By Archana
How To'sInstagram is the most preferred social media platform for sharing and saving countless images online. Crisp photos with short descriptions are best shared through Instagram, with additional filters to enhance your photos. But if you've ever wondered how to make pictures fit on Instagram without cropping or losing important details, you're not alone.
Since Instagram is a global platform, it automatically enforces strict sizing parameters when you upload photos. As a result, some photos can not fit entirely inside the frame because they do not meet the supported photo sizes/resolutions.
Such restrictions can be a barrier for those wanting to share some of their precious memories at the cost of cropping or zooming in, cutting out important details.
Let us explore some simple ways to resize images online so that you can get your photos to fit on Instagram posts.
Many may wonder why Instagram does not support flexible or free image sizes. The Instagram app is primarily meant for mobile devices, having more height than width.
Therefore, Instagram has set standard aspect ratios for photo uploads as posts, which we have discussed below. According to your image resolution, your photo will be automatically cropped or zoomed in to fit the required aspect ratio.
Similarly, the sizes of images on Instagram Stories and profile pictures have a default aspect ratio of 1:1.91 and 1:1, respectively.
Pictures for Instagram Posts need to meet these height and width, or aspect ratio requirements for clarity upon uploading on Instagram -
Square Images [1:1]
You can upload images that have a resolution of up to 1080x1080 pixels(px). Any images with smaller resolutions will be automatically enlarged to fit the minimum width of 320 pixels.
Portrait Images [4:5]
Pictures with portrait orientation look best with 1080x1350 px resolutions. Any higher resolutions would lead to automatic resizing or cropping. Photos with lower resolutions will be automatically enlarged, making finer details appear grainy.
Landscape Images [1.91:1]
Contrary to the belief that Instagram supports only square and portrait images, Instagram also supports pictures with landscape orientation. Landscape or horizontal images best fit in 566x1080 pixels, and any smaller resolutions would lead to resizing to fit the aspect ratio.
Fitting images that do not have the perfect aspect ratio is not that hard on Instagram. With a few Instagram hacks and support from third-party tools, you can ensure that you do not lose any part of your photo that you wish to save as a memory.
The simplest way to avoid having your image cropped or zoomed in to fit the set aspect ratio is to zoom out the picture completely. You can do this by pinching the image using your fingers. However, zooming out does not guarantee that the entire image will be displayed if your picture exceeds the maximum allowed resolution.
While this method does not let viewers access finer details, it can be helpful to prevent anyone or anything from being completely cropped out.
Some third-party tools let you resize photos to the given aspect ratio or resolution without cutting out or cropping the image. This method is good for photos with some pixels above or below the ideal resolutions.
If the images are small, be prepared to see some distortion or grains when you enlarge them. Adobe Lightroom, Canva, and Snapspeed are some high-quality tools for resizing images with minimal to no loss in quality.
Several third-party apps, such as Canva, InShot, etc., offer themes and templates for sharing pictures, specifically on Instagram. Using such templates, you can add photos of any size. Then, you can use elements like borders, text, graphics, etc., to cover up the additional area around the image.
Here, we have the same image we saw earlier, that fits completely into a 1:1 frame. We have added some quirky borders from Canva that make it fit for Instagram.
When your image is too long in the portrait orientation, you can split it into several smaller fragments and make each fragment appear as a separate post on your Instagram grid. When someone views your profile, they can see this image fully when scrolling down your profile grid.
Similarly, when your landscape image is too wide or panoramic, you can make it as a carousel. This split means you fragment your image into several sections and upload each as a separate photo. So, you can select multiple photos to upload at once as a carousel. When viewing the post, every horizontal swipe shows you the next part of the image.
Instagram has rigid sizing guidelines for pictures when you upload them as a post. While cropping your image is the default option provided by Instagram, sometimes this action can lead to removing important parts of your image.
Cropping to resize your image in the permissible aspect ratios is the best way to make your pictures fit on Instagram. Suppose cropping makes you lose out parts of your image. Then, you can consider resizing, zooming out with less intricate details, fitting images into external templates, or making a grid or carousel.
If you have any other hacks to fit Instagram pictures, share them with us.
