When you need this preset
US green card and immigrant visa workflows — the I-485 supporting documents, DS-260 consular processing, and the DV green card lottery — ask for a specific digital photo: a square JPEG at a tight file-size limit. An iPhone photo starts life as a HEIC file that is both the wrong format and too large, so it will not pass these uploads as-is. This page converts that photo to a 600×600 JPEG and compresses it under 240 KB in one step.
One practical note: since December 2025, USCIS captures most domestic applicant photos at the biometrics appointment, so many I-485 filers inside the US no longer upload a photo at all. This preset is most useful for DS-260 consular processing and DV lottery entries, where you still supply your own digital photo.
What the official spec says
Per the State Department's photo requirements (travel.state.gov, and dvprogram.state.gov for the lottery), a US immigrant visa or green card digital photo must be a square JPEG on a plain white or off-white background, sized 600×600 pixels and no larger than 240 KB. DS-160 and DV lottery uploads accept dimensions up to 1200×1200, but 600×600 satisfies all of these workflows, so this preset uses it. The photo must be recent and taken to the official composition rules.
The converter finds the highest JPEG quality that still fits under 240 KB and shows the final size on each file, so you can confirm the cap before you submit. For a US passport photo, which uses a more permissive 54 KB to 10 MB range, use the US passport preset instead.
What this tool does and does not do
This page prepares a file: it decodes your HEIC photo, crops it to a centered 600×600 square, compresses the JPEG under 240 KB, and strips private metadata. It does not check head size, face position, expression, lighting, or background color, and it does not add, replace, or retouch anything. There is no AI enhancement and no background replacement.
heictoimg.com is not official and is not government-approved, and it does not guarantee that your green card, immigrant visa, or DV lottery entry will be accepted or approved. Always check the official USCIS and State Department requirements for your own case and review the finished photo yourself before submitting. This page is not legal or immigration advice.
Private, local conversion
Everything runs in your browser using WebAssembly — your selected image files are not uploaded to heictoimg.com servers. Converted files are re-encoded from decoded pixels, which removes private metadata such as GPS location, camera details, and the original photo timestamp from the JPEG you download. You can process up to 50 files at once on desktop and up to 10 on phones and tablets.