UPSC photo and signature resizer — 350 × 350 px, 20 to 300 KB

How to use UPSC Photo & Signature Resizer

1. In What are you uploading?, choose Photo or Signature. Both show the same target: 350 × 350 px, 20–300 KB, JPEG.
2. Choose your image.
3. For the photo, use Crop to fill with Top (keeps the head). For the signature, choose Fit with white margins so the long signature fits inside the square without being cut.
4. Tick If the file is below the minimum KB, pad it if you expect a small file, which is common for signatures.
5. Press Resize for upload and read the Check against the rules table.
6. Download the file and repeat for the other item.

The official rules (checked 2026-10-02)

From the UPSC One Time Registration FAQ, questions 42 and 44 (upsconline.gov.in):

UPSC can update its FAQ and notices for each examination. Read both before you upload.

What it does and when to use it

UPSC’s One Time Registration FAQ describes the photo and signature uploads. Both images share the same rules, and the shape is a square, which is unusual: most forms want a portrait photo and a wide signature.

That square shape is where people go wrong. A portrait photo must be cropped to a square without cutting the top of the head, and a wide signature must fit inside a square without being sliced off at the sides. This page handles both, and makes sure the file lands inside 20–300 KB.

Use it when you are:

• creating or updating your OTR profile,
• replacing a photo that was rejected as unclear or the wrong size,
• preparing a signature image that follows the instructions of a specific UPSC notice.

How it works

Your images stay on your device; a worker in the browser does all the work.

1. Opening. The image is decoded, upright, with any transparency turned white.
2. Making it square. With Crop to fill, the tool cuts the largest square from your image. For a portrait it keeps the full width; the Top setting keeps more of the upper part, where your head is. With Fit with white margins, the whole image is shrunk to fit inside the square and white fills the rest.
3. Scaling. The square is scaled to exactly 350 × 350 px.
4. Fitting the KB range. The JPEG is saved at top quality. If that is over 300 KB, the tool searches down to as low as 30% quality for the best file under the limit. If it is under 20 KB, it pads the file (when ticked) or warns you.

Even uncompressed, a 350 × 350 px colour image is only 367,500 bytes (122,500 pixels × 3 bytes), and a JPEG is much smaller than that. So for UPSC the 20 KB minimum is usually the limit to watch, not the 300 KB maximum.

Worked examples

These crops are from the tool’s own geometry function.

A portrait phone photo, 3,024 × 4,032 px. The tool keeps the full 3,024 px width and a 3,024 px tall square. With Top, the square starts 202 px from the top, so it keeps your head and shoulders and drops the lower part of the picture. It is then scaled to 350 × 350 px, 122,500 pixels in all.

A signature photographed on a page, 4,032 × 3,024 px, with Crop to fill. The square would be the middle 3,024 px of the width, starting 504 px from the left. A long signature would lose its start and end. That is why Fit with white margins is the better choice here.

A cleaned signature of 1,500 × 500 px, with Fit with white margins. The signature is shrunk to 350 × 117 px and centred in the square, with white above and below. Because so much of the image is plain white, the JPEG may come out under 20 KB; tick padding to reach the minimum.

Preparing the photo and signature

Photo

• Use a recent photo in which your face is clear and well lit. A plain, light background makes the face stand out.
• Frame yourself with some space around your head, because the square crop will trim the top and bottom of a portrait.
• Avoid sunglasses, caps, heavy filters and dark shadows.

Signature

• Sign on plain white paper, preferably with a black ink pen, as the FAQ suggests.
• Check your exam notice for how many signatures the image should hold, and arrange them as the notice says.
• Photograph or scan in good light, then crop close to the ink with the Signature Extractor before you use this page.

Limits and tips

• The tool does not judge clarity. It sets the size and file size. Whether the face is clear and the photo recent is for you to check.
• Padding is not extra quality. It only adds bytes so the file meets the 20 KB minimum.
• Larger squares are allowed. If you want more detail, any square up to 1000 × 1000 px is within the FAQ’s range; set it with the KB-and-pixels tool.
• Rules change. Figures were checked on 2026-10-02. Always confirm them in the latest FAQ and examination notice.
• Other exams. For bank recruitment, see the IBPS Photo & Signature Resizer; for national entrance tests, the NEET Photo Resizer.