Driving licence photos by country
A driving licence is issued by a transport authority or by the police, not by the passport office, and they write their own photo rule. The first question here is not about millimetres at all: in some countries no photo is submitted for a national licence — the applicant is photographed on the spot, at the examination centre or at the service desk. Below are the formats we have confirmed against an official source, and where a photo is needed and where the authority makes it.
| Country | Size | Head | Background | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Albania | 40 × 50 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Armenia | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Austria | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | 35 × 45 mm photo allowing unambiguous identification of the holder | |
| Belarus | 40 × 50 mm | 64–70% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Belgium | 35 × 45 mm | 69–80% | White or very light plain background without shadows or gradients | |
| Colombia | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Croatia | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background | |
| Denmark | 35 × 45 mm | 67–80% | Plain light background, e.g. light blue or light grey | |
| Estonia | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Finland | 36 × 47 mm | 68–77% | Plain light neutral background without shadows | |
| France | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background | |
| Georgia | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Germany | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain neutral background with clear contrast to the face | |
| Hungary | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Iceland | 35 × 45 mm | 67–80% | Plain light background | |
| India | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Strictly white background | |
| Italy | 35 × 45 mm | 62–71% | Even plain background without shadows | |
| Italy | — | 70–80% | Even plain background without shadows | |
| Japan | 24 × 30 mm | 55–75% | Even plain background without shadows | |
| Kazakhstan | 35 × 45 mm | 71–80% | Plain white or light grey background | |
| Kyrgyzstan | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Liechtenstein | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Luxembourg | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Moldova | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures, shadows, or foreign objects | |
| Myanmar | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Netherlands | 35 × 45 mm | 58–67% | Even light background without patterns | |
| North Macedonia | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Peru | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain white background | |
| Poland | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background | |
| Russia | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures, shadows, or foreign objects | |
| Russia | 35 × 45 mm | — | Even plain light background | |
| Russia | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain white background | |
| Slovakia | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Slovenia | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background per ICAO-compatible standard | |
| Sri Lanka | 35 × 45 mm | 70–80% | Plain white background | |
| Switzerland | 35 × 45 mm | 64–76% | Uniform neutral background without shadows or foreign objects | |
| Tajikistan | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures or noticeable gradients | |
| Thailand | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures, shadows, or foreign objects | |
| Turkey | 50 × 60 mm | 53–60% | Plain white background | |
| UK | 35 × 45 mm | 64–76% | Plain light background in cream or grey tone without patterns | |
| Uzbekistan | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain light background without textures, shadows, or foreign objects | |
| Vietnam | 30 × 40 mm | 70–80% | Plain white background |
A national licence and an international permit are two photos
Where the authority takes the picture itself for a national licence, an international permit is still applied for with a photo — and that photo has a size of its own. Armenia shows both halves in one act: the list of documents in Annex No. 2 to Decree No. 385-Ն (www.arlis.am/hy/acts/151605) carries no photograph at all, while clause 84 of the same decree asks for 3 × 4 cm. That 3 × 4 cm belongs to the international permit, so the figure is worth reading twice before it is taken for a requirement of the national licence.
Russia is built the same way: Order No. 80 of the Ministry of the Interior treats photographing the applicant as an act of the service-centre officer (clause 277), devotes a separate clause to the applicant who declines to be photographed (clause 35.4), and names a 35 × 45 mm photo on matte paper among the requirements for the international permit (clause 28.11). In Georgia the examination service takes the picture itself: Order No. 20 of the Georgian Ministry of the Interior, of 18 February 2022, restated Article 24, and in that wording the service photographs the applicant with the appropriate technical means (matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/5386464).
Why the numbers scatter more than they look
The size in the table above is not one figure for everyone: alongside the familiar 35 × 45 mm this category also runs 30 × 40 and 50 × 60 mm. But the format is not what scatters most — the head share does. In some countries the face fills a little over half the height of the print, in others up to four fifths of it. Two prints of the same size with a different head height are two different pictures, and cropping a finished photo down to the neighbouring country does not always work.
The second reason for the spread is who writes the rule. A licence is run by a transport authority or by the police, and their instruction lives apart from the passport one: one country publishes its photo requirements on a page of their own, the next buries them in a paragraph inside the licensing rules, a third publishes nothing because it takes the picture itself. That is why the source links in the table lead to documents of very different kinds, from an administrative regulation to the page of a public service.
What to settle before the shoot
- National licence or international permit. That one answer decides both whether a photo is needed at all and what size it has to be.
- The size and the head share your country shows in the table above: the same 35 × 45 mm frame with a different head height is a different photo.
- A print or a file. Where the act names matte paper outright, as it does for the international permit in Russia, a paper photograph is what is meant.
- The age of the photo. A transport authority counts it by its own instruction, not by the passport one; the exact limit, where it is published, is on the country page.