How to take a passport photo at home

Most rejections come from five things: shadows, a busy background, a tilted head, the wrong head size and an edited file. A phone camera is good enough for every document we cover, if you get those five right.

Set up

1. Wall. Plain and light, with nothing on it. Check the background rule for your document first: France forbids white, the US wants white or off-white, Germany and the Netherlands accept light grey.
2. Light. Face a window in daylight. Light from one side leaves half the face darker, which our checker flags. Turn off ceiling lights that throw shadows under the eyes.
3. Distance. Stand about 50 cm in front of the wall so you don't cast a shadow on it. The camera should be 1 to 1.5 m from your face, at eye height. Closer than that and the lens makes your nose look bigger.
4. Someone else. Have another person take it. A selfie at arm's length tends to tilt the head and distort the face.

Pose

• Look straight into the lens, head level, shoulders square.
• Neutral face, mouth closed, both eyes open. The US allows a small natural smile; most others don't.
• Hair away from your eyes. No hats or head coverings except for religious or medical reasons.
• Glasses off. Almost every document we cover now requires it.

Leave room

Frame from the middle of the chest to well above the head. The crop needs space around your head; if your head touches the top of the frame, we can't cut it to the right size.

Don't edit it

Send the original camera file. No filters, beauty mode, background removal or AI touch-ups. Offices refuse edited photos, and some check for it.

Then run it through the checker. Every line that fails says what to change.