Every routine US document photo — passport, passport card, visa, green card, employment authorization (EAD), citizenship and other USCIS filings — is built on the same printed standard: 2×2 inches (51×51 mm) on a white or off-white background. What changes between documents is everything around that square: how recent the photo must be, whether you may smile, and whether you print it or upload a digital file.
The table below lists each US document we support, with the exact size and submission channel taken from the verified specification behind the matching page. Pick a document to see its full rules and make a compliant photo.
US photo rules come from two different agencies. The Department of State (travel.state.gov) governs passports, passport cards and visas; US Citizenship and Immigration Services (uscis.gov) governs green cards (Form I-485), employment authorization (Form I-765) and naturalization (Form N-400). State is stricter about the photo itself — take off glasses, no software, filter or AI edits, and the photo must come from the last 6 months. USCIS instructions focus on the prints: two identical, unretouched glossy photos, with your name and A-Number written lightly on the back in pencil or felt pen. For a green card the USCIS Policy Manual is tightest of all — photographs taken within 30 days of filing.
Expression is the classic trap: on a passport or passport card photo the State Department explicitly says you can smile as long as your eyes are open and your mouth stays closed, while a US visa photo requires a neutral expression. Channels differ too: online passport renewal accepts a JPG, JPEG, PNG, HEIC or HEIF file between 54 KB and 10 MB, and the visa upload takes a square JPEG from 600×600 up to 1200×1200 pixels no larger than 240 KB. Both agencies reject photos that have been retouched or altered.
Specifications on this page and the linked document pages are verified against the official sources — the State Department's travel.state.gov and USCIS form instructions on uscis.gov — most recently in July 2026.
