Resize product images for Shopify

No. The official wording is: For square product images, a size of 2048 x 2048 px usually displays best. That is a display recommendation for square images, with a hedge, and the same page's size rule is any size up to 5000 x 5000 px, or 25 megapixels. The square preset, which is the default here, outputs 2048 × 2048 because it is the only concrete size Shopify recommends; the fit-inside preset scales a photo down until neither side is over 2048 px and keeps the photo's own proportions.

Both sentences are on official Shopify help pages and they do not agree: 5000 × 5000 px is 25 megapixels, above the 20 megapixel figure the theme images page gives. We do not know which one the upload path enforces at any given moment, so this page outputs 2048 × 2048 px or smaller, which is under both. The two sentences and their sources are shown in the disagreement section above.

The product media page says product and collection images need to have a file size smaller than 20 MB to be added to Shopify; the theme images page gives 20 megabytes as a general upload limit. Reading MB as 1,000,000 bytes, the stricter of the two readings, that is 20,000,000 bytes, and because the official wording is smaller than rather than up to, the cap this page enforces is one byte below it, 19,999,999 bytes — so a file of exactly 20,000,000 bytes is flagged, not passed. Both figures are our arithmetic, not Shopify figures. The cap cannot bind here: every output is 2048 × 2048 px or smaller, and an image that size cannot reach 20 MB in any of the three formats. It is still checked on every output rather than assumed. One limit here is ours, not Shopify's: this site's own uploader takes up to 20 images at a time and 5 MB per file, so a source photo over 5 MB has to be made smaller before this page will take it, even though Shopify's own wording is a file size smaller than 20 MB. That 5 MB intake cap is site-wide, so no page here can take the file either — it has to be made smaller before it reaches this site.

This page produces JPEG (default), PNG or WebP. The product media page lists PNG, JPEG, PSD, TIFF, BMP, GIF, SVG, HEIC and WebP (including animated GIF and animated WebP) as uploadable; the theme images page's list is shorter — JPEG, Progressive JPEG, PNG, GIF, HEIC and WebP. PSD, TIFF, BMP and SVG appear only on the product media page, so the two pages differ on formats as well as on the maximum pixel count. We hold these as recorded lists rather than verbatim quotes, so they are shown here without quotation marks and are not rows in the spec table above, where every row carries the official page's own wording. AVIF is on neither upload list. Both pages are linked under Sources — they are authoritative on what may be uploaded.

We hold no captured wording from either official page listing AVIF as a format you can upload, and this page does not produce AVIF. The theme images page says that when a customer's web browser supports modern image formats such as WebP and AVIF, your images are delivered in those formats: Shopify does the conversion at delivery time. This page outputs JPEG, PNG or WebP; the official pages linked under Sources are authoritative on what may be uploaded.

We found no background colour, no fill ratio and no rule about watermarks, text or logos on either official page. Those rules come from marketplaces such as Amazon and Walmart, not from Shopify. The white padding in the square preset is this page's default for the empty canvas area, not a Shopify value. If the same photos also go to a marketplace, use that marketplace's page on this site.

Shopify names 2048 × 2048 for square images only and publishes no figure for other shapes; the product media page states any size up to 5000 × 5000 px, a figure the theme images page's 20 megapixel cap contradicts. Shopify does advise a consistent aspect ratio across featured images — a recorded note from its product media page rather than a verbatim capture, which is why it is not a quoted row in the spec table — and padding is how photos of different shapes end up with one, so the square preset is the default here and pads each photo to 1:1. The fit-inside preset instead keeps each photo's own proportions and scales it down until neither side is over 2048 px; if these are featured images, prefer the square preset. Every value this page states is in the spec table above with the official page it came from, except where we say in so many words that we hold a recorded note rather than the page's wording; where we hold nothing at all, we leave it out rather than attribute it.

The product media page's size rule is written as any size up to 5000 x 5000 px, or 25 megapixels — an upper bound with no lower bound, and we hold no captured wording setting a minimum on either page; treat that as an absence of evidence rather than a verified 'no minimum'. A small source photo is not refused here, and neither preset makes it bigger: the square preset centres it on the 2048 × 2048 canvas at its own pixel size and the fit-inside preset keeps its pixel size, and each result row reports the pixel size produced, so a photo below the recommended size is visible as such.

No. This page processes still images only and reports an animated file as unsupported rather than flattening it to one frame.

Not necessarily. The theme images page says that when a customer's web browser supports modern image formats such as WebP and AVIF, your images are delivered in those formats, so the format a shopper receives can differ from the one you uploaded. What you upload is the master copy; this page prepares that master within the published limits.

No. Shopify's pages set a file size limit, a maximum size and a square-size display recommendation, and say nothing about background, fill ratio or image content; marketplaces set their own pixel, ratio, background and file size rules, several of which conflict with each other. The ecommerce-image-spec-conflicts page lists the official wording side by side, and multi-platform-image-export produces one set per platform from the same source photos.