How to make a passport photo at home

A booth or studio charges for something you can do with a phone and a plain wall. The crop and size are the easy part; the photograph itself is where most rejections come from, so start there.

Always check your country's rules first

Every country publishes its own requirements, and they change from time to time: photo size, background colour, how much of the frame the head must fill, whether glasses are allowed, and how recent the photo must be. Read the official rules from the office receiving your application before you start. Nothing below replaces them.

To show how much they differ, here are two sets of published rules at the time of writing. Treat them as illustrations and confirm them on the official site:

• United States: 2 × 2 inches (51 × 51 mm), with the head measuring 1 to 1⅜ inches from chin to the top of the head, a white or off-white background, taken within the last six months, and no glasses.
• United Kingdom: 35 mm wide by 45 mm high for printed photos, with the head 29–34 mm from chin to crown, a plain cream or light grey background, and taken within the last month.

Same purpose, different size, different background and a different rule about how recent the photo must be — which is why a photo that was fine for one application can be refused for another.

Take the photo

• Background: stand in front of a plain, light, even wall with no pattern or shadows.
• Light: face a window in daylight so your face is evenly lit. Avoid overhead lights that cast shadows under the eyes, and avoid the phone flash.
• Camera: have someone else take it from about 1–1.5 metres away, at eye level. Selfies distort faces at arm's length.
• You: look straight at the camera with a neutral expression, mouth closed, hair away from the face, shoulders square.
• Take several shots and pick the sharpest.

Two details prevent the most common faults. Stand half a metre or so in front of the wall rather than against it, so your shadow falls on the floor and not behind your head. And leave plenty of space around your head and shoulders in the shot — you can always crop in, but you cannot add background that was never photographed.

Why photos get rejected

Passport offices publish their reasons, and the same ones come up again and again:

• a shadow on the face or on the background behind the head;
• the head too large or too small in the frame, or cut off at the top;
• a smile, an open mouth, or eyes not looking at the camera;
• glare on glasses, or glasses worn where they are not allowed;
• hair across the eyes, or a hat or head covering worn for non-religious reasons;
• a patterned, dark or uneven background;
• a blurred, grainy or over-bright picture;
• a photo that is too old, or that has been edited.

The last point deserves emphasis. Do not apply filters, smooth skin, remove blemishes or replace the background with software. Authorities reject altered photos, and some check for it. If the background is wrong, take the picture again against a better wall.

Crop it to the exact size

1. Open the Passport Photo Maker and add your photo.
2. Choose the size. Presets include 35 × 45 mm (used in the UK, the EU and Australia), 51 × 51 mm (2 × 2 inches, used in the US and India) and 33 × 48 mm (China).
3. Use the zoom and the up-and-down control to place your head as your rules require.
4. Download the JPG.

The photo is produced at 300 dots per inch, the density print shops work at, so it prints at the right physical size — a 35 × 45 mm photo comes out at 413 × 531 pixels. The cropping happens in your browser, so the photo of your face is never uploaded.

Head size is set as a measurement on the finished print, so use the zoom to get it right. On a 35 × 45 mm photo that needs a 29–34 mm head, the head should fill roughly two-thirds to three-quarters of the height of the frame, with a clear gap above the hair.

Print it

Take the JPG to a print shop or photo kiosk. Most will place several copies on one standard 6 × 4 inch print for the price of a single photo — just ask. If you print at home, use photo paper and print at actual size (100%), never “fit to page”: any scaling changes the physical size, and size is the one thing that must be exact.

Before you cut anything, check it with a ruler. Measure the width and height of one printed photo, and the distance from chin to the top of the head. If any of them is out, the print was scaled — fix the print settings rather than the photo. Cut with a paper trimmer or a craft knife and a steel rule; scissors rarely give a straight edge.

Babies and young children

Most countries relax some rules for infants, but the background and lighting rules still apply. The easiest method is to lay the baby on a plain white or light sheet and take the photo from directly above, with daylight coming from the side. Nobody else may appear in the picture — no supporting hands, no toys, no dummy. Expect to take a lot of shots, and check your country's guidance on whether a baby's eyes must be open.

Uploading instead of printing?

Online applications set their own rules for digital photos: pixel dimensions, a maximum file size, and usually JPEG format. These are separate from the printed size, so read them as carefully as the print rules. If the photo is too large, reduce it with Compress Image and check it still meets the pixel size the form asks for. Some application sites also run an automatic check when you upload and tell you straight away if the photo fails, which is a useful free test before you pay for prints.