around the hair. That halo is still a background. GetPassPhoto replaces the backdrop with a plain white field and keeps the face as photographed. Check the preview around the hairline and shoulders. If you see a gray rim or a chunk of the original room, do not submit that file. The requirements page at /passport-photo-requirements-2026 summarizes the background rule next to the size diagram.

Eyeglasses are not allowed in US passport photos, including clear lenses and tinted fashion glasses. Glare, thick frames, and eyes hidden by the rim are the reasons the rule exists. Take them off for the photo even if you wear them all day. A rare medical exception requires a signed statement from a doctor; a normal prescription is not that exception. Sunglasses are out entirely.

Hats and headbands that cover the hairline are out unless the covering is religious or medical and the face from the bottom of the chin to the top of the forehead is fully visible. Headphones, wireless earbuds that show, and costume props do not belong in the frame. Uniforms are discouraged; everyday clothes are fine.

Use a neutral expression or a natural closed-mouth smile. Both eyes open, looking at the camera. Mouth closed. No exaggerated grin that changes the shape of the face. Infants have a little more flexibility on expression, but this guide is about a standard adult or older-child photo. If you blinked, retake. A passport-size crop cannot open an eye that was shut.

Crop to a square first, then scale. Forcing a tall portrait into 600×600 by stretching it distorts the face, and distorted features are their own rejection category. On a phone, the square overlay is only the start. Drag it upward until the chin sits in the lower portion of the frame and the top of the hair sits inside the upper band, with a small margin of background above the head.

Leave a bit of shoulder in the frame when the source allows it. Do not zoom so tight that the chin or the ears are cut off. Do not include a second face, a pet, or your hand holding the phone in a mirror shot. Mirror selfies also flip text on clothing and often include the phone, the arm, and a tilted horizon. A front camera held at eye level, or a photo someone else takes, is easier to crop.

Desktop editors such as Photos, Preview, GIMP, or Photoshop can do this if you lock a 1:1 crop, position the face, then export JPEG at 600×600 without resampling the face into mush. It is slow, and the head-percentage check is still on you. The make photo 2×2 guide walks through editor steps in more detail. If you would rather skip the ruler, upload the original at /upload and review the crop GetPassPhoto proposes.

Save a color JPEG. Black-and-white photos are not acceptable for US passports. Many upload portals also cap file size, often around 240 KB, while still requiring at least 600×600 pixels. Those two limits fight each other. Crushing the quality slider to shrink the file can add blocks around the hair that look like a bad background. Keeping a huge export can bounce off the upload limit before anyone looks at your face.

Other failures that a square crop does not fix: red-eye, a shadow on one side of the nose, a tilted head, a finger at the edge, a busy pattern on a shirt that blends into the hair, and heavy retouching. The photo should look like you in ordinary light, not like a portrait session with dramatic contrast. Do not add borders, dates, or watermarks.

GetPassPhoto keeps edits to crop, size, and background. It does not reshape the face. The digital JPEG is built for the pixel size and a practical file size for online forms. If you only need that file for a DS-82 renewal or a DS-160 upload, the $14.99 option is the one that matches. If you also need paper copies for an in-person DS-11 appointment, choose the $17.99 print sheet and measure one cutout with a ruler before you leave home.

In-person applications, including many first-time DS-11 submissions, still expect a physical 2×2 inch photo on photo paper, not a picture printed on copy paper at the wrong scale. Online renewal and the visa form want the digital square. One good source photo can feed both, but only if you do not re-crop them differently and end up with two head sizes.

When you print at a pharmacy or at home, turn off fit-to-page. A 600×600 file stretched to fill a 4×6 sheet is not a 2×2 photo. The print package from GetPassPhoto is a 4×6 sheet with six copies already placed, which you can send to Walgreens, CVS, Costco, or a home photo printer. Cut on the lines and check one print: 2 inches on each side, head between 1 and 1⅜ inches, white background, no glasses.

Bring a spare print to an acceptance facility if you are going in person. Clerks compare the photo to a physical template. A file that looked correct on a laptop can still be the wrong size on paper if the print dialog scaled it. Digital applicants should use the JPEG from the email, not a photo of the printed sheet taken with a phone.

Run through a short list out loud. Is the photo from the last six months? Is it square, at least 600×600 pixels, and a color JPEG? Is the head about half to just over two-thirds of the frame height? Is the background plain white or off-white, with no shadow halo? Are glasses off, eyes open, and the mouth in a normal closed position? Is there only one person in the frame?

The free checker at /passport-photo-checker is a useful second look at dimensions and obvious framing problems before you pay for printing or before you upload to a government site. A checker can flag a file. It cannot promise that a consular officer or passport specialist will accept every application. Use it to catch mistakes, then fix the source photo if the flag is about expression, glasses, or an outdated likeness.

If the checker or your own ruler shows a head-size or background problem, do not submit and hope. Retake or reformat. GetPassPhoto is built for the reformat step: upload at /upload, confirm the preview, pay $14.99 or $17.99, and download from email. If an application is later rejected because of the photo we delivered, the refund policy is to forward the rejection notice for a full refund. That policy covers our file. It is not a guarantee that the government will approve the application.

Take or choose a color photo from the last six months, glasses off, face front, even light. Confirm you can see both eyes and the top of the hair. Crop to a square with the head at 50–69% of the height and a plain white background. Export at least 600×600 pixels as JPEG. For paper, print at actual 2×2 inch size, ideally several copies on a 4×6 sheet. Measure once.

That sequence is the whole job behind the phrase make a photo in passport size. Tools that only shrink the image skip head height and background. Tools that only whiten the background skip the inch measurement. You need all of it for a US passport photo, whether the next step is a DS-11 counter visit, a DS-82 upload, or a DS-160 visa photo that follows the same 2×2 rules.

Related reading: make a photo passport size for the inch-and-pixel definitions, make a photo into passport size for the resize workflow, and make a photo 2×2 for crop math. When you want the crop, background, and export handled together, start at /upload. Preview first. Submit the file you have actually checked, and keep a copy of what you sent.