Carousel Ad Specs: Carousel Ad Sizes, Dimensions, and Character Limits by Platform
Five platforms run carousels and no two agree on how many cards you get, how big a card is, or how much you can write. Adscreator takes one product URL and builds the whole set in every platform crop.
Flat pricing, no credits · Updated August 2026
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Direct answer
Carousel ad specs differ by platform. Meta carousel cards are square at a minimum of 1080 x 1080, 2 to 10 cards per ad, JPG or PNG up to 30 MB per card, with 80 characters of primary text and a 20 character headline per card. LinkedIn uses the same 1080 x 1080 square with 2 to 10 cards and a 10 MB cap, but its intro text stops at 255 characters and a card headline caps at 45 when the card links out. Pinterest allows only 2 to 5 cards at 1000 x 1500 or 1:1. Google Demand Gen allows 2 to 10 cards at 1:1, 1.91:1 or 4:5. TikTok goes up to 35 images at 9:16. On every platform, all cards in one carousel must share the ratio of the first card.
The problem
A carousel is the one ad format where a single wrong number wastes the whole build. Teams design a five card set for Facebook, reuse it on Pinterest and discover Pinterest stops at five, so the sixth card silently never existed. They write a 200 character intro that saves fine on a LinkedIn single image ad and gets rejected on the carousel, because LinkedIn quietly drops the hard maximum from 3,000 to 255 for that one format. Or they mix a square card with a vertical one, nothing gets rejected, no warning appears, and the platform crops every odd card to match the first, taking the price off card three and half a face off card four. The spec sheets that would catch this are mostly copies of each other, and the errors have been copied along with them.
How Adscreator handles it
Paste a product URL or describe the offer, and Adscreator builds the full carousel rather than one card at a time. You get a coherent set of on brand card images that read as one system instead of assembled stock, rendered at the size each platform asks for: 1080 x 1080 or 1440 x 1440 square for Meta and LinkedIn, 1000 x 1500 at 2:3 for Pinterest, 1200 x 1200 and 960 x 1200 for Demand Gen, and 1080 x 1920 for TikTok. Every card in a set comes out at a matching ratio, which is the rule that breaks most carousels. Copy is written to the limit that actually applies to the format, so 80 characters of primary text on Meta rather than the 125 most sheets quote, and 45 characters for a LinkedIn card headline that links out. LinkedIn cards are composed to stay legible after the platform shrinks them to 312 x 312. You export the files and upload them in your own Ads Manager; Adscreator never connects to an ad account. Pricing is flat monthly with no per card credits, so a ten card carousel costs the same to build as a single image ad.
specs
Carousel ad sizes and limits on every platform that runs the format.
Figures below come from each platform's own advertising documentation, checked in August 2026: Meta's ads guide, LinkedIn Marketing Solutions, Pinterest Business help, Google Ads Help for Demand Gen, and TikTok Ads Manager. Read the card count column first, because it is the spec that differs most and the one that quietly breaks a set built for another network.
| Platform | Cards per ad | Card size and ratio | File type and cap | Text limits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Facebook and Instagram | 2 to 10 | 1080 x 1080 minimum at 1:1, build at 1440 x 1440. 4:5 accepted on feed placements only | JPG or PNG, 30 MB per card | Primary text 80 recommended, headline 20 per card, description 18 |
| 2 to 10 | 1080 x 1080 at 1:1, maximum 4320 x 4320, rendered at 312 x 312 in the feed | JPG, PNG or non-animated GIF, 10 MB per card | Intro text 255 hard maximum, card headline 45 when the card links out | |
| 2 to 5 | 1000 x 1500 at 2:3, or 1:1 | PNG or JPEG, 20 MB per image | Title 100 with the first 40 visible, description 800 and never displayed | |
| Google Demand Gen | 2 to 10 | 1200 x 1200 at 1:1, 1200 x 628 at 1.91:1, or 960 x 1200 at 4:5 | JPG or PNG, 5 MB per image, logo 1:1 capped at 150 KB | Headline 40, description 90, business name 25 |
| TikTok in-feed carousel | 2 to 35 | 1080 x 1920 at 9:16 recommended, 1200 x 628 and 640 x 640 also accepted | JPG, JPEG or PNG | Caption around 90 characters, emojis not supported |
Three rows catch people out. Pinterest stops at 5 cards while everyone else allows 10 or more, so a set built for Meta does not port. Pinterest's 800 character description is never shown to anyone: it feeds relevance matching only, which makes it the one field where writing for the algorithm rather than the reader is correct. And LinkedIn drops its intro text hard maximum from 3,000 characters on a single image ad to 255 on a carousel, which is why the same caption saves on one format and fails on the other. TikTok's image caps vary by placement and objective, so confirm them in Ads Manager before a large upload.
Card count is the spec that breaks a cross-platform carousel
Almost every other carousel spec converges. Meta, LinkedIn and Google Demand Gen all take a square card, all accept JPG and PNG, and all sit within a factor of three on file size. Card count is where they split, and it splits in the direction nobody checks. Meta allows 2 to 10, LinkedIn allows 2 to 10, Demand Gen allows 2 to 10, TikTok allows up to 35 images, and Pinterest stops at 5. If your production process is to build one master set and adapt it, the master set has to be five cards or fewer or Pinterest gets an arbitrary truncation decided by whoever uploads it that afternoon. The subtler cost is narrative. A carousel that tells a sequence, a how it works, a before and after, a product journey, is designed around a specific number of beats. Cutting a seven card story to five does not remove two cards, it removes the middle of the argument, and what runs on Pinterest is then a different ad making a weaker case. The fix is to decide the card count from the constraint rather than from the idea: build the five card version first, make it complete on its own, then add cards for the platforms that allow more if there is genuinely more to say. That ordering also happens to match performance data most advertisers see, because three to five cards is where engagement concentrates on every network. Most people swipe twice and decide. Cards six through ten are usually there for the algorithm to pick from rather than for a human to reach, which is a legitimate reason to include them on Meta, where card order can be optimized automatically, and a poor reason to include them anywhere the order is fixed.
Every platform locks the carousel to the ratio of the first card
This is the rule that produces most broken carousels, and it is silent on every network that enforces it. You upload a mixed set, nothing is rejected, no warning appears, and the platform crops every card that does not match the first one to make the set uniform. What gets trimmed is the outer edge, which is exactly where designers put logos, prices, badges and the edge of a face. The ad runs, it is approved, it looks fine in the campaign list, and the damage is only visible in the placement preview or in the live feed. Meta locks to the first card and allows roughly 3 percent tolerance on the ratio itself, which is enough to absorb a slightly off crop but not enough to absorb a genuinely different shape. LinkedIn expects square throughout. Pinterest requires every card in one carousel to share a ratio, and since it offers both 1:1 and 2:3 it is easy to mix them by accident when cards come from different sources. Demand Gen accepts 1:1, 1.91:1 and 4:5 for carousel cards, which gives you three chances to be inconsistent. The practical discipline is to fix the ratio before any art is made, keep every important element inside the middle 80 percent of the card, and check the placement preview before publishing, which takes about ten seconds and catches this every time. If you genuinely need a landscape version and a square version of the same concept, those are two carousels, not one carousel with mixed cards.
Carousel character limits are shorter than single image limits on every platform
A carousel is not a single image ad with more pictures, and the copy fields are where that shows. On Meta, the primary text guidance for a carousel is 80 characters, not the 125 quoted for single image feed ads, and each card gets a 20 character headline and an 18 character description, against 27 and 27 on a single image ad. Twenty characters is roughly three words. That is not room for a benefit statement, it is room for a product name and a price, which is why carousel headlines that try to argue rather than label read as truncated even when they fit. On LinkedIn the drop is more dramatic and less documented: intro text on a single image ad accepts up to 3,000 characters, and on a carousel the hard maximum is 255. A card headline is capped at 45 characters when the card points to a destination URL, which is about half what the same writer gets on a single image ad. Pinterest inverts the problem. Its title runs to 100 characters with the first 40 visible, and its 800 character description is never displayed at all, so the description is written for relevance matching rather than persuasion and the title carries the entire message. TikTok is tighter again at roughly 90 characters of caption with no emoji support. Written properly, this constraint is useful. The primary text on a carousel is doing setup, not selling, because the cards carry the argument and the swipe is the engagement. Short setup, distinct cards, one clear label each.
One square master, and the three places it stops working
The efficient way to run carousels across networks is to design one 1:1 master at 1440 x 1440 and derive everything from it. Square is the only ratio that renders natively on Meta, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Demand Gen, it downsizes cleanly to LinkedIn's 312 x 312 feed thumbnail, and it sits inside every maximum any of them enforce. That gets you most of the way. It stops working in three specific places. The first is Pinterest, where 1:1 is accepted but 2:3 at 1000 x 1500 is what the surface is built for, and a square card in a vertical masonry feed takes visibly less attention than the pins around it. If Pinterest is a real channel rather than a checkbox, build the 2:3 version. The second is TikTok, where 9:16 is the whole screen and a square image arrives as a small object floating in a full bleed feed. Vertical is not optional there. The third is anywhere the card carries type. A design that reads at 1440 x 1440 on a monitor has to survive being rendered at 312 x 312 on LinkedIn and at roughly thumbnail size in a Meta mobile feed, so a card with a paragraph of set text or a detailed product screenshot arrives illegible. Design each card for the smallest place it will appear: one idea, one object, type large enough to survive a three to five times reduction. Adscreator produces the crops from a single brief, which is the part that usually costs a design round, but the legibility decision still belongs to whoever writes the brief.
what it uses
The features behind carousel ad specs.
questions
Carousel ad specs: the questions people ask.
What are carousel ad specs?
Carousel ad specs are the card dimensions, aspect ratios, card counts, file size caps and character limits each platform enforces for its swipeable multi-card ad format. Meta and LinkedIn use a 1080 x 1080 square card with 2 to 10 cards per ad. Pinterest allows 2 to 5 cards at 1000 x 1500 or 1:1. Google Demand Gen allows 2 to 10 cards at 1:1, 1.91:1 or 4:5, and TikTok allows up to 35 images at 9:16.
What size is a carousel ad?
On Meta and LinkedIn a carousel card is square at 1080 x 1080 pixels, and building at 1440 x 1440 keeps you clear of low resolution flags on modern screens. Pinterest carousel cards run 1000 x 1500 at 2:3, or 1:1. Google Demand Gen accepts 1200 x 1200, 1200 x 628 or 960 x 1200. TikTok recommends 1080 x 1920. Every card inside one carousel must share the same size and ratio.
How many images can a carousel ad have?
It depends on the platform. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Google Demand Gen carousels all take 2 to 10 cards. Pinterest is the outlier and stops at 5. TikTok in-feed carousels accept up to 35 images. Most advertisers see engagement concentrate in the first three to five cards regardless of the maximum, because most people swipe two or three times before deciding.
What is the character limit for carousel ads?
Meta recommends 80 characters of primary text with a 20 character headline and an 18 character description per card. LinkedIn caps carousel intro text at 255 characters, far below the 3,000 it allows on a single image ad, and caps a card headline at 45 characters when the card links to a destination URL. Pinterest allows a 100 character title with the first 40 visible. TikTok captions run to roughly 90 characters.
Can carousel cards have different sizes?
No. Every platform that runs carousels locks the whole set to the aspect ratio of the first card. Nothing is rejected and no warning appears: the platform simply crops the cards that do not match, trimming the outer edges where logos, prices and faces usually sit. Build every card at one ratio from the start and check the placement preview before publishing.
What is the best aspect ratio for carousel ads?
Square 1:1 is the best default. It is the only ratio that renders natively on Meta, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Google Demand Gen, so one master set covers four networks. Use 2:3 when Pinterest is a serious channel, because vertical pins hold more attention in a masonry feed, and 9:16 on TikTok, where a square image floats in a full screen feed and loses the placement.
Do all carousel cards need their own link?
Not necessarily. On Meta and LinkedIn each card can carry its own destination URL, or the whole carousel can point at one URL. Per card links make sense when each card is a distinct product; a single URL makes sense when the cards tell one story. On LinkedIn there is a spec consequence: a card headline caps at 45 characters when that card links to a destination URL.
Are carousel ads worth the extra production work?
They earn their place when you have more than one thing to show: a product range, a set of features, a step by step, or a before and after. Each card is effectively a separate creative with its own headline and link, so a carousel is several ads in one unit. If your offer needs one image, test a single image ad first, because a padded set of weak cards performs worse than one strong frame.
▪ keep reading
A carousel you build yourself is one thing; a carousel the platform assembles from your product feed is another. Catalog ads covers the feed side, where the card content comes from image_link and title rather than from anything you upload.
For Facebook and Instagram in depth, including the 20 percent text rule question and why a carousel gets cropped after upload, read the full Facebook carousel ad specs guide. The carousel ad maker covers the build workflow rather than the numbers.
Carousel is one format inside a wider buy. Meta ad sizes covers the 1440 series Facebook and Instagram now recommend for single image and Stories, LinkedIn ad specs covers the other ten LinkedIn formats, and social media ad sizes lines every platform up in one table.
Building the rest of the set? The Pinterest ad maker and TikTok ad maker handle those platforms end to end, and Google Demand Gen ad specs covers the image, logo and video assets a Demand Gen campaign needs alongside its carousel.
▪ more use cases