Top 10 Free Twitter Banner Resizers

Banners are incredibly important for any kind of social media and Twitter is no exception. Your banner could easily become a multifunctional advertising tool if the message and the position are right. However, there are several nuances when it comes to the correct dimensions of your banner due to Twitter’s complex nature.

That’s not to say that Twitter only has the ability to work with banners, there are also profile pictures and advertisements, although both of those are far less complex in the first place.

While there are specific standards in place when it comes to either of the above image types, it’s not uncommon for people to have no tools for resizing or cropping their future banner or profile picture to the right size. We’re here to solve that problem in several different ways, the first one being Photoshop. However, first, we have to go over the specifications of Twitter image types a bit more thoroughly.

Twitter banners and other picture types

Twitter banners (or Twitter headers) are pictures that you see above the profile picture on everyone’s personal page. It could be used for multiple different purposes, from advertisement to a newsletter, and there’s a relatively strict standard for this image. It’s supposed to be 1500 pixels wide and 500 pixels tall, making the overall aspect ratio 3:1.

At the same time, it’s also recommended to keep a specific part of the image relatively free of any important information – that is, the lower left part of the image, about 400 x 200 pixels. That is due to the way Twitter handles the position of your profile picture over the banner when opened from different devices or different resolutions. 

That being said, the rest of the image specifications are relatively common with other social networks – JPG, PNG, or GIF format (static GIF only), and the file size lower than 5 Mb.

Profile pictures are much easier to figure out in that regard. The overall resolution is 400 x 400 pixels (aspect ratio 1:1), and the maximum file size below 2 Mb.

Advertisements, on the other hand, can be of two different types – square and rectangular. With that in mind, the required resolutions are 800 x 800 and 800 x 418, respectively (1:1 and 1.9:1).

Here’s an example of a Twitter header and a Twitter profile image at the same time:

Twitter header and twitter profile image

With several different strict dimensions, it’s inevitable that some people would have to resize their images that they intend to use for banners, profile pictures or ads. First of all, we’ll go over the most common way of working with images – via Photoshop.

Banner resizing in Photoshop

Photoshop is considered to be one of the common tools for modifying images in the first place, and that includes resizing, too. To start off, we’ll need a “document” to work with.

Creating a new document also implies that you’ll have the ability to specify your intended definitions of the image in question. However, there’s also an alternative in the form of myriad different templates for resizing images, including Twitter-specific templates, as well.

As a reminder, the correct dimensions for your future Twitter-related image are the following:

• 1500 x 500 for banner/header;

• 400 x 400 for profile picture;

• 800 x 800 or 800 x 418 for advertisements.

The boundaries of your document would be crucial for the resizing process to go through correctly.

Before starting the resizing, you’ll need to drag the image into the Photoshop window over your new/existing document. Using Shift+Alt while resizing the image is highly recommended to make sure that your future banner is staying in the middle of the document and keeps its proportions intact, too.

The specific key combination in question is for Windows users only, and there’s also an alternative for Mac users – Shift+Option.

Double-check that you’ve saved the image after the resizing is done (via either the checkmark on Photoshop's toolbar or using the Enter key). It is worth mentioning that any image dragged into Photoshop stays in the Transform mode which is why resizing is so relatively easy. After finishing up, keep in mind that you can always go back to the Transform mode via Windows+T key combination (Windows only, Command+T is an alternative for Mac).

It’s also important to save the entire image in the correct way after all of your changes are performed. The recommended option is “Save for Web”, which can usually be found in the Export tab within the File menu. The “Save for Web” option allows for several additional customization options before saving the image in question. For this specific purpose it’s recommended to use JPEG High preset and Quality: 60 parameter to achieve the best results.

After that, you’re free to upload your freshly resized image on Twitter or wherever else. This concludes the entire resizing process via Photoshop. However, there are other means of performing similar feats, and most of the time they are much easier.

Alternatives for Twitter banner resize 

The Internet on its own offers plenty of different online tools that can perform different operations with images from simple cropping to full-blown photo editor capabilities. This means that most of those tools can also do the resizing job. Here’s our top-10 of Twitter banner resizing tools:

ResizeMyImage

ResizeMyImage landing page

As a simple image editor, there aren't a lot of things that ResizeMyImage can offer. At the same time, there’s still a set number of basic image editing features, including resizing, cropping, converting and compressing, and so on. While there are several templates for specific purposes, like social media sites, there is also an option to manually input the desired image height and width, if needed. Various image-wide effects and the ability to work with an eraser make it slightly more sophisticated than most of the online image editing tools out there.

Canva

Canva landing page

As an extensive designing tool, Canva offers a lot of options when it comes to design in general. That’s not to say that it only works with images specifically, since Canva also works with general merchandise designs, like mugs, flyers, t-shirts, business cards, and more. Many templates for different social media and the general extensive library of beautiful images allows Canva users to create impressive designs with little to no experience in the first place. The list of features also includes more basic ones, like resizing, converting, cropping, and a lot more than that.

Image Resizer & Editor

Image resizer & editor landing page

Another example of a sophisticated online tool is Image Resizer & Editor. First of all, there’s an actual comprehensive image editor built-in, and you can always choose from a number of templates for different purposes to make your banner suit Twitter or YouTube, or a number of other popular social media sites. The tool itself is incredibly intuitive and works like a charm for all of your images, as any Twitter banner resizer should be.

Landscape by SproutSocial

Landscape landing page

A slightly different category of free tools is represented by the ones that serve as a partial advertisement to their more complex, paid counterparts. One good example of that is Landscape, which is a rather simplistic resizing tool for several different social media websites. The tool itself offers a basic set of features, such as social media templates, image mirroring and resizing and a number of other features. What’s interesting is that, while Landscape itself is free, its owner SproutSocial is a paid social media business solution with extensive scaling capabilities.

Image Resize Online

Image resize online landing page

Getting back to more simplistic solutions, Image Resize Online is a good example of a bare-bones image resizer for specific purposes. There are a lot of different templates available, mainly for the many different social media sites. Although there are a number of additional, less popular templates as well, such as photo resizing for PSC, UPSC, SSC, IBPS, and so on.

Reduce Images

Reduce images landing page

Another simplistic tool for your image resizing purposes is Reduce Images, offering the bare minimum of the regular image resizing capabilities. Both resizing by percentage and by pixels are available, as well as the ability to keep or let go of the initial aspect ratio. At the same time, the file’s format could be changed, as well as the end image quality and the background color.

Lunapic

Lunapic landing page

As a slightly more complicated solution, Lunapic’s distinguishing trait is the tool design that makes it look like a classic Windows application inside of your browser (with different drop-down menus, like Edit, Adjust, Filters, Effects, etc.). At the same time, there’s a sizable list of features that Lunapic is capable of offering, from your regular resizing, cropping and compressing to many different effects, borders and even partial animation, making it an interesting choice as your Twitter banner resizer.

Adobe Photoshop Express

Adobe Photoshop express landing page

Another example of a free online tool existing alongside a more expensive standalone one exists in the form of Adobe Photoshop Express. While the original Photoshop is known for its incredible range of features, its online counterpart is more than enough for the most basic of image editing, such as resizing, cropping, adding different effects and such. The addition of a reference table for different image sizes and aspect ratios, the ability to remove backgrounds from images, and the overall backing of Photoshop, in general, is what makes it a good choice for your basic image resizing needs.

BeFunky

BeFunky landing page

Speaking of a comprehensive online image editor, BeFunky is a good example of that. It is a relatively versatile image editing tool that offers a plethora of different features, other than the basic ones like resizing, cropping, and such. Many various effects, visuals, and ways of modifying the picture are available to BeFunky users for free, although a part of those capabilities is only for the paid version of the app.

Design tool for all things ads from Viewst

Viewst landing page

As a comprehensive ads builder, Viewst’s online app offers many different features in the field of image editing, including resizing, cropping, adding text, or even animating. The addition of a free template library and the overall experience of a user-friendly interface allows Viewst to be a versatile tool for many different purposes, including resizing Twitter images and ads.

Conclusion

The Internet has no shortage of different image editing tools, each with its own features. As it stands, a lot of those tools have the ability to resize images, one way or another. It’s not hard to find a specific service that fits your Twitter banner resizer needs the most, since the overall market for such apps and services is quite significant, to say the least.