A TikTok cover is 1080 x 1920 px, either a frame lifted from the video or a still you upload. The full frame only appears in the player, and the profile grid trims the top and the bottom off it.
Where it shows
- Profile video grid
- Search results grid
- Sound and hashtag page grids
- Full screen For You player
- Liked and favourited video lists
The safe zone
In the full screen player the bottom of the frame carries your username, the caption and the sound line, and the right edge carries the profile photo, follow button, like, comment, bookmark and share rail. Recharm's TikTok ad spec guide puts these at roughly the bottom 300 to 320 px, the right 120 px, the top 120 to 130 px and the left 60 px of a 1080 x 1920 px frame. On the profile grid the cover is shown as a vertical tile shorter than 9:16, so the top and bottom are cut a second time. Keep the hook text in the vertical middle of the frame and inside a 900 px wide column.
Quirks worth knowing
- The cover is set on the post screen, either by scrubbing to a frame or by uploading a photo. TikTok described choosing a cover as something you do before publishing in its 2021 help text, and its current help pages do not say whether a cover can be changed once a video is live. Plan the cover before you post, and check your own app if you need to change one.
- TikTok does not publish a profile grid tile ratio. The tile is a vertical rectangle shorter than the 9:16 frame, so a cover built to fill the full height loses both ends on the profile.
- A cover taken from a video frame is compressed as part of the clip, so text burned into that frame is softer than the same text on an uploaded still.
- TikTok's own safe zone template was unreachable when this page was checked, so the margin figures here come from Recharm's TikTok ad spec guide rather than from TikTok.
- The action rail on the right is drawn over the video in the player but not in the grid, so a cover can look balanced on the profile and crowded in the feed.
- A long caption pushes the caption block further up the frame, so the height covered at the bottom is not fixed.
Common mistakes
- Putting the hook text along the bottom of the cover, directly under the username and caption block.
- Placing a logo in the bottom right, behind the share and comment icons.
- Designing the cover to fill the full 1920 px height, then losing both ends to the profile grid tile.
- Relying on a scrubbed frame that catches the subject mid blink instead of choosing a still yourself.
- Writing a long caption after the cover is finished, which raises the caption block over the artwork.
What we recommend
- Upload a still you designed instead of scrubbing to a frame, so the words are typeset rather than filmed.
- Keep the hook in the vertical middle of the frame, clear of the bottom 320 px and the top 130 px.
- Stay 120 px in from the right edge so the action rail never lands on your type.
- Check the cover as a row of three on your profile, since the grid is where covers are actually compared against each other.
- Keep the caption short when the cover already carries text, so the caption block does not climb into the design.
Common questions
Why does my TikTok cover look cropped on my profile?
The profile grid uses a vertical tile shorter than the 9:16 video frame, so the top and bottom of a 1080 x 1920 px cover are trimmed. TikTok does not publish the tile ratio, so there is no exact number to design to. The practical answer is to keep the subject and any text in the vertical middle.
What size should a TikTok cover image be?
1080 x 1920 px, matching the 9:16 video frame that Sprout Social and Hootsuite both list as the recommended TikTok video size. Upload it as a JPG or PNG. That single file serves the full screen player and, cropped, the grid tile.
Where do the TikTok buttons cover my video?
The right edge carries the profile photo, follow button and the like, comment, bookmark and share icons, while the bottom carries the username, caption and sound. Recharm's spec guide puts that at roughly 120 px on the right and 300 to 320 px at the bottom of a 1080 x 1920 px frame. The bottom band grows as the caption gets longer.
Should I pick a frame from my video or upload a cover?
Upload one whenever the cover has to carry words. A scrubbed frame inherits the video's compression and whatever motion blur that moment had, so burned in text looks soft. An uploaded still is encoded on its own and gives you control over where the hook sits.
Why does my cover look fine in the player but wrong on my profile?
The player shows the full 9:16 frame with icons drawn over it, while the grid shows a shorter tile with no icons at all. A design that dodges the icons can still be badly cropped by the tile, and a design that fits the tile can still sit under the action rail. Both have to be checked separately.
More answers on thumbnail, carousel and cover questions are on the FAQ.