You write a post, attach a photo, publish it, and the image comes out wrong. The top of the sign is gone, or the person you photographed is cut off at the shoulders, or the whole thing looks soft on a phone. So you search for the correct dimensions and find a dozen articles confidently stating different numbers, none of which agree and none of which cite anything.

What is documented is that a well-populated profile performs better. Search Engine Land reported in August 2026 on a Whitespark study of 1.8 million Google Business Profiles across 4,209 categories, which found that moving from the bottom to the top of a five-point profile completeness index improved average rank by around 19 positions and tripled the rate of appearing in the top ten. Photos are one of five factors in that index rather than the whole of it, and another of the five is simply whether the profile has been claimed, so the gap largely compares neglected profiles with fully built ones. It is a correlation rather than a photo-specific effect. What it establishes is that imagery belongs to the set of things a complete profile has.

There is a reason the dimension advice disagrees with itself, though, and it is worth stating before any numbers. Google does not publish image specifications specific to posts. Its documentation for creating and managing posts gives no pixel dimensions, no aspect ratio, and no file size. What Google publishes is one set of requirements covering Business Profile imagery generally, and it does not differentiate by placement.

What Google documents

The published requirements for Business Profile photos are narrow and specific. The accepted formats are JPG and PNG. File size must be between 10 KB and 5 MB. The recommended resolution is 720 pixels tall by 720 pixels wide, and the minimum is 250 by 250.

Video, where a post uses it instead, is documented as up to 30 seconds, up to 75 MB, and 720p or higher.

Google also notes that uploaded photos can take up to 24 to 48 hours to appear, which explains a proportion of the "my image did not post" reports that are really just impatience.

Those numbers are the whole of the documented specification, and they sit on Google's Business Profile photo guidance rather than on its posts documentation, which adds nothing post-specific. The honest position is that Google publishes no post-specific dimensions and that its general photo guidance is the closest official reference available. Anybody publishing a precise post-specific spec is extrapolating from it.

The content rules, and what they do not say

Google's published quality rule is that a photo should be in focus, well lit, and free of significant alterations or excessive use of filters or AI. Its phrasing is that the image should represent reality.

What Google does not publish is an explicit ban on text overlays, borders, collages, watermarks, or promotional graphics in post images. A great deal of practitioner advice states these as hard rules. They are inferences from "represent reality" rather than documented prohibitions.

The distinction matters practically. Google publishes no post-specific rule against a small logo in the corner of a crew photo, though the image still has to satisfy its broader quality and content policies. A heavily designed graphic that is mostly text sits awkwardly against the reality guidance, and it is harder to read at the size these images are often seen, in a surface where people expect photographs.

The safer approach is to treat post images as photographs of the business rather than as designed assets. That is also what distinguishes them from the imagery questions covered in why Google rejects profile photos and adding photos to a Business Profile, which deal with the profile's photo library rather than with posts.

Cropping, and the sizes that survive it

Cropping is the part causing most of the frustration, and Google documents none of it. Post images are displayed at different sizes in different places, including a small preview on the profile and a larger view when the post is opened, and the crop is not the same in each.

The convention practitioners have settled on is a 4:3 image around 1200 by 900 pixels, with the important content kept toward the center. That is a convention rather than a specification, and it is worth saying so plainly rather than presenting it as a rule Google published.

The principle underneath it is sound whatever the exact numbers. Leave margin around anything that must survive, keep the subject centered vertically and horizontally, and assume the edges may be lost. A photo composed with the storefront sign hard against the top edge will lose the sign somewhere.

Test before committing to a template. Publish one post, then look at it on a phone and on a desktop, in the profile preview and opened. Five minutes of checking beats any number copied from an article, including this one. The wider question of whether posts influence rankings at all is covered in do Google Business Profile posts help rankings.

How post images differ from profile photos

There is only one published set of file rules, and it sits on the photo guidance rather than on anything post-specific. The differences are in how the images behave once they are up, and those are not documented either.

Profile photos join a library that persists. They accumulate, customers can add their own alongside them, and Google selects which ones to feature. A post image belongs to one post, appears wherever that post appears, and fades in prominence as the post ages.

Post images are also seen at smaller sizes more often. A post surfaces as a compact card on the profile before anybody opens it, which is where edge cropping does its damage, whereas a profile photo is more often viewed at a size closer to what was uploaded.

Practically, that argues for simpler compositions in posts than you might use in the photo library. One clear subject, centered, readable at the size of a thumbnail. Detailed wide shots that reward close inspection belong in the library, where the questions of rejection and how photos are added apply instead. That division is part of how Optuno sets up profiles for small businesses.

Practical settings to work from

Export at 1200 by 900 pixels for a safe default, or 1200 by 1200 if the image will also be reused elsewhere in a square format. Both sit comfortably above Google's 720 pixel recommendation and well above the 250 pixel minimum.

Save as JPG at a quality setting that lands the file between roughly 200 KB and 1 MB. That is inside the documented 10 KB to 5 MB window with room to spare, and it avoids both the blurriness of over-compression and the slow loading of an unnecessarily large file.

Keep the subject in the middle 80 percent of the frame, and avoid placing text or logos near any edge.

Use a real photograph taken at the business. It satisfies the reality requirement, it looks like what people expect to see, and it is the one thing competitors copying a template cannot replicate. Posts are one part of a profile that performs better when it is complete, which is the point of profile optimization, and Optuno's free local SEO report gives a snapshot of rankings, listings, and reviews to show where the gaps are. If keeping the profile current is more than the week allows, Optuno's plans include profile management alongside the site and the local SEO, with no long-term contracts, no setup fees, and a dedicated contact.

Frequently asked questions

What is the correct image size for a Google Business Profile post?
Google does not publish a post-specific size. Its documented Business Profile photo guidance recommends at least 720 by 720 pixels, with a 250 by 250 minimum. A 1200 by 900 image is a widely used safe default that sits comfortably above both.

What file formats and sizes does Google accept?
JPG and PNG, with files between 10 KB and 5 MB. Aiming for roughly 200 KB to 1 MB keeps quality high without making the image unnecessarily heavy.

Why is my post image getting cropped?
Post images display at different sizes in the profile preview and in the opened post, and Google documents neither crop. Keeping the subject centered with margin around the edges is the reliable way to survive it.

Can I put text or a logo on a post image?
Google publishes no explicit ban, though its quality rule asks that images be free of significant alterations and represent reality. A small logo is low risk; a graphic that is mostly text departs from that guidance and is harder to read at the sizes these images appear at.

How long does a post image take to appear?
Google notes that photos can take up to 24 to 48 hours to appear. Waiting a day before concluding that something failed avoids a lot of unnecessary troubleshooting.

Are post images the same as profile photos?
Google publishes general Business Profile image specifications but no separate post-specific dimension or file-size specification, so that general guidance is the closest official reference for both. They differ in how they are displayed and how long they stay prominent, but there is no separate published rule for posts.