1080 × 1080 resize — keep the whole image

Worked example

Resize a PNG to 1080×1080 for an Instagram square post with contain: 1600×1000 becomes 1080×675 with 202.5px transparent bars top and bottom.

A 1080×1080 square is the default Instagram feed post for product shots and announcements, and it shows in full on a phone screen. On a phone the canvas is displayed at around 0.37 scale, so type under about 40px tall ends up near 15px on screen. The picture spans only 62.5% of the canvas height and the rest is transparent bars, so some of those zones land on bars rather than on your PNG content.

Contain scales the PNG by ×0.675 so the whole picture fits at 1080×675px, then fills the rest with transparent bars. The 202.5px bars sit above and below, so 62.5% of the canvas height is picture and nothing is cut. Choose it when the whole frame matters, such as a menu, a screenshot or a wide group photo, and accept a horizontal band of picture in the middle of a square.

With PNG the 202.5px bars are transparent, not white, and the file stays lossless. Platforms flatten transparency their own way, so the bars can turn black or white after posting; if the look matters, fill them with a colour first. A photo at 1080×1080 commonly lands around 1.5 to 3 MB. Platforms generally recompress uploads, so a large PNG costs upload time without keeping its lossless quality on screen.

A shop owner uploads a 1600×1000 PNG flat-lay with contain, and the 675px picture floats between 202.5px bars; among full-bleed posts it looks unfinished. Either choose cover and recompose, or build a square background in the brand colour so the bars look intended. A PNG of this kind is around 1.5 to 3 MB; if the upload is slow or refused, that weight is the usual cause, not the 1080×1080 pixel size.

Before posting, open the file at 100% and confirm it reports 1080×1080, then shrink the view to about 400px wide to see what a phone feed shows. Look at the bars next to your neighbouring posts to see whether their colour belongs. The file is saved as name-preset.png; open it in a viewer with a checkerboard background to confirm what is transparent, and compare the size with the estimate above.

1600 × 1000 px · PNG

1080 × 1080 px · PNG

PNG at 1080×1080: the 202.5px transparent bars apply to a 1600×1000 source; a platform may flatten transparency to black or white.