Field notes
Playbooks, teardowns and the occasional argument — everything we have learned helping creators grow across every major platform.
Spotify publishes album and artist images at 640, 300 and 64 pixels. There is no original behind the 640 — every 'HD Spotify cover art' result is upscaling the same file.
Instagram Story size is 1080x1920, but the top and bottom bands belong to the interface. Here is the usable area and how to design a template once.
Every vertical feed draws its interface on top of your video. Here are the covered regions per platform, and how to design once for all of them.
An aspect ratio is a shape, not a size. Here is what each ratio is for, how to convert between them, and why cropping down beats scaling up.
Pinterest recommends a 2:3 Pin at 1000x1500. Here is why that ratio wins, what happens to taller Pins, and the title and description limits alongside it.
Facebook image size by placement: feed posts, link cards, Stories, cover photos and ads - plus the crops that differ between desktop and mobile.
LinkedIn image size by placement: feed posts, link cards, document posts, profile and company banners - and the mobile crop that decides what is seen.
Twitter image sizes on X: 16:9 for single images, 1200x628 for link cards, and the timeline crop that decides what people actually see.
TikTok video size is 1080x1920 at 9:16. The harder part is the safe zone - the caption, the action rail and the username cover a third of your frame.
YouTube thumbnail size is 1280x720 at 16:9 - but the number that matters is the 170 pixels wide it is actually viewed at.
Instagram image sizes by placement: feed, portrait, carousel, Reels cover, Stories and profile. Three ratios cover all of them.