Quick answer: The LinkedIn banner is the horizontal image behind your profile photo, and it is one of the few free pieces of personal brand real estate on the platform. The correct size for a personal profile is 1584×396 pixels, a 4:1 ratio, uploaded as JPG or PNG. The design rules are governed by the overlap and the crop, not by the full rectangle.

The exact specs

  • Personal profile banner: 1584×396 px (4:1)
  • Minimum accepted: 1192×220 px, which upscales and looks soft — use the full size
  • File types: JPG or PNG
  • Maximum file size: 8 MB

The profile photo overlap

On desktop, your circular profile photo sits at the bottom-left of the banner, covering part of it. On mobile, the banner is cropped to a narrower center band and the photo is positioned differently. The consequence is simple:

  • Treat the bottom-left corner as covered.
  • Treat the extreme left and right edges as likely to crop.
  • Keep every meaningful element in the central horizontal band.

A safe working zone is the central 60–65% of the width, vertically centered. Anything important outside that band is a gamble.

What a good banner says

The banner has two jobs: show what you do and show what you offer. The four patterns that work:

  1. The one-liner. A single sentence stating what you build or who you help, plus a handle.
  2. The offer. A free resource, a newsletter, or a product, with a short pointer.
  3. The proof. A customer logo strip or a metric ("40,000 downloads"), kept small and factual.
  4. The category. A restrained visual plus the category name for people who should know it.

The text hierarchy

At 4:1, the canvas is a letterbox, not a billboard. Keep:

  • One line, occasionally two.
  • The largest text between 56 and 80 px at 1584 wide.
  • A word of emphasis in a brand color.
  • No paragraphs; the About section is the place for them.

The composition

A workable layout from left to right:

  • Left third: nothing critical (the photo lives here).
  • Center: the headline, with the most important word in the accent color.
  • Right third: the logo, the product mark, or a subtle screenshot.

For an offer banner, the URL goes next to the headline. Use a short, memorable address rather than a long tracking link.

The design process

  1. Create a 1584×396 canvas.
  2. Mark the bottom-left quarter as covered.
  3. Mark the far left and right edges as croppable.
  4. Write the one-line statement in the center band.
  5. Add one brand element, not three.
  6. Export at full size and test in a desktop and mobile view before setting it.

Common ways it goes wrong

  • The stock wallpaper. A mountain range or a generic city skyline says nothing. LinkedIn has millions of them.
  • The collage. Six logos, three icons, a QR code, and a tagline. At mobile size it becomes noise.
  • The hidden text. The headline sits behind the profile photo or crops away on phones.
  • The off-brand colors. The banner is the first brand impression; it should match the rest of the brand kit.
  • The stale claim. A "Coming soon" banner six months after launch, or a company name that changed.

How it relates to the other LinkedIn assets

The banner is not the same as the post image or the document carousel:

  • Shared images in the feed are 1200×627.
  • Document pages are 1080×1350 or a letter-sized PDF.
  • The banner is 1584×396.

Keep the same colors and fonts across them, but design each one separately; the LinkedIn image size guide and the carousel guide cover the others.

Generating it with an AI design tool

An AI tool can produce the banner from a one-line statement plus the brand colors and logo, but only if the prompt includes the ratio and the safe zone; otherwise it lays out a generic 16:9 image that gets cropped. A tool such as Neatico takes the 1584×396 ratio and the safe-zone rule in the brief and keeps the logo clear of the profile-photo overlap. The same AI marketing workflow applies: source paragraph, brand inputs, one generation, one review.

Frequently asked questions

What size is the LinkedIn company page banner? Company page covers have different, less stable dimensions than the personal profile banner; LinkedIn has revised them over time and sources differ. Check the uploader's live preview and test on both desktop and mobile before publishing.

Can I use the same banner for X and LinkedIn? No — X headers are 1500×500 with a different photo overlap, and LinkedIn is 1584×396. Reuse the statement and colors, not the pixels.

Should the banner include a QR code? Only if the linked page is the single most important destination and the code is large enough to scan from a phone preview of the profile. Most of the time the URL is cleaner.

How often should I change it? For a launch, an event, or a major milestone — a few times a year. The banner should reflect the current offer, not a permanent logo wall.

Design the center, assume the edges disappear, and say one thing. The 4:1 banner is a headline, not a homepage.