Baby Passport Photo

There is no special size for babies. A newborn's passport photo has the same print dimensions, background and file limits as the parent's, and each authority's own page sets them. The table lists four common ones; pick the matching document in the tool and the crop, pixel size and head guide follow.

The head-height rule still applies, which is the hardest part with an infant. Babies have small faces and move constantly, so take several shots and choose the one where the head is straight and centered.

A 2 × 2 inch US photo and a 50 × 70 mm Canadian photo are very different shapes, so choose the document before you crop. The digital sizes and file limits in the table matter only for online applications; for a paper form, the print size is what counts.

Authorities know a newborn will not sit still, look at the lens or keep a neutral face, so they bend some rules. The US State Department accepts a baby whose eyes are not completely open. GOV.UK goes further: children under one need not have their eyes open, and children under six need not look straight at the camera or keep a plain expression. Canada's passport office allows newborns a range of facial expressions.

Other rules stay firm. The baby must be alone in the picture: no parent's hands, arms or shoulders, no toys and, in the UK, no dummy. The face has to be fully visible and evenly lit, and the photo must be recent, which for a baby who changes week to week matters more than for anyone else.

None of these exceptions covers editing. A photo where a sleeping baby's eyes were opened digitally, a parent's arm was erased or the skin was smoothed is still a manipulated photo, and the authorities that publish these rules reject it. Take another shot instead of fixing a flawed one.

The simplest method is to lay your baby on their back on a plain white sheet spread over a bed or the floor, then take the photo from directly above. The sheet becomes the background, nobody's hands are in the frame, and the baby's head stays level. Stand so that your own shadow does not fall across the face; daylight from a window to the side, softened by a curtain, works better than a ceiling lamp or the phone's flash.

For a baby who settles better sitting up, both the State Department and Canada describe the car-seat method: cover the seat with a plain white sheet or blanket so that it fills the area behind the head, and photograph from the front. Take a burst of shots and pick the one where the face is turned straight towards the camera.

This page keeps the background exactly as you photographed it. Some authorities, including Canada, reject photos whose background has been edited, and a sheet already gives you the plain backdrop they ask for.

Once the crop looks right, download the photo for an online application, or turn on a print sheet under Advanced settings to get several copies on one 4 × 6 in print. Photo kiosks in drugstores and supermarkets print that size, and you then cut out the copies along the guide lines. Canada requires printed photos to be made by a professional printer on photo paper, so print at a store rather than at home there.

For the full adult rules, see US passport photo requirements and the Canadian photo requirements. The Passport Photo Maker lists every document size the tool supports, from visas to exam forms.

If the photo is for a passport and the baby also needs a visa, check the visa rules separately: some consulates use a different size from the passport office of the same country. If you only need to cut a photo to a free shape rather than an official size, Crop Image is the simpler tool.