How to make a passport-size photo at home
You can get a perfectly usable passport-size photo with a phone, a plain wall and about ten minutes. The tricky parts are the exact size, the file size an online form wants, and printing so the copies come out the right size. Here is how to handle each.
Check the rules first. Requirements differ between countries and offices, and they change. Look up the size, background colour and file limits for your application before you start. A tool can give you the right dimensions, but it can’t judge your expression, head position or lighting for you.
1. Take the photo
- Stand in front of a plain, light wall, in the colour your application asks for.
- Face a window so daylight lights your face evenly. Avoid a lamp behind you and shadows across your face.
- Have someone hold the camera at eye level, a little way back, rather than taking a close-up selfie. It avoids the stretched look wide lenses give.
- Look straight at the camera with a neutral expression, and keep your head level.
This tool can’t change the background for you, so it is worth getting the wall right at the start.
2. Crop to size
Open Passport Size Photo, add your picture and pick the size your application asks for. Common sizes include 35 × 45 mm and 2 × 2 inches. Move and zoom the frame until your face sits where the guidelines say, then apply the crop.
3. Hit an exact file size for online forms
Many online applications want a JPG under a set size, such as 50 KB or 200 KB. On the second step, keep “Target file size” selected and type the number. The tool lowers the quality until the file fits, or pads it up if the form needs a minimum, and it tells you what it will do before you download. If the target is far below the photo’s natural size, it may also have to reduce the pixel size, and it shows you the final dimensions.
4. Print several on one sheet
For physical copies, choose “Print sheet” instead. Pick a paper size such as 4 × 6 inches or A4, and portrait or landscape. The tool fits as many copies as the paper holds. Download the sheet as JPG, PNG or PDF.
The one thing that goes wrong here is scaling. Print at 100 percent, also called actual size, and turn off “fit to page”. Otherwise the printer resizes the sheet and your photos come out the wrong size. Measure one printed photo against the requirement before you cut them all.
5. A final check
Compare your result against the official guidance one more time: size, head height within the frame, background and file type. If something is off, redo the crop. It takes seconds, and a rejected application takes days.
Related tools
- Print Photo Sheet for laying out any photos on a page.
- Resize Image if you only need new dimensions.
- Compress Image to reduce a file’s size in KB.
Make your photo
Crop, hit a file-size target and build a print sheet. Your picture stays on your device.
Open Passport Size Photo