The Ultimate Cheat Sheet for Social Media Images

Social media is an important tool. Graphics are a big part of social media, whether you’re on Facebook, Google+, Twitter, or any of the other platforms. The infographic below, courtesy of WeAreTop10.com will tell you what you need to know when it comes to the image sizes for all that you’re going to be posting. After all, you want the image to present well, not be cut off or look too enlarged for where it’s going.

Facebook

You might be surprised to learn that there are a lot of different images that can be shared on Facebook. You not only have your profile photo but also your cover photo. From there, you can share images, have event images, ads, and so much more.

A good photo will help people to connect to what you have to say. It’s hard to show yourself as an authority about anything when your profile photo is too grainy or your event photo is cut off.

The infographic tells you that a good profile photo is going to be 160×160 pixels and your cover photo should be 820×312 pixels.

Google+

When you’re on Google+, it can help you to get some extra notoriety in the search engines. The images you share here are going to be completely different from Facebook, which means you have to spend some time in a software program or working with your graphic designer for resizing. Your cover image here is going to be 1080×608 pixels. That’s longer and wider than that of Facebook, so forget using the same exact image unless you don’t mind cropping.

The infographic will show you the sizes of images in your feed and even what the sizes are for shared images and videos. It allows you to be in full control of what everything will look like so that there are no surprises.

Twitter

Twitter has gotten a lot more image-friendly in recent years. You can have a profile and cover image and then have images in shared links and videos. Plus, if you’re going to share an image, it’s best to have it as 590×295 pixels so that it shows up in the best possible way.

Considering you only have 140 characters to play with for all of your tweets, the best thing you can do is use images on at least some of your posts. It will help people to stop and read a tweet as opposed to scrolling right past it.

Instagram

Instagram is another biggie. The social media giant focuses almost entirely on images. The good thing is that it’s fairly simple to come up with good images. Everything is a square, so remember that there will be some cropping if you have your camera settings to a rectangle.

The Others

LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Youtube are featured on the infographic, too. Any time you’re posting images, take the time to review the cheat sheet. Using the right image sizes makes a difference.

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