Instagram Carousel Size: Dimensions, Ratios and Safe Zones

A carousel is a single feed post with several photos or videos that people swipe through. Instagram supports three orientations for feed posts, and all slides in a carousel share one of them.

Instagram displays feed images at up to 1080 pixels wide, so going bigger doesn't add sharpness in the app. Designing at exactly 1080 wide keeps file sizes sensible and avoids surprise rescaling.

Everything you need to set up a carousel in one table. The limits come from Instagram's help pages; the recommendations are what we use for our own exports.

One rule matters more than any number in the table: every slide in a carousel shares the same frame. Pick 4:5 and export every image and every video at 1080×1350, and nothing gets cropped on upload.

Portrait 4:5 is the tallest ratio Instagram allows for feed posts. On a phone, that means your carousel covers more of the screen than a square or landscape post, which gives the first slide more room to stop the scroll.

It also gives text-heavy slides more vertical space, which matters for educational carousels and step-by-step posts. Unless you have a strong reason to go square, design at 1080×1350. Our Instagram carousel generator exports at this size by default.

Instagram lets you add up to 20 photos and videos to a single carousel post. You can mix images and videos in the same carousel.

Being allowed 20 doesn't mean you should use 20. Most carousels that get read to the end tell one tight story in 6 to 10 slides. Add slides only when each one carries new information. If you need a structure, the Instagram carousel template gives you a ready-made outline.

When you build a carousel in the app, the orientation you pick (square, portrait or landscape) applies to every photo and video in the post. You can reposition each image inside the frame, but you can't give one slide a different ratio.

• Export every slide at the same pixel size before uploading. Mixed sizes get cropped to match the chosen frame.
• Check the crop on each slide after upload. Tap a slide in the editor to reposition it if the app shifted it.
• If you design a panorama that runs across slides, use identical slide sizes and line up the seams at exactly 1080 pixel intervals.
• For video slides, export at 1080×1350 too, or the app will crop a 9:16 clip to fit the 4:5 frame.

If slides look cut off after you post, it is almost always one of these four causes. Each one has a simple fix.

How much the profile grid trims depends on the slide ratio. A 4:5 cover loses about 34 pixels from each side, a square cover about 135 pixels from each side, and a landscape cover most of its width. That is one more reason to post carousels in 4:5.

Even when a slide displays in full, parts of it get covered or cropped in some views. Design with margins so nothing important lands at the edges.

• Keep text at least 60 to 80 pixels in from every edge.
• Leave the bottom of each slide a little clear. The carousel dots and, on some screens, tags and buttons sit near it.
• Profile grid: the grid shows 3:4 thumbnails, which are narrower than 4:5. A 1080×1350 cover loses about 34 pixels on each side in the grid, so keep the cover headline away from the left and right edges.
• Don't place a single key word on the far left or right of the first slide. It is the slide most likely to be shown cropped in previews and shares.

💡Put a small '1/7' or arrow on the cover slide's right edge, inside the safe margin. It tells people there is more to swipe without stealing focus from the headline.

Whatever you design in, set the canvas up once and save it as a template. Rebuilding the frame for every post is how slides end up a few pixels off and get cropped.

1. Create a canvas of 1080×1350 pixels. In tools that use print sizes, set the unit to pixels first.
2. Add guides 80 pixels in from each edge. That is your text-safe area.
3. Add a second set of guides about 100 pixels in from the top and bottom of the cover slide only. Keep the headline inside them so the grid thumbnail doesn't clip it.
4. Duplicate the page for each slide rather than resizing new pages, so every slide matches exactly.
5. Name exported files with a number prefix (01, 02, 03) so they stay in order in your camera roll.

If you also post the same content to TikTok, make a second template at 1080×1920 with the same fonts and colors. Keeping the text in the middle of both frames makes it much faster to adapt one into the other.

• Format: PNG for text-heavy graphics, high-quality JPG for photos. Both upload fine.
• Color: export in sRGB. Other color profiles can look washed out after upload.
• Resolution: exactly 1080 pixels wide. Larger files get downscaled by the app anyway.
• Text size: nothing smaller than about 32 px on a 1080-wide canvas, or it becomes hard to read on a phone.
• Upload quality: in Instagram settings, turn on the option to upload at the highest quality if your app shows it. It is often off by default on mobile data.
• Transfer: move files to your phone via AirDrop, cloud storage or a cable rather than chat apps, which compress images.

Video slides follow the same frame as the image slides. If the carousel is 4:5, export clips at 1080×1350. A vertical 9:16 Reel dropped into a 4:5 carousel is cropped top and bottom, so captions and on-screen text near the edges disappear.

• Re-frame vertical clips to 4:5 before uploading instead of letting the app crop the center.
• Keep burned-in captions in the middle 80% of the frame.
• Short clips work best: a carousel is swiped, not watched. Most video slides in good carousels run a few seconds to under a minute.
• The first slide sets the tone. A still cover with a clear promise often gets more swipes than a video that starts slowly.

TikTok slideshows are 9:16 (1080×1920). If you upload those to Instagram as a carousel, they get cropped to 4:5 and you lose the top and bottom. Text that sat in those areas disappears.

The fix is to export a second version of each slide at 1080×1350, with the text re-laid for the shorter frame. Our guide to repurposing TikTok content for Instagram covers the rest of the workflow. UGCHooks does this automatically: every slideshow comes as a 1080×1920 TikTok version and a 1080×1350 carousel version, with captions and hashtags for each.