Instagram carousel splitter: turn a panorama into seamless slides
Cut a wide picture into 2 to 20 seamless Instagram carousel slides at 4:5, 3:4 or 1:1, preview the swipe and download them in order. Free; nothing is uploaded.
By Mellow · UpdatedSplit a wide picture into slides
The safe default: the app and schedulers, Mellow Hub included, all take it.
How do you make a seamless carousel on Instagram?
Take one wide picture, cut it into equal slides side by side, and post them in order as one carousel with the same crop for every slide. At 4:5, each slide is 1080 × 1350, so three slides come from a 3240 × 1350 picture. Instagram applies one orientation to every item in a carousel and allows up to 20 of them from the app, 10 through its API. The splitter does the cutting and the numbering, and shows the swipe before you post.
Picture sizes for 2 to 5 slides
| Slides | 4:5 (1080 × 1350) | 3:4 (1080 × 1440) | 1:1 (1080 × 1080) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 2160 × 1350 | 2160 × 1440 | 2160 × 1080 |
| 3 | 3240 × 1350 | 3240 × 1440 | 3240 × 1080 |
| 4 | 4320 × 1350 | 4320 × 1440 | 4320 × 1080 |
| 5 | 5400 × 1350 | 5400 × 1440 | 5400 × 1080 |
These are the smallest pictures that give sharp slides; a larger picture in the same shape works too. Instagram keeps a photo 1080 pixels wide when its shape is between 1.91:1 and 3:4. Sources: Instagram Help Center: Share a post with multiple photos or videos and Instagram Help Center: Image resolution of photos you share on Instagram, read on 1 October 2026.
Designing across the seams
- Keep faces and words off the cuts. Anything crossing a seam is split between two slides, and people rarely see both halves at once.
- Lead the eye to the right. A line, a gaze or an arrow that runs off the edge of a slide invites the swipe.
- Let the first slide stand alone. It is the one shown in the feed before anyone swipes, and on your profile grid.
- Finish on the last slide. End the picture there, or put the one sentence you want remembered.
Planning a grid instead, where several posts form one picture on your profile? Use the grid maker.
Questions
What size should seamless carousel slides be?
1080 × 1350 (4:5) works everywhere, in the Instagram app and through schedulers. The app also takes 1080 × 1440 (3:4), the tallest shape Instagram keeps without cropping. A panorama for three 4:5 slides should be 3240 × 1350 pixels, or larger in the same shape.
How many slides can an Instagram carousel have?
Up to 20 photos and videos when you post from the app. Instagram’s API, which scheduling tools use, takes 10.
Why is there a line or a jump between my slides?
Instagram applies one orientation to every item in a carousel. If the slides were cut in one shape and posted in another, Instagram crops each of them again and the edges no longer meet. Keep the crop you cut the slides for, and choose them in the numbered order.
Will the first slide look right on my profile?
The profile grid shows the first slide as a 3:4 rectangle cut from its middle. With 3:4 slides nothing is hidden; with 4:5 a thin strip goes on each side. Make the first slide work on its own: it is the one people see before they swipe.
Is my picture uploaded?
No. The picture stays in this page and the slides are cut in your browser; the ZIP is made on your own device.
Make the carousel from a brief, then schedule it
Mellow Hub’s Creative Studio writes and designs carousel slides from a short brief, as editable slides you can change before anything goes out, and Hub schedules the carousel to Instagram, LinkedIn, Threads and the rest. It checks each network’s rules before sending, such as Instagram’s 10 items per post through its API. See the Creative Studio guide.
See how the Creative Studio makes carouselsThis tool is free and needs no account. Mellow Hub is paid, after a 7-day free trial, and publishes only what you, or an assistant you have authorised, send or schedule.
More free tools
- LinkedIn text formatter: Bold, italic, underlined text and bullet lists for LinkedIn posts, with a preview of where the post folds.
- YouTube thumbnail maker: Make a thumbnail from your photo and a bold headline in four layouts, check it at Up next size and export 1280×720 or 4K.
- Carousel maker: Type one idea per slide and get designed carousel slides: PNGs for Instagram or a PDF LinkedIn shows as a document.
- YouTube thumbnail tester: See a thumbnail in YouTube’s home feed, search and sidebar at their real sizes, then export it at 1280×720 under 2 MB.
- Instagram grid maker: Split one image into 3, 6, 9 or 12 posts that line up on your profile, numbered in the order to post them.
- Social media character counter: Count one post against every network’s limit at once, with X’s weighted count and Bluesky’s graphemes.
- Social media post checker: Check caption, title and media count against Mellow Hub’s input rules for each destination.