Rules for US Passport Photos: Size, Background, and Editing

A US passport photo must be a 2-by-2-inch color image taken within the last six months, shot against a plain white or off-white background, showing your full face with a neutral expression, no glasses, no hat, and no digital filters. Those are the US passport photo requirements in one sentence, and the Department of State enforces every part of them. Miss one specification and your application sits on hold until you send a replacement.

Size, Framing, and Print Quality

The print measures exactly 2 inches by 2 inches. Inside that square, your head — from the bottom of your chin to the top of your hair — should fall between 1 inch and 1⅜ inches tall, with your eyes roughly 1⅛ to 1⅜ inches up from the bottom edge.¹ A head that fills too much of the frame, or floats too small inside it, is a rejection.

Print it in color on matte or glossy photo-quality paper. The image has to be sharp: no blur, no grain, no visible pixels.² Photocopies and scans of an existing photo are not accepted. The shot must have been taken within the last six months and must still look like you. A new hairstyle is fine as long as the photo is a clear likeness.³

How You Should Look in the Frame

Face the camera straight on, head centered, full face in view. No tilting, no turning, no glancing off to the side. Both eyes open, both eyes visible.¹

Keep a neutral expression or a natural, closed-mouth smile. An exaggerated grin, raised eyebrows, or a squint will distort your features enough to fail the review. The State Department’s detailed guidance points to mouth closed as the safest option.¹

Glasses, Head Coverings, and Clothing

Glasses are not allowed. The only exception is a medical one, and it requires a signed note from your doctor submitted with your application.¹ The rule has been in place since 2016 and remains the most common reason photos come back rejected.

Hats and head coverings are off-limits too, unless you wear one daily for religious or medical reasons. A religious covering requires a signed statement confirming it is part of traditional religious attire you wear continuously in public. A medical covering requires a signed doctor’s note. Either way, your full face has to stay visible, the covering cannot hide your hairline, and it cannot cast shadows across your face.²

Wear ordinary, everyday clothing. Uniforms, anything that looks like a uniform, and camouflage are not permitted.¹ Everyday jewelry and facial piercings are fine if they don’t cover your face or throw glare. Skip bulky scarves and high collars that swallow your jawline.

Background and Lighting

The background must be plain white or off-white. No patterns, no textures, no visible objects. Light your face evenly. Overhead bulbs or a single lamp off to one side will throw shadows on your features or on the wall behind you, and reviewers treat shadows the same way they treat obstructions.¹ Overexposure washes you out; underexposure hides your features. Either extreme fails.

Flash red-eye means retake the photo. You cannot fix it in software, because the State Department treats any digital correction as an alteration.⁴

No Filters, No AI, No Digital Editing

This is where home photographers most often fail without realizing it. The State Department explicitly prohibits altering your photo with computer software, phone apps, filters, or artificial intelligence.¹ Beauty filters, skin smoothing, background-removal tools, and AI enhancements built into modern phone cameras all count. If your phone applies portrait-mode blur or HDR processing by default, turn those off before you shoot. Don’t run the file through any editor afterward.

Digital Photos for Online Renewal

Renewing online means uploading a digital file instead of a print. The renewal system accepts JPG, JPEG, PNG, HEIC, and HEIF files between 54 KB and 10 MB.⁵ Every composition rule still applies: white background, neutral face, no glasses, no filters.

Position yourself several feet from the camera, head centered and fully visible, with the bottom of the frame landing near where your shoulders meet your arms.⁵ Do not photograph a printed photo, and do not scan a physical print to make a digital one. The upload has to be an original capture.

Visa applications use a separate portal with tighter specs: JPEG only, square aspect ratio, between 600×600 and 1200×1200 pixels, and no larger than 240 KB.⁴

Photos for Infants and Young Children

Children need their own passports and their own compliant photos, newborns included. The child has to be alone in the frame. No parent’s hands, no toys, no pacifiers.¹

The workable approach for babies is to lay them on a plain white or off-white sheet, or drape a car seat with a white sheet and shoot from directly above. Watch for shadows across the face. The State Department accepts that a newborn’s eyes do not have to be open.¹ Everything else still applies.

Taking Your Own Photo at Home

The State Department allows a home photo, and specifically mentions having a friend or family member take it and printing it on matte or glossy paper.¹ A modern smartphone works fine.

Stand several feet back, not at arm’s length. Selfies taken close up distort your face because the lens is much nearer to your nose than to your ears. Roughly three feet away, or farther and then cropped, avoids the problem. Use a tripod, prop the phone on a shelf, or hand it to someone at your eye level.

Find a blank white wall and stand about two feet in front of it so your body doesn’t cast a shadow on the background. Use daylight from a window facing you, or place two lamps at equal distance on either side for even light. Turn off beauty mode, portrait effects, and HDR. Skip editing entirely. Print at 2×2 on photo paper — most home printers and drugstore kiosks handle the size.

Where to Get a Professional Passport Photo

Paying someone else to take the shot removes most of the risk. USPS locations that handle passport applications generally offer photo services, bookable through the USPS website, for $15.⁶ Appointments run about 15 minutes.⁷

Pharmacies, shipping stores, and big-box retailers also offer walk-in photo services, usually priced from about $1 to $16 for a pair of prints. Staff at these locations tend to know the current rules and will reshoot on the spot if something looks wrong.

Why Photos Get Rejected

Reviewers bounce photos for a short list of predictable reasons:

Wrong size or framing — head too large, too small, or off-center in the 2×2 square
Shadows or uneven lighting on the face, neck, or background
Colored, patterned, or textured backgrounds instead of plain white or off-white
Glasses, still the most frequently broken rule since the 2016 change
Filters, beauty mode, AI enhancement, or digitally removed backgrounds
Exaggerated expressions, closed eyes, or a tilted head

Before you submit, hold your photo up against the composition template on the State Department’s website and check it point by point.⁸

1
U.S. Department of State. U.S. Passport Photos
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U.S. Department of State. Photo Frequently Asked Questions
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U.S. Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual. 8 FAM 402.1 – Passport Photographs
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U.S. Department of State. Digital Image Requirements
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U.S. Department of State. Uploading a Digital Photo
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United States Postal Service. Passport Appointments, Renewals, and Photo Services
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United States Postal Service. Schedule An Appointment
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U.S. Department of State. Photo Composition Template