Video aspect ratios explained: 16:9, 9:16, 1:1 and 4:5
A few dozen people a month find this site after typing something like "is 9:16 portrait or landscape" into Google. Quite a few of them are filling in a form that's asked them to choose an orientation, and they'd like to know what they're agreeing to before they pick one.
So here's what the numbers mean, which one each platform wants, and what I'd choose if a form asks you.
What the numbers mean.
An aspect ratio is the width of the picture compared with its height. The first number is the width and the second is the height.
16:9 is landscape. It's wider than it is tall, the shape of a TV, a laptop screen or a normal YouTube video. When people say widescreen, this is what they mean.
9:16 is portrait. It's taller than it is wide, the shape of your phone held upright. Reels, Shorts, TikTok and Stories all use it.
1:1 is square. You'll mostly see it in social media feeds.
4:5 is a slightly tall portrait. It's the tallest shape Instagram and LinkedIn will show in the feed without cropping it, so your video takes up more of the screen as people scroll past. I use it a lot for that reason.
An easy way to remember it is that if the first number is bigger it's landscape, and if the second number is bigger it's portrait.
Which one each platform wants.
Where it's going | Ratio |
Your website | 16:9 |
YouTube | 16:9 |
YouTube Shorts | 9:16 |
LinkedIn, standard post | 16:9 |
LinkedIn, to fill more of the feed | 1:1 or 4:5 |
Instagram Reels and Stories | 9:16 |
Instagram feed | 4:5 or 1:1 |
TikTok | 9:16 |
Presentations and internal comms | 16:9 |
If a form asks you to pick, choose landscape.
This is what a lot of people are actually looking for. An awards entry, a brief or a submission form asks how the footage should be recorded, and gives you portrait, landscape, square or "any orientation acceptable".
Unless it says otherwise, I'd choose landscape. You can crop a landscape shot down to portrait or square afterwards and it'll still work, but you can't turn a portrait shot into landscape, because there's nothing either side of it to use. And whoever wrote the form will probably want to use your footage somewhere other than a phone screen.
If it says any orientation is fine, I'd still send landscape.
Shoot landscape unless it's only for social.
Landscape gives you room to crop, reframe and cut a vertical version later on. If you start in portrait, you've made that decision for good.
The exception is a video you know is only going on Reels or TikTok and nowhere else. In that case, shoot it vertical from the start. A landscape shot cropped down to portrait usually leaves the person's head in the wrong place and a lot of empty floor.
I've written more about this in should you film in landscape or portrait?
Choose it before you start editing.
In Canva and most other editing tools, the aspect ratio is the first thing you're asked, and it's easy to click straight past it. If you change it at the end, you'll have to reposition every shot by hand, and it usually shows.
If you need both versions.
If you know on the day that you'll need a landscape and a vertical version, shoot landscape but keep the person a bit nearer the middle of the frame than you normally would, with some space above their head.
Then making the vertical version later is just a case of sliding the frame across, and you won't find your subject half out of shot. It doesn't cost anything on the day and it saves a lot of time in the edit.
Want your team to get this right every time?
Aspect ratios are one of about a dozen things that catch teams out when they start making their own video. I run a one-day session that covers planning, filming on a phone, framing, sound and editing, built around the channels your team uses.
It costs about the same as having one video made for you, and afterwards your team can make their own.
Or if you'd rather we made it for you, here's how we work.
Tom Vince
I'm the director of Revel Studios, just outside Norwich. I've worked in video for fifteen years, including time at Archant and Mustard TV, and these days I split my time between making video for organisations across Norfolk and Suffolk and training their teams to make their own.
Over the years I've trained hundreds of people, from journalists, camera operators and editors to marketing teams and small business owners, most recently with the Federation of Small Businesses in Norfolk and Suffolk.
If anything here has raised a question, email me. I answer my own email.
tom@revelstudios.co.uk · 01603 336273
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