OpenPhotoId · Documents
DV Lottery photo, made and checked in your browser
A DV Lottery photo, for the Diversity Visa or green card lottery, is a square JPEG of 600 × 600 pixels and 240 KB or less, with the head 50–69% of the image height, on a plain white or off-white background. OpenPhotoId is a free passport photo maker that makes the file on your own device, crops it to the State Department’s rules and checks it before you download it. No sign-up, no watermark, and nothing is uploaded.
DV Lottery photo size and rules
These are the numbers the app uses. They come from the State Department’s visa photo page at travel.state.gov and the DV-2026 instructions.
| Rule | United States, DV Lottery |
|---|---|
| File | JPEG · 600 × 600 px, square · 240 KB or less · digital only |
| Background | plain white or off-white, in the photo itself |
| Head height | 50–69% of the image height, chin to crown |
| Glasses | not allowed |
| Editing | an entry photo that has been “manipulated in any way” may make you ineligible; photos “must not be digitally enhanced or altered to change your appearance in any way” |
Every entry, with its official page, is on the supported documents list. The rules can change from one year’s lottery to the next, so read the current instructions on travel.state.gov before you enter.
The DV Lottery photo keeps its own background
Because a manipulated photo can make an entry ineligible, the app does not replace the background of a DV Lottery photo and does not retouch it. It crops and scales your photo to 600 × 600 px, keeps the wall that is already behind you and measures how flat and how white it is. If that check does not pass, take the photo again in front of a plain white or off-white wall rather than editing it. The file size is found by search, not guessed: the app looks for a JPEG quality that stays at 240 KB or less.
How the photo is made
- Pick the US DV Lottery, then choose a photo; on a phone, the photo picker also lets you take one.
- The app finds your face from five landmarks and measures its tilt.
- Your own background is kept and checked, not replaced.
- The crop lands in the middle of the head-height, eye-line and centring bands at once. Three sliders let you move within them.
- Twelve checks run on the finished file, and the face is detected again on the output.
What each check measures is explained in what a passport photo check can measure, and the usual reasons a photo is refused in passport photo rejected.
DV Lottery photo or US passport photo?
Both are square and both are saved at 600 × 600 px, but they are not the same document. The DV Lottery photo is a file of 240 KB or less that you upload with the entry, and it is never printed, so there is no print sheet for it. The US passport photo is a 2 × 2 inch print, or a file of 54 KB to 10 MB for online renewal. See the US passport photo page for that one.
Before you submit a DV Lottery photo
- Take your glasses off before the picture.
- Face the camera straight on with a neutral expression, in even light. A window works, direct sun does not.
- Stand in front of a plain white or off-white wall, a little away from it, so your shadow falls behind you.
- Software cannot judge everything the State Department does, such as an expression. Read the checklist rather than assuming a pass.
Taking the DV Lottery photo yourself? See how to take a passport photo at home.
Free, private, and on every device
Every feature is free, with no account and no watermark. The face detector and the matting model run on your device, so the photo never leaves it, and after the first visit the app works offline. It runs in any modern browser, on desktop or phone, and there are apps for macOS, Windows and Android; the iPhone and iPad download is coming back soon.