Google Play Screenshots: Counts, Sizes, and Content Rules

Google Play screenshots are the images in your app's store listing, uploaded per device type in Play Console: at least 2 to publish, up to 8 for each device type, as JPEG or 24-bit PNG files with no alpha channel. Each side must be between 320 and 3,840 pixels, the long side can be at most twice the short side, and phone screenshots need to be 9:16 or 16:9 at 1080 pixels or more to be considered for featuring.

Those numbers come from Google's preview assets help page, which ranks first for this search. The rest of the first page is a mix of tool pages selling templates, a sizes guide from AppRadar, a Pinterest board, and a Reddit thread from r/androiddev that's four years old. The part that catches developers who already ship on iOS is further down Google's page, where it lists what should and shouldn't appear inside the image. A slide headlined "#1 habit tracker, download now" goes against two of those items, one for the ranking claim and one for the call to action. The sections below cover the formal requirements first, then the content rules, then what changes when you start from an App Store set.

Requirements by device type

Phone screenshots are the ones nearly every app needs. The other device types apply only if your app supports them, and a few have rules of their own.

Device type	Count	Size and shape
Phone	Up to 8; 4 or more for featuring	320 to 3,840 px per side, 2:1 at most; 9:16 or 16:9 at 1080 px or more for featuring
7-inch and 10-inch tablet	Up to 8 each; at least 4	9:16 portrait or 16:9 landscape, 1,080 to 7,680 px
Chromebook	Up to 8; at least 4	9:16 or 16:9, 1,080 to 7,680 px
Wear OS	At least 1	1:1, at least 384 x 384, interface only with no frame, text, or background
Android TV	At least 1, plus a TV banner	Banner is 1280 x 720
Android XR	4 to 8	8:5, 1920 x 1200 minimum, 3840 x 2400 recommended, up to 8 MB each

Games get a slightly different featuring bar on phones: at least 3 screenshots, all landscape at 16:9 or all portrait at 9:16, and they have to show the in-game experience. The minimum of 2 screenshots to publish counts across all device types, so an app with one phone screenshot and one tablet screenshot technically clears it. For exact pixel sizes per device, the Google Play screenshot sizes page lists the recommended dimensions along with the icon and feature graphic specs.

What Google lets you put in the image

Google splits its guidance into requirements, which can lead to removal or suspension if you break them, and highly recommended items, which affect eligibility for promotion. The content rules for screenshots sit in the second group, so they won't block an upload, but they count toward whether Google promotes the listing. Here's what the help page asks for, in plain terms:

• Keep taglines to 20% of the image or less, and avoid small text.
• Leave out calls to action such as "Download now" or "Try it free".
• Leave out performance, ranking, award, and price claims, which rules out "Best", "#1", "New", and "Sale".
• Avoid taglines tied to a date or season that will go stale.
• Show a clean status bar with full battery, Wi-Fi, and signal, and no notifications.
• Don't show fingers or hands tapping the screen, unless the app is used away from the device.
• Don't blur, stretch, rotate, or distort the images.
• Localize taglines and overlay text for each language.
• Write alt text for each image, up to 140 characters, without "image of" or "photo of".

The 20% rule is the one an App Store layout is most likely to run into. App Store layouts often reserve a wide band at the top of the slide for a large headline, and on a 1080 x 1920 canvas a band one fifth tall is 384 pixels across the full width. Measure the area the tagline's text takes up rather than the band behind it, and cut words before you shrink the type, since Google also asks you to avoid small fonts. Google does allow sets where the UI breaks across two images (a panorama), as long as the first three screenshots still put the app's interface first. The localization advice matches what Apple does, and the screenshot localization checklist works for a Play listing with the App Store Connect steps swapped for Play Console.

Starting from an App Store set

If the iOS listing came first, it's tempting to upload the same files. The 6.9-inch iPhone size, 1290 x 2796, has an aspect ratio of about 2.17:1, which is over Google's 2:1 limit, so Play Console won't accept it as it is. You'd have to crop or pad it to 2:1 or less, or to 9:16 if you want it considered for featuring, and either change moves the headline and the device off their planned positions, so in practice the slides get rebuilt at 1080 x 1920. That's the moment to fix the other differences as well. Apple allows up to 10 screenshots per device and Google allows 8, so a 10-slide iOS set loses its two weakest slides, and the post on how many App Store screenshots to use has a way to rank slides that works for that cut. Take new captures from the Android build too, because an iPhone frame or iOS navigation on a Play listing shows a product Android users won't get.

The same applies in reverse. Apple's guideline 2.3.10 bars Android devices and Google Play badges from App Store screenshots, which is covered in why App Store screenshots get rejected. Two stores means two sets, each captured on its own platform.

The feature graphic sits next to the screenshots

Every Play listing also needs a feature graphic, a 1024 x 500 banner in JPEG or 24-bit PNG with no alpha. It's a separate asset from the screenshots, and Google uses it as the cover of your preview video and in large-format app collections, which can include ads. Google recommends keeping the important parts near the center so nothing is cut off, avoiding pure white, black, or dark gray backgrounds, and leaving out device images and Play badges. A preview video, if you add one, goes in as a YouTube link with ads turned off.

Uploading them in Play Console

Screenshots belong to the store listing in Play Console, with one set per device type for each language you've added. Saved changes go to Google for review before they appear on the store, and since the listing is separate from your app bundle, replacing screenshots doesn't need a new release.

Making a Play set with Screenies

Screenies generates Android phone sets at 1080 x 1920 portrait or 1920 x 1080 landscape, and Android tablet sets at 1440 x 2560 or 2560 x 1440, all as PNG with no alpha, built from captures of your Android app. You can start an Android phone set from your captures and an app description, and it doesn't make the feature graphic, so that banner is still yours to design. Once the workspace has bought a credit pack and the app is linked to its Play package through a service account key, the dashboard can send a finished set of up to 8 slides to the matching language of your listing, backing up the screenshots already there before replacing them. Phone slides cost one credit each and tablet slides two, so a full 8-slide phone set uses 8 of the 12 credits in the $9 pack.

Google Play screenshot questions

How many screenshots does Google Play require?

At least 2 across all device types before you can publish, and up to 8 per device type. For an app to be considered for featuring, Google asks for at least 4 phone screenshots at 9:16 or 16:9 and 1080 pixels or more, and games need at least 3 in landscape or 3 in portrait that show gameplay.

Can Google Play screenshots be PNG with transparency?

Google accepts JPEG or 24-bit PNG only, so a PNG with an alpha channel is refused. Export with the alpha channel removed, or save as JPEG.

Do I need tablet screenshots on Google Play?

They're optional. If your app supports tablets, Google asks for at least 4 tablet screenshots at 9:16 or 16:9, with each side between 1,080 and 7,680 pixels. Phone-only apps can skip them.

Can I put "#1" or an award in a screenshot?

Google's guidance asks you to leave out ranking, award, and performance claims, so a "#1" badge or an award ribbon goes against it even when the claim is true. Leave the claim out of the screenshots, where it can't be updated without a new image.

Is landscape allowed for Google Play phone screenshots?

Landscape at 16:9 and 1920 x 1080 or larger meets the same featuring bar as portrait at 9:16. Pick one orientation for the set so the screenshots line up when someone scrolls the listing.