A Schengen visa application takes the same photo everywhere: 35 by 45 millimetres, head filling most of the frame, plain light background, neutral face. The specification comes from ICAO Doc 9303, the same document that standardises the photo page of every biometric passport in the world, which is why a photo made for a German passport is usually accepted in Warsaw and Madrid too. The complication is not the specification. It is that each consulate applies it, adds conditions of its own, and has the final word — so the goal is a photo that leaves nothing to argue about.
The numbers you have to hit
The frame is 35 mm wide and 45 mm high — the standard used across the European Union and most of the world outside North America. Within that frame, the head from the chin to the top of the head should measure between 32 and 36 mm. That is 70 to 80 per cent of the height of the photo, which is why several countries, Poland among them, write the rule as a percentage instead of millimetres. Both formulations describe the same picture.
Those few millimetres of tolerance are less generous than they look. Four millimetres is the difference between a head that fills the frame correctly and one that is visibly too small, and on a printed photo you cannot judge it by eye — which is precisely why this tool measures it for you and prints the number next to the requirement.
- Photo size: 35 × 45 mm
- Head height, chin to crown: 32–36 mm
- Background: plain, light, uniform — white or light grey
- Taken within the last 6 months
- In colour, sharp, correctly exposed, no filters and no retouching
The eye line is not part of the common specification. Some national guidance adds one, and some does not, so a photo cropped to the correct head height with the head sitting slightly above the centre of the frame satisfies both. When a format in this catalogue does specify an eye line, the checklist shows it as a separate row with its own measurement.
Neutral expression means neutral
Mouth closed, no smile, both eyes open and clearly visible, looking straight into the lens. This is the requirement people find hardest to take seriously, and it is one of the most common reasons for rejection. The reason is not bureaucratic taste: the photo has to work as an input to face recognition software at the border, and a smile changes the geometry of the lower face enough to matter.
Head straight, not tilted and not turned. Hair must not fall across the eyes or hide the outline of the face. If you wear your hair over your forehead every day, that is fine — what is not fine is a strand across an eyebrow or a fringe that shadows the eyes.
Glasses: the rule tightened
Most European countries now prefer photos without glasses, and several refuse them outright. The safest approach for a Schengen application is to take the photo without glasses, even if you wear them every waking hour — nobody has ever been rejected for not wearing glasses, and it removes an entire category of problems: reflections, tinting, frames crossing the eyes, lenses that distort the eye area.
If you must keep them on for a medical reason, the frames must be thin, the eyes fully visible through clear lenses, and there must be no glare. Photochromic lenses that darken indoors are a frequent and avoidable failure.
Head coverings and children
A head covering is accepted for religious or medical reasons, provided the face is fully visible from the bottom of the chin to the top of the forehead, with no shadow cast over the features. Fashion accessories — hats, hair bands wider than a finger, sunglasses pushed up on the head — are not accepted.
Children get the same photo requirements as adults, with two practical concessions: no neutral expression is demanded from an infant, and the eyes need not be perfectly open for a newborn. Nothing else is relaxed — the background must still be plain, no toy or hand may appear in the frame, and the head must still fill the required proportion of the photo, which is the part parents underestimate.
Where consulates differ
The common specification is a floor, not a ceiling. Individual consulates publish their own additional conditions and enforce them unevenly, so the rule of thumb is to read the page of the specific consulate you are applying to — not a general Schengen guide, and not the page of a neighbouring country.
- Some consulates insist on a white background and reject the light grey the general rule allows
- Some ask for two identical printed copies, some accept one
- Some external visa centres photograph applicants on site for a fee and prefer their own photo
- Some accept a digital upload with its own pixel and file size limits, unrelated to the printed format
None of these conditions changes the geometry of the photo, which is the part that is hard to get right. A correctly cropped 35 × 45 photo with a plain white background satisfies the strictest reading of every one of them.
Printing it
Print on photo paper, not on office paper, and not at home on a document printer unless it is a photo printer with photo stock. A visibly inkjet-striped or matte-office print is rejected on sight in some consulates, and the cost of avoiding it is under a euro at any photo kiosk.
The cheapest way is a print sheet: a standard 10 × 15 cm photo print holds eight 35 × 45 photos with cut lines, and kiosks charge the same for it as for a single print. Cut along the lines with scissors or a paper trimmer, leaving no white border — the photo must be exactly 35 by 45 millimetres after cutting.
Keep the spare copies. Visa applications, residence permits and travel insurance forms all tend to arrive in the same month, and the same photo works for all of them as long as it is under six months old.
Before you submit
- The head measures 32 to 36 mm from chin to crown — measured, not estimated
- The background has no shadow, no seam, no pattern and no colour cast
- Mouth closed, eyes open, head straight, no glasses
- The photo is under six months old and looks like you do today
- The print is on photo paper and cut to exactly 35 × 45 mm
And one thing no checklist can do for you: compare the result against the requirements published by the consulate you are applying to. A measurement is a measurement, but the decision belongs to the person behind the counter.