Passport and visa photo requirements
Compare photo sizes, head position and background requirements. Choose your document to review the official guidance and preview your photo privately.
Every step runs inside your browser. Your photo is never uploaded, never stored and never seen by anyone but you.
Choose your document
- Canadian passport photoCanada50 × 70 mm
- Schengen visa photoSchengen Area35 × 45 mm
- UK passport photoUnited Kingdom35 × 45 mm
- DV lottery photoUnited States600 × 600 px
- US passport photoUnited States50.8 × 50.8 mm
Photo examples
A straight head, visible eyes and even lighting make a clear starting photo. Check the rules for your document before applying.
Illustrations of pose and framing, not photos to submit or a guarantee of acceptance. Examples adapted from GOV.UK.
GOV.UK· © Crown copyright · Open Government Licence v3.0
How the measurements work
Every authority publishes two numbers that matter more than the outer size: how tall your head must be from the bottom of the chin to the top of the head, and sometimes how far your eyes must sit above the bottom edge. These are narrow ranges, often only five millimetres wide, and a crop that looks right by eye lands outside them more often than not.
Head height is measured to the top of the head including hair, which is why this tool separates you from the background first: the outline of your hair is what reveals where the top of your head really is. Face-detection models stop at the hairline and consistently underestimate it. Once the crown, chin and eye line are known, the crop is computed to land in the middle of each permitted range rather than at its edge, which leaves the most room for error.
If your original photo is framed too tightly to produce a compliant result, the tool says which edge falls short instead of cropping in further and handing you something that will be turned down at the counter.