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Instagram Stories fill the entire phone screen, which makes them the least forgiving format on the platform: there is exactly one size that looks right, and anything else gets shrunk onto a blurred background with your text reduced to squint size.
Here is every dimension, ratio, and limit that matters for Stories, and how to hit them without a design tool.
Instagram Story size in pixels
The correct Instagram Story size is 1080 x 1920 pixels with a 9:16 aspect ratio. That matches a vertical phone screen edge to edge.
Instagram stores Stories at 1080 pixels wide. Upload something wider and it gets compressed down; upload something narrower and it gets stretched or padded. Both cost you sharpness, so export at exactly 1080 x 1920 rather than "big enough". You can crop any photo to this size in your browser with the free Instagram photo resizer, which has a Story preset built in.
Instagram Story safe zones
A 9:16 canvas isn't all usable. Instagram overlays its own interface on both ends of your Story:
- The top roughly 250 pixels hold your profile name and the Story progress bar
- The bottom roughly 310 pixels hold the reply box and share buttons
Keep text, stickers, and anything tappable inside the middle of the frame. If you're designing Stories in an external tool, run the export through the free safe zone checker to see the overlays drawn on your actual image before you post it.
Instagram Story length
- Photos display for about 5 seconds
- Videos can run up to 60 seconds as a single Story
- Longer videos are split automatically into 60-second segments
Each segment appears as its own tappable dot in the progress bar, so a 3-minute upload becomes three Stories. That's fine for vlogs, but if the video has one key moment, cut it to a single segment so nobody taps past it.
Instagram Story file specs
- Image formats: JPG or PNG
- Video formats: MP4 or MOV
- Video frame rate: 30 FPS
- Maximum video file size: 4 GB
Instagram Highlight cover size
Highlight covers use the same 1080 x 1920 pixel canvas as a normal Story, but they display as a small circle on your profile. Only the center of the image survives the circular crop, so put your icon or artwork in the middle of the frame and treat everything outside a centered square as disposable.
Do Story ads use the same size?
Yes. Story ads are full-screen 9:16 at 1080 x 1920 pixels, with the same overlay zones at the top and bottom, plus a call-to-action bar. If you design organic Stories inside the safe zones, the same layouts work as ads without rework.
Get the size right, then schedule it
Stories are one format in a bigger system: feed posts, Reels, and carousels each have their own dimensions, all covered in our guide to Instagram post sizes. Once your Story is cropped to 1080 x 1920, you can schedule Instagram Stories with Pallyy so they go out while your audience is online, not whenever you happen to remember.
