YouTube just bounced your thumbnail for being too big. Drop the image anywhere on this page, or paste it with Ctrl+V, and the free YouTube thumbnail resizer makes it exactly 1280×720 at maximum quality, compressing only if needed to land under the 2 MB limit. No upload, no signup.
Why your export was over 2 MB
Design tools default to PNG, and PNG stores your thumbnail's photo areas losslessly: enormous. YouTube accepts JPG at 1280×720, where even a busy thumbnail with text fits comfortably under 2 MB at visually perfect quality. We convert at maximum quality first and only step down if needed to clear the limit.
The spec, for reference
| Rule | Value |
|---|---|
| Resolution | 1280 × 720 (16:9) |
| Max file size | 2 MB |
| Formats | JPG, PNG, GIF, BMP |
FAQ
Will my text stay sharp?
Yes. We resize to the exact display resolution first, so JPEG compression works on final pixels. Text survives far better than a blind compress.
My image isn't 16:9.
It's scaled to fill the full 1280×720 frame and the overflow is trimmed evenly from the edges, which is exactly how YouTube would display it anyway. Want to control the crop yourself? Frame it in your editor first, then drop it here.