TikTok aspect ratio and video size
TikTok is a single-shape platform: 9:16, full screen, 1080 × 1920 pixels. Everything interesting is about what the interface covers, not about the frame itself.
The numbers
| Asset | Ratio | Pixels | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard video | 9:16 | 1080 × 1920 | Full screen on virtually every phone. |
| Higher-resolution vertical | 9:16 | 1440 × 2560 | Same shape, more detail. Useful if you crop or reframe later. |
| Square upload | 1:1 | 1080 × 1080 | Accepted, but shows large empty bands above and below. |
| Horizontal upload | 16:9 | 1920 × 1080 | Accepted, plays as a small strip unless the viewer rotates. |
| Video cover | 9:16 | 1080 × 1920 | Chosen from a frame, then cropped toward a taller thumbnail on your profile grid. |
| Profile photo | 1:1 | 400 × 400 or larger | Displayed as a circle; upload square and keep the subject centred. |
9:16 is the one number here that will not change. File size caps, length limits and the exact interface margins all move with app releases — design against the ratio and verify the margins on a real device.
Calculator
Start from the 9:16 preset and scale to whatever height you need, or unlock the ratio to check what shape an existing file really is.
Nearest standard resolutions
Why 9:16 and not something taller
9:16 is 0.5625:1 — the exact inverse of 16:9. It became the vertical standard because early widescreen phones were 16:9, so rotating the frame gave a perfect full-screen fit. Modern phones are actually taller than 16:9: many are close to 9:19.5 or 9:20. That means a 1080 × 1920 video does not quite fill the newest screens; the app scales it up slightly and crops the top and bottom, or pads with a small amount of background depending on the layout.
The practical consequence is the same either way: do not put anything critical within about 5% of the top or bottom edge. If you want to see how much room that is, type 1920 into the height field and note that 5% is 96 px at each end.
Safe areas: where the interface sits
The 1080 × 1920 frame is shared with the app's own controls. Approximate regions to keep clear:
- Right edge, roughly 150 px wide: the profile, like, comment, share and sound buttons run vertically down this strip.
- Bottom, roughly 300–400 px: username, caption text, music ticker and the progress bar.
- Top, roughly 150 px: the "Following / For You" tabs and search icon on the main feed.
These are working estimates, not published specifications — the layout differs between the feed, a profile view and the web player, and it changes with app updates. The reliable technique is to compose within the central column: keep faces, product shots and any burned-in text inside roughly the middle 780 px of width and between 200 px and 1500 px vertically. Anything outside that is decoration.
Burned-in subtitles are the most common casualty. Placing them at the very bottom "like a film" puts them directly under the caption and progress bar. Move them up to around the 60–70% mark of the frame height.
Repurposing horizontal footage
A 1920 × 1080 edit is 1.78:1; TikTok wants 0.5625:1. That is a factor of more than three, so there is no gentle conversion. Three approaches, in order of quality:
- Reframe shot by shot. Crop to 9:16 and keyframe the horizontal position to follow the subject. Enter 1080 in the width field with 9:16 locked: the height is 1920, and since your source is only 1080 tall, you need a source that is at least 1920 px tall — meaning you must crop from a 4K master (2160 px tall) to avoid upscaling. This is the strongest argument for shooting 4K even when delivering 1080p.
- Stack. Place the 16:9 video in the upper portion of the 9:16 canvas and fill the rest with captions, a talking-head inset or graphics. A 1080-wide 16:9 clip is 608 px tall, leaving 1312 px of canvas to design into.
- Blur-fill. Scale the 16:9 clip to 1080 wide, centre it, and fill the empty space with a blurred, enlarged copy of the same frame. Cheap and fast, but it reads as recycled content.
Frequently asked questions
What is the correct TikTok video size?
1080 × 1920 pixels, aspect ratio 9:16. Uploading larger at the same ratio (1440 × 2560 or 2160 × 3840) is fine and gives the encoder more to work with, but TikTok will deliver a smaller stream to most viewers.
Can I upload a horizontal video to TikTok?
Yes, and it will play — but inside a small letterboxed strip in a full-screen vertical feed. Engagement on horizontal uploads is generally poor for a purely mechanical reason: the picture occupies about a third of the screen while the rest is empty.
Why does my video look zoomed in or cropped?
Either your source was not exactly 9:16 and the app cropped it to fill, or your phone screen is taller than 16:9 and the video was scaled up to fill the height. Check the source ratio with the calculator above using the lock off. If it does not read 9:16, that is the cause.
How do I stop text being covered by the caption?
Keep it above roughly 1500 px in a 1920 px tall frame, and away from the right-hand 150 px. If you are working in an editor with percentage guides, that is the top 78% of the frame and the left 86% of the width.
Is TikTok the same size as Instagram Reels?
The frame is identical — 1080 × 1920, 9:16 — so a single export can serve both. The interface overlays differ, so a caption that clears TikTok's buttons may sit awkwardly on Reels. If you post to both, design to the stricter of the two safe areas. See the Instagram page for those margins.
Should I shoot in 4K for TikTok?
Shoot 4K if you plan to reframe. A 3840 × 2160 horizontal source contains a full 1215 × 2160 vertical crop, which downscales cleanly to 1080 × 1920. A 1920 × 1080 source only contains a 608 × 1080 crop, which has to be upscaled by 78% and will look soft.
Use cases & limitations
- Planning a vertical crop. Use the calculator to check whether your source has enough height to fill 1920 px without upscaling.
- Designing overlays. Convert the percentage safe areas above into pixels for whatever canvas size you are working at.
- Cross-platform export. One 1080 × 1920 master covers TikTok, Reels, Stories and YouTube Shorts.
- Limitation: safe-area figures on this page are approximations based on the common interface layout, not official specifications, and they vary by app version and device.
- Limitation: this page covers frame geometry only — not codecs, bitrates, length limits or file size caps, which change far more often than the 9:16 ratio does.