US passport photo for a paper application

This is the photo you print and attach to a paper form: DS-11, which you hand in at an acceptance facility, or DS-82, which you post. It is a physical 2 x 2 inch photograph, and the rules on this page are about the print — its size, the size of your head on it, and the paper it comes out on.

Renewing online instead? Stop here.

If you are 25 or older and renewing through the State Department's online application, none of the print geometry below applies to you. That route has its own published rules — a file specification with no pixel dimensions at all — and the State Department crops the photo inside its own application.

Photo for renewing a US passport online

The print geometry State publishes

Every number in this table is on one page: travel.state.gov(opens in a new tab), in the section headed Passport Photos. We read it on 16 September 2026; its own footer said it was last updated on 24 March 2026. Nothing has been rounded, converted or helpfully filled in.

Printed photo requirements published by the U.S. Department of State for a paper passport application
What	The requirement	State's own wording
Printed size	2 x 2 inches (51 x 51 mm)	"The correct printed size of a passport photo is 2 x 2 inches (51 x 51 mm)."
Head size	25–35 mm from the bottom of the chin to the top of the head	"The size of your head in the printed photo must be between 1 -1 3/8 inches (25 - 35 mm) from the bottom of the chin to the top of the head."
Paper	Matte or glossy photo-quality paper. No photocopies, no scans.	"Print your photo on matte or glossy photo-quality paper." / "Do not submit photocopies or digitally scanned photos."
How many, and how recent	One colour photo, taken within the last 6 months	"Submit 1 color photo taken in the last 6 months."
Background	Plain white or off-white, no shadows, no texture, no objects, no lines	"Background must be white or off-white, free of shadows, and plain without texture, objects, or lines."
Distance from the camera	Several feet, head centred and fully visible	"Position yourself several feet away from the camera with your head centered and head fully visible."
Hair past the edge	Allowed, if your whole head is shown at the right size	"Your hair may extend past the edges of the photo, as long as your entire head is shown and is the appropriate size."

One rounding difference, so you are not caught out by it

The same State page states the head size twice and rounds it differently each time. The requirement bullet says 1 – 1 3/8 inches (25 – 35 mm). The photo tips further down the page say 1 – 1.4 inches (25 – 35 mm). One and three-eighths of an inch is 34.9 mm; 1.4 inches is 35.6 mm. The millimetre pair is identical in both places, and forms DS-11 and DS-82 both print "1-1 3/8 inches", so we measure against 25–35 mm and say so wherever a measurement appears.

The rules you have to judge for yourself

These are the ones that decide most applications, and none of them is a number. They are quoted from the same page.

Expression — and yes, you may smile on this path

"Avoid exaggerated facial expressions. You can smile in your photo. Just make sure your eyes are open and your mouth is closed."

That is the paper-form wording, and it is worth knowing because it is not what the online renewal page says. Online renewal asks for a "neutral facial expression or natural smile" and tells you to avoid showing teeth. Same passport, two routes, two different sentences. If you are on this page, the sentence above is the one that governs your photo.

Eyes

Face the camera directly, head not tilted, full face in view. State's wording is that "the colored portions of your eyes must be clearly visible" and that your eyes must not be obstructed or covered by your hair. Closed eyes, a downward gaze or a head turned slightly away are all listed as unacceptable examples.

Glasses come off

"Take off any eyeglasses, sunglasses, or tinted glasses. Do not rest them on your head for the photo." There is one documented exception: if you cannot remove them for medical reasons, include a signed note from your doctor with your application.

Hats and head coverings come off, with two documented exceptions

Remove hats and head coverings. If you wear one for religious purposes, submit a signed statement saying it is religious attire worn daily in public; if for medical purposes, a signed doctor's statement. Where a covering is worn, State requires that your full face is visible, that no part of your face is shadowed or blocked, that the covering is one colour, and that the material has no patterns or small holes.

Clothing, headphones, masks, jewellery

"You cannot wear a uniform, clothing that looks like a uniform, or camouflage clothing." The DS-11 and DS-82 instructions repeat this, adding that photos are to be taken in clothing normally worn on a daily basis.
"You cannot wear headphones or wireless hands-free devices in or on your ears."
Take off any face covering or medical mask; your full face must be visible.
Jewellery and facial piercings are allowed, as long as they do not hide your face. This is one of the few places State says yes rather than no.

Two situations State writes down explicitly

Wheelchairs. It is acceptable if part of the head support appears in the photo. Include a note with your application explaining that the background is not completely white because you are in a wheelchair.
Babies and toddlers. State publishes separate guidance for them — a baby's eyes need not be entirely open, all other children's must be, and no other person may be in the photo. Our automated checks are written for an adult applicant, so if you are photographing a child, read that section on State's page(opens in a new tab) rather than relying on us.

The one rule with no exceptions: do not change the photo

This is the part of the page people skip, and it is the part that is stated most bluntly. Quoted in full from State's Digital changes section:

"Submit the original, unchanged photo."

"Do not change your photo using computer software, phone apps or filters, or artificial intelligence."

The example captions on the same page are just as specific:

"Do not stretch or compress your image to resize it."
"Do not use editing tools to cover up red eye, as this changes your natural eye color and shape." Adjust or turn off the flash and take the photo again instead.
"The image is an original but the background is not plain white or off-white. Do not enhance or change the photo using software or artificial intelligence tools. Fix your lighting and background and take a new photo."
"We check all photos to ensure you are not using artificial intelligence tools."

So there is no version of this where a retouched, relit, background-replaced or AI-tidied photo is the safe option. If a service offers to fix your background or smooth your photo for a US passport, the sentence above is what it is asking you to submit.

What that means for what we do

We do not retouch, relight, recolour, filter, upscale or generate any part of your photograph, and we never replace or clean up your background. If the background is wrong, we tell you to move and take another photo, because that is what State tells you to do.

To give you something you can print, we scale your photo uniformly and set the 2 x 2 inch frame around it at the required head size, then lay six copies out on a 4 x 6 inch sheet. That is a sizing and layout operation on the print, not a change to your appearance or to the outline of your head, face and neck. The State Department runs its own cropping tool(opens in a new tab) for exactly this job on the paper-form path — and that tool carries a red banner telling online renewers not to use it.

You also get your original file back, byte for byte, every time. Whatever else happens, you keep the untouched photograph.

What we check automatically, and what only a person can

We would rather tell you where the line is than imply the software sees everything. It does not.

Measured by software, on every upload, before you pay anything

That the file is one we can actually open and read — JPEG or PNG.
That it is a colour photograph rather than black and white, measured across every pixel.
Overall lighting: too dark, too bright, and areas blown to pure white or crushed to pure black with no detail left in them.
Focus, so a photo that is soft or motion-blurred is caught before it is printed.
The background, in three separate ways: how evenly lit it is across the edges of the frame (which is how shadows show up), whether there is texture or an object behind you, and how light it is against "plain white or off-white".
The capture date recorded in the file, against the 6-month rule. If the file carries no date — which is normal for screenshots, downloads and anything sent through a messaging app — we say we could not check it rather than assuming it is fine.
Whether the file says it was last saved by editing software, or has had its camera information stripped out. Neither is proof of anything, so both send the photo to a reviewer rather than failing it outright.

Not measured by software, and we say so on the report

Head size, head tilt, centring and whether exactly one person is in the frame. These are not measured automatically yet. A trained reviewer measures them by hand on every paid order, and the report says "not checked" rather than showing you a green tick we have not earned.
Your expression, your eyes, glasses, head coverings and clothing. Software cannot responsibly decide whether a mouth is closed or a jacket looks like a uniform. A person does.
Pixel dimensions and aspect ratio. State publishes none for a printed photo, so there is no threshold for us to check against and we do not invent one.
The paper you print on. We cannot see your printer. Matte or glossy photo-quality paper is on you, and it is one of the rejection causes State names outright.

What the State Department does not publish for this path

This section exists because most of the "requirements" circulating online for US passport photos are not passport requirements at all. Here is what U.S. Department of State — Passport Services does not state:

No pixel dimensions, aspect ratio, file format, file size, colour space or numeric DPI is published for the paper application — the artefact you submit is a print.
No eye-height measurement is published for passport photos. The 28–35 mm figure circulating online is from the US visa programme.
State does not publish a numeric sharpness, noise or exposure threshold; it describes the outcome ("not blurry, grainy, or pixelated") and leaves the judgement to a reviewer.

Where 600 x 600, sRGB, 240 kB and 300 ppi actually come from

They come from the US visa programme, which is a different set of pages on the same website: Digital Image Requirements for visa photos(opens in a new tab). That programme does specify a square image between 600 x 600 and 1200 x 1200 pixels, 24 bits per pixel in sRGB, JPEG, 240 kB or less, and scanning at 300 pixels per inch. The visa pages are also where the 28–35 mm eye height comes from.

None of those numbers appears on the passport pages. We keep them out of the passport profiles entirely, which is why a check against them will never appear on your report.

What you get, and what it costs

Your original photo. Exactly the file you uploaded, unchanged, so you always have the untouched original.
Print-ready 2×2 inch photo. Your photo cropped to the 2×2 inch frame with the head sized between 25 and 35 mm, ready to print on photo paper.
4×6 inch print sheet. Six copies of the 2×2 photo laid out on a 4×6 inch sheet, so a one-hour print booth costs you a few cents.
Printing and submission checklist. What paper to use, what to check before you print, and the exact wording of the rules your photo was measured against.

Full check and preparation $9.90

One payment, for one person and one document. No subscription and no account. The checks themselves are free — you see the whole report before you decide whether to pay.

If a reviewer asks you for a different photo, uploading it again costs nothing.

Payments are in test mode. No order can be paid for real yet. You can upload a photo and read the full check report today, but the payment step is connected to a test environment and will not charge a card.

Check my photo for the paper form

We check your photo against the State Department’s published paper-application rules and give you a print-ready 2×2 inch layout. We do not retouch your photo, we do not submit anything to the State Department, and we cannot promise how they will decide.

What we will not do

We will not tell you your photo will be accepted. Nobody outside the State Department can say that. State decides when it processes your application, and it states that unacceptable photos are the single most common reason applications are put on hold.
We will not edit, retouch or generate a photograph. State forbids it and says it checks.
We will not submit anything to the State Department. You file your own application.
We will not quote you a turnaround time we have not measured. When there is a real number, it will appear here.

More detail: how the whole process works, the standards we check against and when we last read them, or the full requirements for both application routes. If you only want to measure a photo you already have, the photo checker and the 2 x 2 inch layout tool are free and need no account. For printing, see how to print a 2 x 2 inch photo.