TikTok photo mode is 3:4, not 9:16: the right slide size

Search for "TikTok slideshow size" and nearly every answer says 1080 × 1920. That number is right for videos. For photo posts it costs you the top and the bottom of every slide, which is exactly where most people put the hook and the call to action.

This page shows what TikTok actually displays, what gets cut, and how to fix slides you already made. For file types, image counts and text sizes, see TikTok photo post size: dimensions, safe zones and file rules.

What most guides say

The 9:16 advice is everywhere, and it is easy to see why: TikTok is a full-screen video app, so a full-screen slide sounds right.

• Postfa.st's carousel spec page recommends "1080×1920 pixels (9:16 vertical aspect ratio)" and lists 1:1 and 4:5 as alternatives. It does not mention 3:4.
• Kapwing's photo mode guide says TikTok doesn't require a specific ratio, then suggests resizing to 9:16 with "1080 by 1920" as the output size.
• Postiz's May 2026 tutorial on automating slideshows with an AI agent renders every slide at 1080 × 1920.

TikTok itself gives no number. Its developer reference for photo posts lists how many images a post can have (35) and how long the title and caption can be, but no dimensions. So the only way to know is to post and look.

What TikTok actually shows

We opened our own photo posts on an iPhone in September 2026 and measured the screen. From top to bottom:

1. The status bar.
2. The picture, in a 3:4 window across the full width of the screen.
3. An opaque black panel with the page dots, the caption and the sound name.

The caption panel sits below the picture, not on top of it. So the picture gets a 3:4 window, and anything outside that window is simply not drawn.

Two things are drawn over the picture itself:

• A search pill across the top ("Find related content" and similar), from about 1 to 7.5 percent of the window's height.
• The action rail on the right: your avatar, the like button and the comment button, in the right 16 percent of the width, from about 62 percent of the height to the bottom.

The crop, in pixels

Here is what each common size turns into inside a 3:4 window at 1080 px wide.

Slide size	Ratio	What viewers see
1080 × 1440	3:4	The whole slide, edge to edge
1080 × 1920	9:16	Rows 240 to 1680 only: 240 px gone at the top, 240 px at the bottom (a quarter of the height in total)
1080 × 1350	4:5	The whole slide, with a thin band of fill above and below
1080 × 1080	1:1	The whole slide, with wide bands above and below

The 9:16 row is the one that hurts. TikTok keeps the middle and throws away the ends, and nothing warns you. The post uploads fine, the swipe works, and your stats look normal. Viewers just see a hook with its first line missing.

Take a slide from @yourapp, a budgeting app. Its 9:16 template puts the hook "5 money habits I wish I knew at 22" at y = 200 and a "Link in bio" line at y = 1760. In the app, both are gone. What is left is the photo and the middle of the slide.

Where to put text on a 3:4 slide

On a 1080 × 1440 slide the window and the canvas are the same, so the numbers are simple:

Area	Where it is	What to do
Search pill	y ≈ 14 to 108 px, almost full width	No text above about y = 175
Action rail	x ≥ about 905 px, y ≈ 890 to 1400 px	No text in the bottom-right corner
Caption, sound, dots	Below the picture	Nothing to avoid on the slide

That leaves a safe rectangle from about x = 85 to 905 and y = 175 to 1325. Put every word inside it. The photo can run edge to edge.

If you must keep a 9:16 slide, keep text between 20 and 70 percent of its height (y = 384 to 1344) and out of the right 16 percent. That band survives both the crop and the rail.

How to fix slides you already made

You don't have to throw away a folder of 9:16 slides.

1. Check where the text sits. If every word is between 20 and 70 percent of the height and the subject of the photo is near the centre, the crop only costs you background. Keep them.
2. Move text that sits in the ends. A hook near the top or a call to action near the bottom has to move toward the middle before anything else.
3. Crop to 1080 × 1440. Cut 240 px from the top and 240 px from the bottom. Now what you see in your editor is what viewers see.
4. Run it through the TikTok photo crop checker. Drop a slide in and it shows the part TikTok displays, with the search pill and the action rail drawn over it.
5. Post once as "Only me" and look on your phone. It takes a minute and settles any doubt. Cover the bottom-right corner with your thumb and check that every sentence still reads.

For new slides, start at 1080 × 1440 and skip all of this.

When 9:16 still makes sense

Use 9:16 when the same image also has to work as an Instagram Story or a Reel cover and you accept the crop on TikTok. Keep the words in the middle band from the section above and one file can serve both.

For TikTok alone there is no reason to design at 9:16. The extra 480 px are never seen.

A short history of why this is confusing

TikTok has changed how photo posts are framed before, and the app frames them differently from videos, so advice written for one gets copied to the other. Spec pages also tend to copy each other. When a page says 1080 × 1920 for photo mode, check whether it shows a screenshot of a real photo post. Most don't.

We re-measure on real posts when the app changes and keep the size guide up to date. The safe zone above has a margin built in so a small interface change doesn't cut your text.

What Reelazy does with this

Reelazy makes every new slide at 1080 × 1440 by default and keeps text inside the safe zone when the AI writes a post or when you drag text in the editor. A project can switch to 9:16 if you reuse slides elsewhere. Every slide is rendered to JPEG, because TikTok's posting API refuses PNG.

The size is the easy part. The words matter more: a listicle hook in the right place, and slides short enough to read (how long the text on a slide should be). If you run an app like @yourapp, TikTok slideshows for budgeting apps shows a month of posts in that size. To try it on your own product, start here.