Passport photos: how to avoid the most common rejection

Photographs are the cheapest thing in a passport application and the most common reason one is sent back. They are also the easiest failure to prevent, because unlike a name discrepancy or a missing certificate, you can check a photograph in thirty seconds if you know what you are checking.

The short answer

• Get the specification from your mission or from the passport authority before you have photographs taken. It is published, it is short, and it is the only version that counts.
• Do not assume a US or UK passport photo is acceptable. Different countries specify different print sizes, head proportions and background colours. A pharmacy counter photographing you “for a passport” is working to the domestic standard by default — tell them which standard you need.
• Ask whether photographs are even submitted. An e-passport involves a facial capture, and some applications are handled by an on-site capture rather than by prints you supply. Missions differ.
• Bring more prints than asked for, and keep the digital file.

What a specification actually governs

Even without printing numbers, it is useful to know the list of things a passport photo standard controls, because that list is your checklist when you read the real one:

• Print dimensions — the physical size of the photograph.
• Head size and position — how much of the frame the head occupies, and where the eyes sit vertically. This is usually expressed as a measurement or a percentage, and it is the requirement most often failed by a photo cropped from a holiday snap.
• Background — colour and uniformity. Shadows cast on the wall behind you are a real rejection reason, not a technicality.
• Expression and eyes — typically neutral, mouth closed, eyes open and clearly visible.
• Glasses — whether they are permitted at all, and if so, the rules on glare, tinting and frames obscuring the eyes.
• Head coverings — the rules where these are worn for religious reasons, and what must remain visible.
• Recency — how recently the photograph must have been taken.
• Print quality — paper finish, colour, absence of retouching, and whether digital enhancement is prohibited.

Go through your mission’s published specification item by item against that list. If it is silent on something, ask rather than assuming.

Where people actually go wrong

In practice, four things account for most rejections:

1. The wrong standard. The photographer used the domestic default. Say explicitly what you need before the shutter goes.
2. Background shadow. Standing too close to a wall throws a shadow that a human eye ignores and an assessor does not.
3. Glasses glare. If your lenses catch the light at all, take them off — assuming the specification allows a photograph without them, which it generally will.
4. A child who will not cooperate. This is a category of its own; see below, and see renewing for children.

Photographing children

Small children are held to the same framing rules while being least able to comply with them. The practical technique that works is to lay a baby on a plain sheet of the required background colour and photograph from directly above, making sure nothing — a hand, a strap, a shadow — enters the frame. For toddlers, get someone to stand behind the camera rather than beside the child, so the eyes are on the lens.

Expect several attempts. Do not accept a photograph you are unsure about because the child was becoming difficult; the cost of resubmitting the whole application is much higher than the cost of trying again tomorrow.

Keep the digital original

Whatever you submit, keep the high-resolution file. If the mission asks for more prints, or an online step requires an upload, you will not have to repeat the sitting. Keep it somewhere you will find it in five years, because you will need it again.

Related

• E-passport renewal from the USA
• Renewing for children
• Paying mission fees

What we could not verify

• The required print dimensions for a Bangladeshi passport photograph.
• The required head-size proportion and eye position.
• The required background colour.
• The rules on glasses, head coverings and photo age.
• How many prints each mission requires.
• Whether photographs are submitted at all, or whether a facial capture is taken at the mission for e-passport applications.

We have deliberately not printed a figure for any of these. Take them from the published specification for your mission — it is a one-page document and it is the difference between one application and two.