Nepal Passport Photo Size 2026

Nepal Passport Photo at a Glance

Nepali passport photos are commonly published at 35x45mm on a plain white background, taken within the last six months — confirm the live specification on the Department of Passport website during application week, since enrollment instructions update. Applications run through the Kathmandu headquarters plus district administration offices and Nepali missions abroad, with live capture increasingly part of enrollment. Details below reflect commonly published DoP guidance with official links throughout.

Exact Size in mm, Inches, and Pixels

The commonly cited 35x45mm rectangle equals roughly 1.38 x 1.77 inches with head height at 70–80 percent of frame height. Because live capture operates at enrollment, the studio print's critical job is the file upload and supporting paperwork — both demand the same ratio. Our preset encodes it so one source photo serves upload, prints, and re-exports; confirm the live millimeter figure on the DoP site before finalizing, since this page states the widely published value with its source link.

Digital steps follow on-screen bands during application: export high quality first, step quality (never dimensions) down on kilobyte rejection, keep filenames plain lowercase. Screenshots and chat forwards recompress unpredictably — always upload the exported original.

DoP Process: Kathmandu, Districts, and Missions

First-time and renewal applications flow through the Department of Passport in Kathmandu, district administration offices for regional applicants, and Nepali embassies and consulates abroad — each with its own token and appointment mechanics, so check the specific office notice before traveling and prefer morning tokens where queues build by midday. Citizenship certificate, old passport for renewals, and relationship documents for minors form the standard file; incomplete files lose the day.普通 Express and urgent handling tiers exist with different fees and windows — confirm the live schedule when booking.

MRP-to-e-passport conversions follow the same capture with updated forms and fresh biometrics for every single applicant present in person. Name, date-of-birth, and address corrections route through affidavit and supporting-certificate chains that dwarf photography in complexity — assemble those fully first, since enrollment burns on paperwork gaps. Overseas Nepalis renew through missions with the same photo standard and post-specific checklists.

Where to Get Photos in Nepal

Passport-office vicinity studios in Kathmandu (Tripureshwor area), Pokhara, Biratnagar, and Nepalgunj process the ratio daily — state the purpose explicitly and ruler-check, since visa and ID sizes differ. Market photo shops work with the preset named. For zero cost, shoot at home against white in window daylight with our maker, then print at any quality printer; live capture at enrollment remains operative regardless. Students and workers needing identical sets for parallel visa-plus-passport filings should print extras in the same run, since reprints months later rarely match the original sitting.

Make It Free with Our Photo Maker

Our free passport photo maker carries a one-click preset for this exact specification (Nepal 35x45mm). Upload a well-lit headshot, pick the preset, and the tool crops, sizes, and lays out the sheet automatically — no account, no watermark, files stay in your browser. The full walkthrough below uses the same steps our checker validates against, so a photo that passes here passes the official counter too.

1. Upload a source photo. Phone photo against a plain wall, face the window for soft daylight, hair off the face, neutral expression. Bigger and sharper is better; the tool downsamples, it cannot invent detail.
2. Pick the country preset. Select the preset named for this specification. The crop box locks to the official aspect ratio and head-height band automatically.
3. Adjust and check background. Center the face in the guides, confirm the background reads plain and light, and remove glasses unless your country's rules permit them.
4. Download the single photo and the 4x6 sheet. The single JPEG is for online applications; the sheet prints multiple copies at exact size for paper filings.
5. Run the checker before submitting. Our free checker re-verifies dimensions, background, and quality against the same rules below.

Print at Exact Size (4x6 and A4)

Home printing fails on scaling, not on printers: one wrong dialog box shrinks the photo and voids the size. Print the 4x6 sheet at 300 DPI, paper size set to 4x6 inch (or A4 with the sheet placed unscaled), scaling at 100 percent or Actual Size, and borderless off unless the layout accounts for margins. Matte or luster photo paper takes ink without the glare that glossy prints add — glare reads as a defect under counter lighting.

Verify with a ruler before cutting: the printed photo must measure the official millimeters edge to edge, not approximately. If it is off by even a millimeter, recheck the scaling setting rather than trimming to fit — trimming a wrongly scaled print keeps the head proportion wrong. Our print-at-home walkthrough, linked below, shows the exact dialog settings for the common printer brands.

Baby and Child Photos

Children need their own compliant photo, and babies are rejected most often for hands, toys, shadows, and tilted heads. The working method: lay the baby on a plain light sheet, shoot from directly above in daylight, keep toys and dummies out of frame, and support the head from behind the sheet so no adult hand appears. Enrollment staff photograph minors live as well; bring the child with documents ready. Home-method prints serve file and upload needs identically.

Validity, Reissue, and Lost Cases

Standard validity runs ten years for adults with shorter cycles for minors — confirm tiers on the DoP site when choosing. Renewal restarts the full photo standard; never recycle old images. Lost cases add police-report documentation with identical photo rules; damaged booklets travel with the holder for cancellation. Assemble reports before the photo sitting so appointments burn on neither gap.

Rejection Reasons and Fixes

Counters reject on a short repeat list. Each cause below pairs with its fix — run through it before every submission, because re-takes cost days and rebooked appointments cost more.

• Wrong-ratio prints. Visa-size defaults fail proportions — confirm the DoP figure and re-frame from source.
• Unprepared live capture. The operative photo happens at enrollment — arrive camera-ready.
• Citizenship mismatches. Certificate details must match the application exactly; update civil records first.
• Shadowed backgrounds on prints. Daylight reshoot on true white fixes supporting sets.
• Stale likeness. Photos must resemble current appearance across the full validity.

Fees and Processing Lanes

Regular and urgent handling tiers carry different fees and windows — confirm the live schedule on the DoP site when booking, since tiers move. The photo standard never varies by lane; urgent money buys speed, not leniency, and a rejected photo in the urgent lane burns both the premium and the deadline. Choose the lane by date arithmetic (deadline minus published window minus a buffer week), prepare prints plus camera-ready appearance first, and only then pay the tier. Keep every receipt with the file.

Corrections and Citizenship Linkage

Citizenship certificate details must match the application exactly — update civil records first on marriage, correction, or address change, since offices verify against the citizenship database and mismatches stall regardless of photo perfection. Name and birth-date corrections route through affidavit and supporting-certificate chains that dwarf photography in complexity; assemble those first, photograph to the corrected identity second. Renewal never absorbs unfiled corrections automatically.

Districts vs Kathmandu vs Missions Abroad

District administration offices serve regional applicants with local token mechanics, Kathmandu headquarters handles volume plus complex cases, and missions abroad serve overseas Nepalis with post-specific checklists — confirm the exact venue's notice before traveling, since procedures differ by site. Complex files (corrections, replacements, minor guardianship cases) fare better at larger centers with deeper staff benches. Wherever you file, one complete folder beats three partial visits.

Frequently Asked Questions