Why was my photo rejected?

By Aman, founder of FABX Labs · Updated 17 September 2026 · 6 min read

Exam and government portals refuse a photo for seven reasons, and most of them are invisible when you look at the picture. Here is each one, how to spot it, and how to fix it before the form closes.

You picked a clear, recent photo. The portal still says "invalid file", "image dimensions not valid" or simply refuses to upload. That is frustrating, because the photo looks fine.

The reason is that portals do not look at your photo the way you do. They read the file: its real format, its exact width and height in pixels, its size in kilobytes, and sometimes a few hidden labels inside it. Any one of those being off is enough for a rejection, and none of them show up when you open the picture on your phone.

Check your file in 30 seconds

Before guessing, find out which rule the file is breaking. Drop it into the checker below and choose your exam. It reads the same things a portal reads and tells you, line by line, what passes and what does not. The photo is checked on your own phone and is never uploaded anywhere.

Then go to the section for whichever line came back with a cross.

1. The file is not really a JPEG

Almost every Indian exam portal asks for a JPEG (a .jpg file), and the good ones check the first few bytes of the file to be sure. The name at the end does not matter to them.

This catches people out in three common ways:

• iPhone photos. iPhones save photos as HEIC by default, a format most portals refuse.
• Screenshots. A screenshot of your photo is a PNG file, not a JPEG.
• Renamed files. Changing photo.png to photo.jpg changes only the name. The file inside is still a PNG, and the portal can tell.

The fix is to convert the image for real, so the file inside becomes a JPEG.

2. The width and height are wrong

Portals ask for an exact size in pixels, such as 200 × 230. A photo straight from a phone is often 3000 pixels wide or more, so it fails this check even though it looks perfect.

Some notifications give the size in centimetres instead. The same centimetre size can mean different pixel sizes, depending on the dots per inch (DPI) the notification states. A 3.5 × 4.5 cm photo is 413 × 531 pixels at 300 DPI, but 276 × 354 pixels at 200 DPI. That is why two forms can ask for "the same" photo and still need different files.

These are typical values from our specs table. Your exam's notification is the one that counts.

The full specs table covers more exams and portals. If yours is listed, open its page and the size is already filled in. If it is not, enter the width, height and size limit from your notification yourself.

3. The file is too big, or too small

Most people know a photo can be too large. Fewer know it can also be too small. Many forms give a range, such as 20–50 KB, and a 12 KB file is rejected just as firmly as a 90 KB one.

Two habits make this worse:

• Squeezing quality instead of resizing. A 4000-pixel photo pushed down to 50 KB turns blurry and blocky. Resize to the required pixels first; the file size usually drops into the range on its own.
• Using a photo that went through WhatsApp. WhatsApp shrinks and re-compresses images. Start from the original photo on your phone.

A tool that knows both limits will aim for the range, not just "as small as possible".

4. It shows sideways after you upload it

Phones often don't turn the picture itself. They save it as it came off the camera and add a small label saying "rotate this when you show it". Your gallery reads the label, so the photo looks upright.

Some portals ignore the label. On those sites your photo appears on its side, or gets rejected by a check that expected a portrait image. The fix is to apply the rotation to the picture itself and remove the label, so the photo is upright everywhere.

5. The signature or thumb impression looks grey

For signatures, thumb impressions and handwritten declarations, portals and the people who review forms want dark ink on a clean white background. A scan taken under a tube light often comes out grey or shadowed, and that is a common reason these files are sent back.

A few rules that bank-exam notifications repeat every year:

• Sign on plain white paper with a black pen.
• Sign as you normally sign. Bank-exam notifications such as IBPS and SBI state that a signature in CAPITAL letters will not be accepted.
• Photograph it in daylight, flat, with no shadow from your hand or phone.

A cleaner can whiten the paper, darken the ink and trim the edges. It works only on your own signature: FABX never draws, generates or copies a signature or thumb impression.

6. The name and date are missing from the photo

Some exams want your name and the date the photo was taken printed on the photo itself, under your face. NTA exams (NEET, JEE Main, CUET) ask for this, and so does UPSC. UPSC has also asked for a photo taken no more than 10 days before you apply, so check the current notification for how recent yours needs to be.

If your exam asks for it, a plain photo is not enough, however good it looks. The name and date must be part of the image. The exam pages add the strip for you in the right place.

7. The DPI number

Some notifications mention a DPI, often 200. DPI is only a label stored in the file: it tells a printer how large to print the photo, and it does not change the pixels or the file size. Very few portals check it. If yours asks for a DPI, set the label and leave the rest of the photo alone. Resizing it, or saving it again, would change the pixels and the file size you have already got right.

Before you press Upload

1. Open the notification and write down the pixels, the size range in KB and the format.
2. Run the file through the checker and choose your exam.
3. Fix only what failed, in the order above: format, then pixels, then size.
4. Open the final file once more and look at it. Is it upright? Is it clearly your face, or your own signature?
5. Keep the final file somewhere safe. You will need it again for the admit card and later stages.

Tools used in this guide

More guides

• UPSC: the photo, the triple signature and the 10-day rule
• Form 16, ITR-V and bank statements: finding the PDF password you already have
• SSC photo and signature rules, explained
• Split a large PDF to fit a 5 MB or 10 MB limit