Change log
Every substantive change to the site is recorded here with a date: specification corrections, new reference pages, pages we retired from the index, and policy changes. Small copy edits are not listed.
The UK visa upload is 600 × 750 px, not 35 × 45 mm
UKVI publishes its own digital photo rules — at least 600 pixels wide and 750 tall, 50 KB to 6 MB, JPEG, vertical and not mirrored — measured in pixels and bytes rather than millimetres. A correct 35 × 45 mm print export is 413 × 531 px, which sits below that floor. Added a page transcribing the digital rules, including the glasses and children provisions and the bar on reusing a passport photo.
Japan's visa form is square, and the guides get it wrong
The MFA visa application form prints its photo box as 45 mm × 45 mm or 2 in × 2 in. The 35 × 45 mm figure that dominates guide sites is the Japanese passport frame. Added a page on the distinction, and noted on it that we have not captured the eVISA upload ceiling, so no byte limit is published for that route.
Canada's digital photo ceiling: two official pages disagree
The dedicated digital-photo specifications page and the official specification PDF state a 200 KB–4 MB window for the file used in Canada's online passport renewal; the general Passport photo requirements page states 200 KB–5 MB. We did not choose the convenient number: the IRCC digital photo page now publishes 4 MB as the working ceiling — the stricter reading, so a file that satisfies it satisfies both — and states the disagreement on the page rather than resolving it silently.
Two portal rule sets transcribed from source
Added the U.S. DS-160 upload rules (square 600–1200 px, JPEG, 240 kB ceiling, compression under 20:1, sRGB) and the Canada online renewal rules above. Both quote the authority's own page, with the access date, rather than a secondary summary.
New reference page: the twenty-destination spec matrix
Published One photo, twenty destinations: the eight print frames actually in use, the destinations that share them, and the three rules that genuinely diverge — background colour, head proportion, and where a digital ceiling exists at all.
Index narrowed to genuinely differentiated pages
An audit of all 153 built pages found that the indexable set was dominated by single-purpose utilities that duplicate what every other image site already offers. Fourteen of those pages were retired from the index while remaining reachable for anyone who has the URL: smart crop, image editor, photoshop core, metadata manager, batch enhance, product studio, listing pack, business portrait, enhance, to-ico, merge, split PDF, add page numbers to PDF, and text watermark.
The French edition (12 pages of a 91-page English site, with no localised tool pages behind them) was moved out of the index, the sitemap and hreflang until it is completed rather than leaving a partial locale that reads as translated filler. The French URLs still work.
The indexable surface went from 117 pages to 90, and the sitemap from 127 URLs to 91.
Ad code removed from every page we do not index
Pages that declare noindex — the 404 page, locale stubs, and the retired utilities above — no longer load the advertising script or contain an ad unit. A page we do not consider worth indexing is not a page we should monetise. Advertising remains on the content pages only.
Homepage now leads with reference material
The homepage previously opened on the tool grid. It now opens on the guides and reference pages: the specification library, the portal upload rules, and the head-size and framing walkthroughs. The tools follow. The change reflects what the site is for — checking a photo against a published rule — rather than what it contains.
New reference page: portal upload limits
Published Portal upload limits, a cross-system table of the exact pixel dimensions, file-size windows and formats enforced by receiving systems — UK passport online and the HMPO photo form, UK visa guidance and the underlying legislation, VFS Belgium, Iran, Malta and Finland, the US DV lottery, Canada passport and citizenship, and Australia citizenship and ImmiCard. Every row names its official source and the date it was checked.
The page exists because the rules that actually reject an upload often live on the portal, not on the photo page — and because one country can publish several conflicting limits at once. The United Kingdom currently publishes four different upper bounds for the same photograph depending on the channel.
Editorial and verification pages added
Added How we test and verify specifications and Editorial policy: which sources we accept, who writes and reviews, the 90-day re-check cycle, how corrections are handled, and the separation between advertising and editorial decisions.
Specification pages re-checked against primary sources
The country specification pages were re-checked against their passport authority or immigration department. The pages that were re-checked carry the date of that check in their source line. Where an official page contradicts a widely repeated figure, the contradiction is stated on the page rather than quietly resolved in favour of the familiar number.
One known open item: the Japanese digital photo file-size limit is widely repeated as 600 KB, but the official page has not yet been captured in a form we can cite, so the figure is marked as unconfirmed until it is.
How to report an error
If a number here disagrees with the source you are working from, write to [email protected] with the page and the source. Corrections are logged on this page with a date. See the methodology page for what we can and cannot guarantee.