Rohman
You have a decent photo of yourself against a white wall. The photo counter wants real money for two small prints. Your printer is right there. So you try to print passport photos at home, and the first one comes out a millimetre or two too small, because the print dialog quietly "fit" it to the paper.
Size is the easy part to get right and the easiest part to get wrong. Here's how to get it right, and where home printing isn't allowed at all.
Quick answer: To print passport photos at home, place the photo on a sheet at its exact physical size, then print at 100% or Actual Size with every "fit" option off. Photo Tiling Prepress builds that sheet as a PDF at true millimetres (35 × 45 mm, 2 × 2 in or a custom size) on 4×6, 5×7, A4 or Letter paper, with cut marks, in your browser.
Passport Photo Sizes by Country
Check the official page before you print. Rules change, and the agency's word beats any table, including this one.
| Document | Printed size | Head height | Home prints accepted? | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US passport | 2 × 2 in (51 × 51 mm) | 1 to 1⅜ in | Yes, if it meets the rules | travel.state.gov |
| UK passport (paper form) | 35 × 45 mm | 29 to 34 mm | Must not be "a cut down version of a larger picture" | gov.uk |
| Schengen visa (e.g. Austria) | 35 × 45 mm | up to 36 mm | Check the consulate | Austrian embassy |
| India passport | 35 × 45 mm (4.5 × 3.5 cm) | White background | passportindia.gov.in | |
| India visa | Square; 2 × 2 in when printed | Uploaded digitally | indianvisaonline.gov.in | |
| Canada passport | 50 × 70 mm | 31 to 36 mm | No | canada.ca |
Canada is the one to read twice. Its passport page says photos must be "taken in person by a commercial photographer or photo studio" and "We don't accept photos printed at home." The photographer also has to stamp the back. No layout trick changes that, so if you're Canadian, this article is about your visa photos for other countries, not your passport.
The UK's "cut down" rule is about a photo cropped out of a bigger picture, like a holiday snap. A sheet of identical, correctly framed photos is a different thing, but if you're unsure, a booth print costs very little next to a delayed application. If you apply online, you need a digital photo instead of prints anyway.
The Scale-to-Fit Trap
A file that's exactly the right size can still print wrong. Every consumer printer has an edge it can't print to, so print dialogs default to shrinking the page a few percent to fit inside that edge. Acrobat calls the setting "Fit" or "Shrink oversized pages"; Preview and Windows have their own names for it. On a passport photo a few percent is about a millimetre, which is enough to push the head height out of range.
The fix is boring and it works:
- In the print dialog, choose 100%, Actual Size, or "None" for scaling. Turn off anything with "fit" or "shrink" in its name.
- Pick the same paper size in the dialog as in the PDF. A 4×6 sheet printed to Letter isn't wrong, but it wastes paper and makes it easy to grab the wrong tray.
- Print the first sheet on plain paper. It costs nothing and catches a wrong setting before you spend a sheet of photo paper.
- Measure one photo with a ruler before you cut the rest. If it reads 35 mm wide, the whole sheet is right.
Photo Tiling Prepress also keeps a print-safe margin around the sheet (4 mm by default, up to 15), so nothing sits in the zone the printer can't reach and the dialog has no excuse to shrink the page.
How to Print Passport Photos at Home
- Crop your photo first so the head is the right height for your document (see the table). The tool center-crops each photo to the cell's shape, so the framing you give it is the framing you get.
- Open Photo Tiling Prepress and drop in the JPG or PNG. You can add several people's photos at once.
- Under Photo size, pick 35 × 45 mm for the UK, Schengen and India, or 51 × 51 mm (2″ sq) for the US. For Canada-style 50 × 70 mm, choose Custom.
- Pick your paper and set Copies per photo. On 4×6 paper, 35 × 45 mm fits 6 to a sheet and 2 × 2 in fits 2. On A4 or Letter you get up to 30 at 35 × 45 mm.
- Leave dashed cut marks on, create the sheet, download the PDF, and print it at Actual Size on photo paper.
One thing about the labels: "25 × 35 mm (1″)" and "35 × 49 mm (2″)" in that menu use the East Asian convention where a "1-inch" or "2-inch" photo is a named format, not a measurement. For a US 2 × 2 inch photo, use 51 × 51 mm. The State Department's own FAQ writes the size as "2 x 2 inches (51 x 51 mm)".
I ran a plain test portrait through it with the defaults. The PDF was a 4 × 6 inch page (288 × 432 points) with four 35 × 45 mm photos, each a cropped copy of the original at roughly 650 pixels per inch, which is far more than a photo printer can resolve.
The whole thing runs in your browser tab. Your face doesn't get uploaded to a print site or anywhere else.
What the Tool Can't Check
Exact size is necessary. It isn't sufficient. The tool places pixels; it doesn't know whether they're a compliant passport photo. Every agency in the table also sets rules on:
- Age of the photo. Six months for the US and Canada; the UK asks for a photo taken in the last month.
- Background and lighting. Plain and light, no shadows. India wants white specifically.
- Expression and pose. Neutral, mouth closed, eyes open, facing the camera squarely.
- Editing. No filters, no retouching, no AI background swaps. Canada lists cropping and pasting you onto a white background as an alteration it will reject.
Get those wrong and a perfectly sized photo still gets your application held. If you also need a copy of the ID itself, front and back on one page, our guide to printing an ID card front and back uses ID Composer for that. And the graph paper guide has more on why print dialogs shrink pages.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I print my own passport photos at home?
For a US passport, yes, as long as the photo meets every State Department rule. Canada doesn't accept home-printed passport photos, and the UK prefers a digital photo for online applications. Check your country's official page first.
What paper should I use for passport photos?
Matte or glossy photo paper, not plain office paper. 4×6 inch photo paper is the cheapest per sheet and fits six 35 × 45 mm photos or two 2 × 2 inch photos.
How many passport photos fit on a 4×6 sheet?
Six at 35 × 45 mm and two at 2 × 2 inches, with a small safety margin. A Letter or A4 sheet fits up to 30 at 35 × 45 mm.
Why did my passport photo print too small?
The print dialog scaled the page to fit the printable area. Reprint at 100% or Actual Size, with "Fit" and "Shrink oversized pages" turned off, then measure with a ruler.
Is 35 × 45 mm the same as 2 × 2 inches?
No. 35 × 45 mm is about 1.38 × 1.77 inches, a portrait rectangle used by the UK, the Schengen countries and India. 2 × 2 inches (51 × 51 mm) is the square US format.
Can I get my passport photo sheet printed at a photo counter?
Usually, yes, since most photo counters print a standard 4×6 from your own file. Make the sheet first, at true size with cut marks, and ask for it printed unscaled. You pay for one 4×6 print instead of a passport photo package.
Have a good photo already? Make an exact-size passport photo sheet and print it at Actual Size.
