Pinterest Pin Size: 1000×1500 and Why 2:3 Matters

Pinterest is the one major platform built around a vertical feed, and that single fact decides almost everything about pin dimensions. A pin does not compete for attention in a row — it competes for height in a column. The taller it is, the more column it occupies, right up to the point where the platform cuts it off.

The Standard Pin: 1000 × 1500

The recommended pin is 1000 × 1500 px — a 2:3 ratio. This is not an arbitrary preference. 2:3 is the tallest shape that displays in full in the feed; go taller and the pin is truncated, with the bottom hidden behind a “see more” interaction that most people never perform.

So 2:3 is the sweet spot: maximum vertical presence, nothing cut off. If you make only one size, make this one.

What Happens to Other Shapes

• Square (1:1) — displays fine, occupies less column height, so it is passed more quickly. Works, but gives away the platform’s main advantage.
• Taller than 2:3 — a long infographic at 1000 × 3000 is truncated in the feed. The pin still works when opened, but the feed shows only the top third, so the top third has to carry the whole message.
• Landscape — technically allowed, visually lost. In a vertical feed a wide pin is a thin strip.

Video and Idea Pins

Video pins follow the same vertical logic but go further: 1080 × 1920 px (9:16) is the full-screen format, matching what every other short-video surface uses. A 2:3 video also works and keeps the feed layout consistent.

Because 9:16 is taller than 2:3, a video pin designed at 9:16 will be letterboxed or cropped in the feed preview. Keep anything essential — a title, a face, a price — in the middle of the frame.

Boards and Profile

• Board cover — displayed as a square, so design at 600 × 600 px or larger at 1:1. A board cover cropped from a 2:3 pin usually loses its text.
• Profile photo — shown as a circle at a small size; 400 × 400 px gives plenty of headroom. As with every circular avatar, the corners of the square are discarded.

File Size and Format

Pinterest accepts PNG and JPG, with a generous size ceiling — but generous is not a target. A 1000 × 1500 JPG at quality 85 lands around 200–400 KB, loads quickly, and looks identical to a 3 MB version on any phone.

Format choice follows the usual rule, and it matters more on Pinterest than elsewhere because so many pins carry text. A pin that is a photograph belongs in JPG. A pin that is a text overlay, a chart or a flat-colour graphic belongs in PNG, where the lettering stays crisp.

Preparing a Pin From an Existing Image

Most pins start life as something else — a product photo, a blog header, a screenshot. Turning one into a pin is two operations, in this order:

1. Crop to 2:3. Decide which part of the image survives; a landscape source will lose its sides, so check that the subject is still centred.
2. Resize to 1000 × 1500. If the source is smaller than that, a larger target will not add detail — better to accept 2:3 at the source’s own resolution than to upscale.

Only then compress, and only if the file is unreasonably large.

Quick Reference

• Standard pin: 1000 × 1500 px (2:3)
• Square pin: 1000 × 1000 px (1:1)
• Video pin: 1080 × 1920 px (9:16)
• Board cover: 600 × 600 px (1:1)
• Profile photo: 400 × 400 px, shown as a circle
• PNG for text and flat colour, JPG for photographs

The one number worth memorising is 2:3. Everything else on Pinterest is a variation on it.