How to crop a picture into a circle
Updated 2026-09-03 · The crop is drawn on a canvas in this tab. No copy of your photo is sent anywhere.
Cropping a picture into a circle takes about ten seconds once you have a tool that does the masking for you. Below is the quickest method that works on Android, iPhone, Windows and Mac without installing anything, followed by the details that trip people up: transparency, sizes, and why some apps still show a square.
The three-step method
- 1Open the circle cropper
Go to cropphoto.com/circle-crop. Circle mode is already selected, so you do not need to change any setting.
- 2Add your picture
Drop the photo onto the viewfinder, paste it, or tap Choose photo. Nothing is uploaded — the photo stays in your browser.
- 3Place the circle
Drag the circle over the face or object. Pull any corner handle to make it bigger or smaller; it always stays a perfect circle.
- 4Download the transparent PNG
Tap Download. The file is a PNG whose corners are transparent, so it sits cleanly on any background.
That is genuinely all there is to it. The circle cropper keeps the selection square underneath, applies a circular mask when you save, and writes a PNG so the outside of the circle is transparent instead of white.
Circle or square? Check where the photo is going
Many services that display round pictures — WhatsApp, Instagram, LinkedIn, Slack, Google — actually store a square and draw the circle themselves. Uploading a transparent circle to those services works, but it is unnecessary; a well-framed square gives the same result and avoids a thin jagged edge on some platforms. Use this rule:
- Profile picture on an app: crop a square with the face centred and use the profile picture preset, which overlays the circle so you can see what will be cut. WhatsApp has its own preset: WhatsApp DP.
- A real round image for a slide, poster, website, badge, sticker, team page or a document: crop an actual circle with transparency on /circle-crop.
Getting a transparent background (and avoiding white corners)
Only PNG and WebP can store transparency. If you save a circle as JPG, the corners become white (or black) because JPG has no “empty” pixel. CropPhoto defaults to PNG in circle mode for exactly this reason. If you deliberately want a solid background — for example a coloured card — choose a colour under Shape → Background and JPG becomes available.
If you already have a circle image with white corners, re-crop from the original photo rather than trying to remove the white; masking the original is always cleaner.
What size should the circle be?
A circle crop keeps the original pixels inside the ring, so quality depends on the source. As a guide, aim for a source crop of at least:
| Use | Minimum | Comfortable |
|---|---|---|
| Chat / social avatar | 320 × 320 | 500 × 500 – 800 × 800 |
| Website team photo | 400 × 400 | 800 × 800 |
| Slide or poster | 800 × 800 | 1500 × 1500+ |
| Print sticker (300 dpi) | 600 × 600 (5 cm) | 1200 × 1200 (10 cm) |
The live badge on the crop box shows the pixel size while you drag. Need a specific number? Open More options → Export and type the width; the 2× chip doubles the output if the platform wants a larger file than your crop.
Oval, rounded, heart and star
Under More options → Shape you can switch the same crop to an oval (any width-to-height ratio), a rounded rectangle with an adjustable corner radius, a heart or a star. All of them export with transparency, and all keep the straighten, flip and zoom controls, so you can level a horizon before masking it.
On a phone
The steps are identical. The handles are sized for fingers, and you can pinch inside the crop to zoom for precise placement. Downloads land in your Downloads folder on Android and in Files (or Photos, if you choose Save Image) on iPhone. Because nothing is uploaded, it works the same on slow connections.
Troubleshooting
- The circle looks squashed in another app. The app is stretching a non-square file. Make sure the export width and height are equal (the badge shows a 1:1 ratio).
- Edges look jagged. You may be viewing a small file scaled up. Export at 2× or crop a larger area from the original.
- The photo is sideways. Some cameras store rotation in metadata. CropPhoto reads the EXIF orientation and rotates the picture correctly before you crop; if it still looks wrong, use Rotate under More options.
Related reading: WhatsApp DP size and Instagram photo sizes.