Spotify Canvas: Dimensions, Specs, and How to Add One

Spotify Canvas is the short looping visual that plays behind a track on the Now Playing screen. It runs 3 to 8 seconds, loops silently, and fills the phone screen while the song plays. For artists it is one of the easiest ways to make a track feel alive and get people to share it. Here are the exact specs, the upload steps, and what to do when it refuses to work.

What Spotify Canvas actually is

A Canvas is a vertical, looping clip (video or a still image) attached to a specific track. When a listener opens that song on the mobile app, the static cover art is replaced by your Canvas, which loops on repeat with no sound. It is not a music video and it is not the cover art. Think of it as a moving backdrop: a few seconds of motion designed to catch the eye and, ideally, get tapped and shared.

It shows on the Spotify mobile app on the Now Playing view. Desktop and web support has been patchy over the years, which matters when we get to troubleshooting. Canvas is set per track, so a ten-song album can have ten different Canvases, or none.

Spotify Canvas dimensions and specs

These are the requirements straight from Spotify for Artists. Miss any of them and the upload gets rejected, so check them before you export.

• Aspect ratio: vertical 9:16 (portrait).
• Dimensions: between 720px and 1080px tall. A common, safe export is 720 x 1280.
• Length: 3 to 8 seconds. Clips outside this range are rejected, no exceptions.
• File format: MP4 (for video) or JPEG (for a still image).
• No audio: the Canvas must be silent. Any audio track on the file will get it rejected.
• Loop: it repeats from the start on every pass, so plan the loop point.

Spotify does not publish a hard maximum file size in the guidelines, but keep files reasonable (a few seconds of vertical video is small anyway). If your export is heavy, re-encode it at a lower bitrate rather than fighting the uploader.

A quick note on the safe area: because phone screens crop differently and Spotify overlays the track title, artist name, and controls near the bottom, keep the important part of your visual centered and away from the edges. Text or a logo shoved to the bottom of the frame will sit under the play button.

How to add a Canvas on Spotify

You add a Canvas through Spotify for Artists, not the regular Spotify app. Here is the flow:

1. Make sure you have Editor or Admin access to the artist profile in Spotify for Artists.
2. Open your dashboard and go to the Music (catalog) section.
3. Select the track you want the Canvas on.
4. Find the Canvas option in the track’s settings.
5. Upload your MP4 or JPEG that meets all the specs above.
6. Preview the loop in the uploader to check the cut point.
7. Save. It usually goes live within minutes, sometimes a bit longer.

You can replace or remove a Canvas anytime from the same screen, so nothing is permanent. If you are prepping a release, add the Canvas around the same time you set up your Spotify pre-save so everything is ready the moment the track goes live.

If you do not have a video ready, a Canvas maker can help. Plenty of apps and templates export the correct 9:16, 3-to-8-second, no-audio format automatically. You can also loop a section of your existing cover art or a simple animation. If you need the source artwork to build from, our Spotify cover art downloader pulls the high-res image for you.

Why Canvas helps: shares, saves, and attention

Spotify has pointed to its own early Canvas testing to argue the feature moves the needle. The figures it circulated during rollout suggested tracks with a Canvas were noticeably more likely to be shared, streamed again, and added to playlists, along with a bump in artist-profile visits. Treat those numbers as early, Spotify-supplied data rather than a guarantee, since results vary a lot by artist and audience.

The logic holds up even without the stats, though. A moving visual is more thumb-stopping than a static square. It gives listeners something to screenshot or share to their story, and every share is free discovery. In that sense a Canvas plays a similar role to good visuals when you promote music on SoundCloud: it lowers the friction for someone to pass your track along. It will not fix a song nobody wants to hear, but for a track with momentum it adds polish and shareability at basically zero cost.

Canvas best practices

A few things separate a good Canvas from a distracting one:

• Loop cleanly. The clip restarts from frame one every time. Either match the first and last frames so the loop has no visible jump, or use a deliberate hard cut so the restart looks intentional.
• Keep it simple. Avoid rapid cuts, fast flashing, and anything that reads as chaotic on a small screen. Slow, hypnotic motion works better than a frantic edit.
• No lyrics or singing footage. Spotify’s guidance steers away from talking or singing shots. Abstract motion, texture, or a looping scene fits the format better.
• Mind the safe area. Keep key elements centered so the app’s overlay and screen cropping do not hide them.
• Prioritize your active tracks. Put Canvases on the singles you are actually pushing rather than spreading effort across the whole back catalog.
• Quality over filler. A blurry vertical crop of a random clip looks worse than plain cover art. If you cannot make a decent one, leave it off for now.

Spotify Canvas not working? Try this

If your Canvas will not upload, or you cannot see one as a listener, the fixes fall into two buckets.

As an artist (upload problems):

• Check every spec. The most common rejection reasons are wrong length (must be 3 to 8 seconds), wrong ratio (must be 9:16), or leftover audio on the file. Strip the audio and re-export.
• Confirm your access level. You need Editor or Admin on the profile. Viewer access will not show the Canvas tools.
• Re-encode the file. A stubborn MP4 sometimes uploads fine after a fresh export from a different tool. Spotify also publishes a dedicated Canvas upload error page.
• Give it time. New Canvases can take a little while to appear live after saving.

As a listener (cannot see a Canvas):

• Update the app. Canvas is a mobile app feature. An outdated app is the usual culprit.
• Turn off Data Saver. Data Saver mode disables Canvas playback. Toggle it off in Settings.
• Check Canvas is enabled. In the app settings there is a toggle for Canvas; make sure it is on.
• Remember not every track has one. If the artist never added a Canvas, you will just see the cover art. That is not a bug.

Reddit artist threads on r/WeAreTheMusicMakers echo the same pattern: most “Canvas not working” posts come down to a spec mismatch on upload or Data Saver being on for the listener, rather than a Spotify outage. For the rest of the set, see all our Spotify tools and guides.

FAQ

Sources

• Spotify for Artists: Canvas guidelines
• Spotify for Artists: Fix a Canvas upload error
• Spotify for Artists: 10 tips to get the most from your Canvas
• Velveteen: Spotify Canvas size, dimensions and specs
• Musosoup: How long is a Spotify Canvas, specs and best practices