How to Split an Image Into a Grid for Instagram (3, 6 or 9 Posts)

To split an image into a grid for Instagram, crop the photo to the shape of the whole grid, cut it into 3 columns and 1, 2 or 3 rows, and post the tiles in reverse order, bottom-right tile first, top-left tile last. Since January 2025 the profile grid shows posts as 3:4 portrait thumbnails, so each tile should be 3:4 (1080 × 1440 px) for the joins to line up.

The quickest way is Instagram Grid Maker: choose your photo, pick 3, 6 or 9 posts, drag the photo to frame it, and download a ZIP of tiles already numbered in posting order. It runs in your browser, so the photo is not uploaded. Below are the details that make a grid look seamless, and an alternative that doesn’t take over your whole profile.

How an Instagram grid post works

Your profile shows posts in a grid that is always three columns wide, newest first, starting at the top left. A grid post (also called a puzzle feed or split post) uses that layout as a canvas: one big image is cut into pieces, each piece is published as its own post, and the profile reassembles them.

Grid	Posts	Whole image shape with 3:4 tiles	Full size at 1080 px per tile
1 × 3	3	9:4 (wide strip)	3240 × 1440 px
2 × 3	6	9:8 (almost square)	3240 × 2880 px
3 × 3	9	3:4 (portrait)	3240 × 4320 px

Two consequences follow. First, the photo needs plenty of pixels: a 3-column grid at full Instagram width needs an image at least 3240 px wide after cropping. Second, whatever you post later shifts every tile by one place, so a grid only stays intact if you keep posting in multiples of three.

The 2025 switch to 3:4 thumbnails

For most of Instagram’s history the profile grid was made of squares, and every grid tutorial told you to cut 1080 × 1080 tiles. In January 2025 Instagram replaced the squares with taller rectangles. Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, announced the change after months of testing and explained it by the fact that most uploads are now vertical, so taller thumbnails crop them less.

The thumbnails are 3:4, which is the default tile shape in Instagram Grid Maker:

Tile shape	Tile size	On today’s profile grid
Portrait 3:4 (recommended)	1080 × 1440 px	Matches the thumbnails, joins line up
Portrait 4:5	1080 × 1350 px	Fills the feed, trimmed slightly top and bottom on the grid
Square 1:1	1080 × 1080 px	The old grid shape, trimmed at the sides today

The Instagram app accepts 3:4 photos in posts. Some scheduling tools that publish through Meta’s API still cap images at 4:5 and crop anything taller; if you schedule your posts with one of those, choose 4:5 tiles and accept a small shift at the joins.

Step by step with Instagram Grid Maker

1. Open Instagram Grid Maker and choose or drop your photo (JPG, PNG, WebP, HEIC and other common formats work).
2. Pick the Grid: 1 × 3 (3 posts), 2 × 3 (6 posts) or 3 × 3 (9 posts).
3. Keep Tile shape on Portrait 3:4, unless your scheduling tool needs 4:5.
4. The preview dims what will be cut away. Drag the photo, or move the Crop position slider, to choose what stays in the grid. Keep faces and text away from the cut lines, since Instagram leaves a thin gap between thumbnails.
5. Check the tile size shown under the preview. Tiles are 1080 px wide when the photo is large enough; smaller photos give smaller tiles rather than being upscaled.
6. Click Download tiles (ZIP). Choose JPG (recommended) or PNG.

The files are named like post-01-row3-col3.jpg: the number is the posting order, and the row and column say where the tile ends up. Everything happens on your device, and because the tiles are redrawn from pixels, EXIF data such as the GPS location is not copied into them.

Posting order: last tile first

Instagram puts every new post at the top left and pushes the older ones right and down. To make the image read correctly, publish it backwards:

1. Post post-01 (the bottom-right tile) first.
2. Continue in number order: post-02, post-03, and so on, which moves right to left along each row, from the bottom row up.
3. Post the last file (the top-left tile) last.
4. Don’t publish anything else until the grid is finished.

A few practical tips:

• Publish all tiles in one sitting. Followers see individual tiles in their feed while you post; a short caption on each, such as “part 3 of 9”, helps.
• Watch for pinned posts. Pinned posts are shown first, ahead of the grid, so they can visually break the pattern. Unpin them or plan around them.
• Keep the rows aligned later. Post new content in groups of three, or the whole picture shifts by one column.
• Check the result. Open your profile in the Instagram app once the last tile is up, If a tile landed in the wrong place, delete it and every tile posted after it, then post them again in order.

Alternative: a carousel panorama

If you don’t want one image to occupy 3 to 9 posts, a carousel panorama is the lighter option. You cut a wide photo into equal vertical slices and upload them together as one post. Swiping from slide to slide reveals the panorama continuously, and your profile shows only the first slice. According to the Instagram Help Center, a single post can contain up to 20 photos and videos.

Use Image Splitter for this, since it cuts without cropping:

1. Open Image Splitter and choose the panorama.
2. Set Rows to 1 and Columns to the number of slides (up to 10).
3. Pick the number of columns so each slice has the shape you want. For square slides, use roughly the image width divided by its height; for 4:5 portrait slides, the width divided by 0.8 × the height. The tool shows the size of each tile as you change the settings.
4. Download the ZIP. The files are named name-1-1, name-1-2 and so on, in left-to-right order, which is the order to add them to the carousel.

Instagram uses one aspect ratio for all items of a carousel, so slices of equal size, which Image Splitter produces, keep the seams continuous. If the panorama’s proportions don’t divide nicely, the tool still cuts equal slices; you can crop a little off the photo first so the slices come out exactly square or 4:5.

Image Splitter is also the tool to use for grids Instagram Grid Maker doesn’t cover: any number of rows and columns from 1 to 10, kept in the original format or saved as PNG or JPG.

Common problems

The tiles are blurry on my profile. The source photo was too small. A 3 × 3 grid of 1080 × 1440 tiles needs a 3240 × 4320 px image; a 1200 px wide photo gives 400 px tiles. Start from the original camera file, not a screenshot or a downloaded copy.

My photo is an iPhone HEIC. Instagram Grid Maker reads HEIC directly. To keep a JPG copy for other uses, see HEIC vs JPG.

I only want to post one photo without cropping. You don’t need a grid at all. Pad it to a square with Make Image Square, or resize it for any network with the Social Media Image Resizer. To combine two photos into one post instead, see how to put two photos side by side.