How to Make a Passport-Size Photo at Home for Online Applications

Start with the official instructions

Before you take a single photo, open your notification or the portal help page and find the photo section. It will normally tell you the background colour, the size (in centimetres, pixels or both), the file format, the KB range, and sometimes how much of the frame your face should fill or whether spectacles are allowed. These details differ between exams, departments and countries, and they are revised from time to time.

Watch outThis guide does not give any authority's official specification. For an Indian passport, follow the photo instructions published on the Passport Seva portal. For exams, jobs and other services, follow the exact notification you are applying under. If anything here differs from those instructions, the official instructions win.

With that in hand, making a good application photo at home is very achievable. You need a phone, a plain wall, daylight and about ten minutes.

Background, lighting and pose

Background. A plain white or very light wall is the easiest starting point, as many forms ask for a light background. Move away from posters, switchboards, curtains and door frames. Stand about half a metre from the wall so your shadow falls behind you and not beside your head.

Lighting. Face a window during the day so soft light falls evenly on both sides of your face. Avoid standing under a single ceiling bulb, which puts shadows under the eyes and nose. Turn off the phone flash if it creates a shiny forehead or red eyes.

Pose. Look straight into the lens with your shoulders square to the camera, mouth closed and a neutral expression. Keep hair away from your eyes. Remove caps and dark glasses unless your instructions permit otherwise, and check what they say about spectacles and religious headwear.

• Ask someone else to take the photo, holding the phone at your eye level, rather than using a selfie at arm's length, which distorts the face.
• Use the main rear camera if possible, as it usually gives a sharper image than the front camera.
• Turn off beauty modes, filters and portrait blur.
• Wear clothes that contrast with the background; a white shirt against a white wall can make your shoulders vanish.
• Take ten or more shots and pick the sharpest one with both eyes clearly open.

Centimetres to pixels: the formula

Many photo instructions are written in centimetres because they were designed for printed photos. Online forms, though, work in pixels. To go from one to the other you need a DPI (dots per inch) value, and the conversion is:

pixels = cm ÷ 2.54 × DPI

There are 2.54 centimetres in an inch, so dividing by 2.54 converts centimetres to inches, and multiplying by DPI tells you how many pixels fit in that many inches. Here are some worked examples using the formula. They are arithmetic examples, not official sizes:

If your form states pixel dimensions directly, ignore the formula and use those numbers exactly. If it gives only centimetres and no DPI, 300 DPI is a common printing value, but check the instructions first.

TipChanging the DPI value stored in a file does not make it sharper or change its KB. What matters online is the actual pixel width and height.

Crop to the exact size

The Application photos tool crops your picture to an exact pixel size. It opens with 413 × 531 px, which is the 3.5 cm × 4.5 cm shape at 300 DPI from the table above, and you can change both values to whatever your notification requires. Drag the crop box and its corner handles so your face is centred, with a small gap above your head and the top of your shoulders visible, unless your instructions say otherwise.

If the resulting file is still over the KB limit, open it in the Photo and signature size optimizer, enter the same width and height, choose JPEG and set a target KB. It will adjust only the quality to fit. Our article on reducing a photo to 20 KB or 50 KB explains this step in more depth.

Fixing a busy background

If you cannot find a plain wall, the Portrait background remover can separate you from the background so you can place yourself on a plain colour. It uses an AI model that is downloaded to your browser the first time you use it and then runs locally, so your photo is not uploaded.

Watch outAutomatic background removal can leave rough edges around hair or ears. Look carefully at the result at full size. Some instructions require an unedited or natural photo, so where possible, retaking against a plain wall is the safer choice.

Privacy and final checks

Phone photos often carry hidden information called EXIF metadata, which can include the date, the phone model and sometimes the GPS location where the photo was taken. A portal does not need any of this. The EXIF and location cleaner removes it in your browser before you upload.

1. The file format matches the instructions (usually JPG or JPEG).
2. The pixel dimensions are exactly as stated, if stated.
3. The KB size is inside the minimum and maximum range.
4. The background colour and face position follow the instructions.
5. The photo is recent, sharp and both eyes are clearly visible.
6. You have kept the original full-size photo in case you need to redo it.

If you need to submit a printed photo too, a local studio can print from your digital file. For uploads that must be a PDF, our guide to converting JPG to PDF shows how to combine images into a single document.