The sizes, platform by platform
| Placement | Shape | Size |
|---|---|---|
| Facebook and Instagram feed | 4:5 | 1440 x 1800, at least 600 wide |
| Facebook and Instagram Stories and Reels | 9:16 | Full screen; 1080 x 1920 is the usual master |
| TikTok in-feed | 9:16 (1:1 and 16:9 accepted) | At least 540 x 960; 1080 x 1920 is the usual master |
| YouTube Shorts | Vertical | Up to 1080p, up to 3 minutes |
| Pinterest standard pin | 2:3 | 1000 x 1500 |
| LinkedIn single image | 1:1, 4:5 or 1.91:1 | 1200 x 1200, 720 x 900 (mobile only), 1200 x 628 |
Sources, all read on 20 October 2026: Meta's ads guide, TikTok in-feed ads, YouTube Shorts help, Pinterest product specs and LinkedIn single image ads. Platforms change these without notice, so check the page before a large campaign.
Three shapes cover almost everything
You do not need a file per placement. 4:5 covers the feeds, 9:16 covers Stories, Reels, TikTok and Shorts, and 1:1 covers carousels and anywhere square is safest. Pinterest's 2:3 is a little taller than 4:5, and LinkedIn's landscape 1.91:1 is the odd one out. Hyzgen's static ads come in 1:1, 4:5 and 9:16, and its carousels in 1:1 or 4:5.
Keep the words out of the edges
In full-screen placements the app draws its own buttons, caption and profile over the top and bottom of your frame. TikTok says its safe zone depends on the shape, the length of the ad caption and any extra formats, and offers templates to download. Pinterest's full-screen idea ads keep 270 px at the top and 440 px at the bottom of a 1080 x 1920 frame clear.
Keep headlines, prices and logos in the middle band, and check the platform's template before you publish. In Hyzgen's videos, a hook line sits 20 percent from the top, below the platform's own top row, and a product label 27 percent from the bottom; carousel slides keep 150 px at the bottom for the swipe dots.
Why AI images come out square
Many image models ignore a shape written in the prompt. Asked for an image "framed as a vertical 9:16 image", Gemini's image model returned 1024 x 1024. Cropped to 9:16, half the picture was thrown away, often including the product.
The shape has to go in the request's own setting. For Gemini that is the aspect ratio in the image configuration: with "9:16" set there, the same model returned 768 x 1344, and Gemini's 2K model returned 1856 x 2304 for 4:5 and 2752 x 1536 for 16:9. Other image models have their own size or aspect setting; look for it before you write the shape into the prompt.
Draw for the space, not the whole ad
In most layouts the picture fills only part of the ad. Draw it at the shape of that space, at the nearest ratio the model supports, and say where the words will go so the product is kept clear of them. The model follows that loosely, so leave room to move the crop afterwards.
Look for bars and bands
Image models sometimes draw a letterbox into a tall frame: asked for a wide shot of two people side by side in 9:16, one drew black bars at the top and bottom, and the video model then filmed them. A style that said "35mm anamorphic" made it worse, and telling the model to fill the frame did not stop it.
So measure it. Hyzgen checks for dark rows along both the top and bottom edges (both, and at least 3 percent each, so a night sky is not mistaken for a bar), draws a barred frame once more, and otherwise crops and scales it to fill. Video has the same problem: portrait clips from one video model carried a 10 to 14 px black band at the top, so every clip from that model is trimmed by 1.5 percent on each edge.
Make one, then resize by layout
Stretching or cropping a finished ad to another shape cuts words and squeezes the product. Keep the picture and the words separate, and each size is a new layout of the same pieces. In Hyzgen, "Also make it square" or "story" makes those copies at no cost, and a carousel keeps one look across every slide. More on keeping words out of pictures in our guide to clean ad text.