WhatsApp catalog image size: the specs that actually matter

Most catalog photos fail for a boring reason: the wrong shape. WhatsApp displays products in a square frame, so a tall lifestyle photo gets cropped exactly where it matters. Here are the specs worth designing to, plus two rules WhatsApp documents properly and almost every other guide skips.

The specs in one table

Note what is not in that table: an official maximum file size or pixel dimension. WhatsApp's About catalog and create and maintain a catalog pages specify required fields and review, not dimensions. If a photo refuses to upload, check the current in-app limit rather than assuming your file is corrupt.

Why square wins

A square crop is neutral: it works for a bottle, a dress on a hanger and a plate of food. Once you standardise on square, your catalog grid looks deliberate instead of accidental, and you stop re-shooting because a product was cut off at the edges.

It also protects the thing that sells: the product's silhouette. A 4:5 portrait photo cropped to 1:1 loses the top and bottom, which is precisely where a dress, a pair of shoes or a stacked pack usually sits.

Use ten images on one item, not ten items

This is the single most useful thing the WhatsApp documentation tells you. Each catalog entry accepts up to 10 images plus a video. Most sellers instead do one of two wasteful things: upload a single photo and hope, or split one product into several items to show more.

• Image 1: the product alone, centred, on your standard background. This is the grid thumbnail, so it must read at small size.
• Images 2 to 4: angles and back. Bag straps, shoe sole, the back of a frame.
• Images 5 to 7: detail. Stitching, clasp, label, texture.
• Image 8: scale. Next to a hand, a coin or a standard object.
• Image 9: in use. Worn, plated, installed.
• Image 10: the variant you keep getting asked about, so the question stops.

If you sell clothing in six sizes, that is one item with ten images and the sizes in the description, not six items. The trade-off is a clarifying message per order, and it is nearly always worth it. For the fuller argument, see the WhatsApp catalog limit guide.

The review step that can empty your catalog

WhatsApp checks every image you upload against its Business Messaging Policy, and a catalog item is only visible to customers once it has been approved. Until then it is pending; if rejected, a red exclamation mark appears next to the image. That produces the most confusing failure in the whole feature: your catalog looks complete to you and partly or wholly blank to your buyers.

The causes are almost always in the image rather than the product. Text overlays, price stamps, watermarks, competitor names, and claims about what something does all attract rejection.

1. 1Open the catalog manager and count items that are actually live, not saved.
2. 2Remove baked-in text and price overlays from the photo and put that information in the price and description fields, where it belongs.
3. 3Edit the image rather than re-uploading the same file, then request another review.
4. 4If a refusal is wrong after you have re-read the policy, WhatsApp documents an appeal and a further review request.

If that is the problem you are actually solving, WhatsApp catalog not working: six fixes covers the rest.

A phone workflow that stays consistent

1. 1Shoot near a window in daylight, with light from the side rather than behind the product.
2. 2Leave space around the item. You can crop in; you cannot add back what the frame cut off.
3. 3Set the camera to its highest resolution and avoid digital zoom entirely.
4. 4Crop to 1:1 and straighten the horizon in the phone editor.
5. 5Export at 1080 x 1080 and compress under 1 MB.
6. 6Repeat with the same background and distance for every item, so the grid reads as one shop.

The full lighting and setup version is in product photos with a phone.

Formats, and the HEIC problem

HEIC is the quiet one. An iPhone shoots HEIC by default, and half the time a seller is fighting an upload error they are trying to send a perfectly good photo. MyShp handles this in the browser: HEIC is decoded to JPEG, and photos are re-encoded to WebP so the live catalog loads quickly on customer phones. Images are capped at 5 MB and video at 100 MB per upload.

The mistakes that make a catalog look amateur

• Text baked into the photo. Prices and 'DM to order' overlays look crowded in a grid, age badly, and are a common reason an image fails review.
• Collages. Four products in one image makes every product smaller and harder to browse.
• Mixed backgrounds. White for one item and a wooden table for the next reads as a folder dump.
• Screenshots of screenshots. Re-saving repeatedly destroys detail; always start from the original file.
• Direct flash. It flattens texture, blows out labels and creates hard shadows.
• One photo per item. You have ten slots. Use them.

What changes on a hosted catalog

The same specs apply in both places, because both display square. The difference is that a hosted catalog has no approval wait and no per-image rejection risk, which is the fix if you are editing prices and photos weekly rather than publishing once.

Try it on one product first

Do not reshoot your whole catalog. Pick your bestseller, make one square image at 1080 x 1080 under 1 MB, add it as a single entry with the sizes in the description, then look at the grid. That one test tells you whether your problem was ever really the image size. Create your catalog and upload one photo per product before you commit an afternoon to shooting.