LinkedIn recommends 1584 x 396 px at 4:1 for a personal profile background, as a JPG or PNG under 8 MB. The trap is that the profile card on a phone is much narrower than 4:1, so a wide banner is trimmed before anyone reads it.
Where it shows
- The top of your profile on linkedin.com
- The top of your profile card in the LinkedIn mobile app
- The profile preview that opens from a connection request
- Your profile in LinkedIn search results and to logged out visitors
The safe zone
Your profile photo sits as a circle over the lower left of the banner on the desktop profile, with your name, headline and location stacked below in the same card. On a phone that card is narrower than 4:1 and the banner is cropped inward from both sides rather than scaled down, so a design that reads left to right across 1584 px loses both ends. Keep any words in the central half of the width, stay clear of the lower left where the photo lands, and treat the outer sixth on each side as decoration you can afford to lose.
Quirks worth knowing
- LinkedIn publishes 1584 x 396 px for the profile background, names only JPG and PNG, and puts the ceiling at under 8 MB.
- The personal banner is 4:1 while a company page cover is a much longer, shallower band, so one file cannot serve a founder profile and the company page.
- LinkedIn's own help tells you to choose an image with a larger file size when the background looks blurry, which is unusual advice and says a lot about how hard it downsamples small uploads.
- The mobile profile card crops the 4:1 banner from both sides instead of scaling it, so the desktop preview you sign off is not what most people see.
- The profile photo circle sits low and left over the banner on desktop, which makes the bottom left corner of a 1584 x 396 px file effectively unusable.
Common mistakes
- Writing a tagline across the full width of a 1584 x 396 px file and losing both ends on a phone.
- Placing a headshot or icon in the bottom left, directly under the profile photo circle.
- Compressing the banner down to a few hundred kilobytes when LinkedIn allows up to 8 MB.
- Building the banner at a company page ratio and wondering why it sits squashed on a personal profile.
What we recommend
- Export at 1584 x 396 px and keep every word inside the central half of the width.
- Let the file be generous, since LinkedIn allows up to 8 MB and its own help tells you to use a larger file when the banner looks soft.
- Keep the lower left as flat background so the profile photo has somewhere clean to sit.
- Check the result in the LinkedIn app before calling it done, because that view crops the sides.
Common questions
Why does my LinkedIn banner look blurry?
LinkedIn's help tells you to choose an image with a larger file size when the background photo appears blurry or pixelated. The slot allows up to 8 MB and most people upload something far below that. Export at 1584 x 396 px without heavy compression and it sharpens up.
What size is the LinkedIn profile background photo?
LinkedIn recommends 1584 x 396 px, which is a 4:1 ratio, as a JPG or PNG under 8 MB. That figure is for the personal profile background only. A company page cover is a different shape and reusing one for the other does not work.
Why is my LinkedIn banner cut off on mobile?
The profile card in the LinkedIn app is narrower than 4:1, so the banner is trimmed inward from the left and right. Text placed near either end is gone before anyone gets to read it. Keep the message inside the middle half of the frame.
Where does my profile photo sit on my LinkedIn banner?
On the desktop profile the circular photo overlaps the lower left of the banner. Anything you place in that corner is hidden behind it. Leave it as plain background or a soft gradient and put your message to the right of it.
More answers on thumbnail, carousel and cover questions are on the FAQ.