How to take a passport photo at home in Australia
By the PhotoPrep team · Checked against the Australian Passport Office's published guidelines on 17 July 2026. PhotoPrep is an online photo service, mentioned below.
You can. There is no rule that a passport photo must be taken in a shop - every photo is judged against the same published guidelines. The short version: stand in front of a plain light wall in even window light, have someone photograph you with the rear camera from 1.5 to 2 metres at eye level, keep a neutral expression, then crop to 35 × 45 mm with your face 32 to 36 mm chin to crown, and print two copies on glossy photo paper. The rest of this guide is those steps in detail, mapped to the actual rules.
The rules at a glance
Summarised from the Passport Office's photo guidelines, checked 17 July 2026: photo less than 6 months old · 35-40 mm wide × 45-50 mm high · face 32-36 mm chin to crown, centred, looking straight at the camera · plain white or light grey background · uniform lighting, no shadows or reflections · neutral expression, eyes open, mouth closed (open mouths are allowed under age 3) · no retouching of any kind · no glasses without a medical reason · religious head coverings allowed if plain and the whole face is visible · hearing aids allowed, wireless earbuds not. Our requirements page keeps the full list.
Step by step
1. Find a plain, light background
The rules ask for a plain white or light grey background that contrasts with your face. A bare interior wall works. No patterns, no doors or picture frames in shot, nothing else visible. Stand about half a metre in front of the wall so you don't cast a shadow onto it.
2. Use soft, even daylight
Face a large window in daytime, so the light lands evenly on both sides of your face. Direct sun makes harsh stripes; a single ceiling light makes shadows under your eyes and chin. The requirement is uniform lighting that shows your natural skin tone, with no shadows anywhere in the photo.
3. Put the phone 1.5 to 2 metres away, at eye level
Use the rear camera and have someone else take the photo, or prop the phone up and use the timer. Do not shoot at arm's length: a camera that close distorts your face, and "distortion - camera too close" is one of the Passport Office's named examples of an unacceptable photo. If you look small in the frame, zoom in a little rather than stepping closer.
4. Switch off every enhancement
Beauty mode, portrait mode, filters and skin smoothing all count as retouching, which is banned - the rules specifically say moles, wrinkles and scars must not be removed. Shoot on the standard camera at the highest quality your phone offers.
5. Pose to the rules
Look straight at the camera with your head level, not tilted in any direction. Eyes open, mouth closed, neutral expression - no smile. Hair completely clear of the edges of your face. No glasses unless you can't remove them for medical reasons, no hat, and take your earbuds out: the Passport Office states that AirPods and other wireless earbuds are not hearing aids and must be removed.
6. Shoot a batch and cull hard
Take ten or fifteen frames, then judge them the way an assessor would: any shadow on your face or the wall, any blur, red-eye, a tilted head, or an odd skin tone means that frame is out. Good-quality phone cameras clear the bar easily; careless framing and lighting are what fail.
7. Crop, print, done
The printed photo must be 35-40 mm wide and 45-50 mm high - 35 x 45 mm is the standard cut - with your face measuring 32 to 36 mm from chin to crown. You need two identical prints on heavy glossy photo paper (minimum 200 gsm) from a dye-sublimation printer. Photo kiosks and print counters produce this; a home inkjet print is explicitly not acceptable.
Where home photos actually fail
The Passport Office publishes its list of unacceptable examples, and almost all of them are avoidable in the ten seconds before you press the shutter: smiling or even a subtle expression, shadows from single-source light, hair across the face, a tilted or turned head, beauty-filter skin smoothing, glasses left on, earbuds left in, heavy makeup, and camera-too-close distortion from arm's-length shots. The camera itself is almost never the problem. The framing and lighting are.
Should you DIY at all?
An honest note. The Passport Office recommends using a professional photo provider, and it specifically cautions against online photo services and apps over identity-fraud risk. That warning covers our category, so here is exactly where we stand: PhotoPrep is not a government service and is not affiliated with any government agency. Photos are deleted within 48 hours, never used to train models, never sold or shared. And if you want zero risk and prints in your hand today, an in-store service with a free-retake policy is the right call - our price guide compares those options.
Where we fit
Steps 1 to 6 are easy to do with care. Step 7 is where home attempts quietly go wrong: judging whether your face measures 32 to 36 mm on a 45 mm print is exactly the kind of thing humans eyeball badly. That is the part we built PhotoPrep for. Upload your best frame and we crop it to size and grade it against the published rules, item by item, for free - if it is likely to fail, we tell you before you pay anything. If it passes, $6 unlocks the file plus a print-ready sheet of four sized for any photo kiosk.
Upload the frame you just took and see the full pass/fail checklist before you pay anything.
Check my photoCommon questions
Can I just take a selfie?
Not a hand-held one. At arm's length the camera is too close and distorts your face, which the Passport Office lists as an unacceptable photo. Use the rear camera from 1.5 metres or more, with a second person or a propped phone and the self-timer.
Do I have to use a professional photographer?
No. The Passport Office recommends professional providers, but there is no rule requiring one - every photo, however it was taken, is assessed against the same published guidelines. What a store adds is the safety net: staff framing, correct paper, and usually a free retake if the photo is rejected.
Can I wear glasses?
Only if you can't remove them for medical reasons, and vision impairment alone doesn't qualify. If you have a genuine medical exemption, the frames must not cover any part of your eyes and there must be no reflection from the lenses.
How does this work for a baby?
Children under 3 get one concession: their mouth may be open. Everything else still applies, and nobody else can be visible in the photo - a parent's steadying hand is a named unacceptable example. The reliable method is laying the baby on a plain white sheet in even daylight and shooting from directly above.
How do I get a phone photo printed at the right size?
The photo has to be cropped to passport proportions first, then placed on a standard print sheet - a 6 x 4 inch sheet fits four passport photos and an application needs two. Take the sheet to any photo kiosk or print counter and ask for a glossy print. Costs are in our price guide.
Sources
- Australian Passport Office — Passport photos (all requirements and unacceptable-photo examples on this page, checked 17 Jul 2026)
- PhotoPrep — Photo requirements (our running summary of the published rules)
Rules change. If you spot something out of date, email us and we will fix it. Not affiliated with the Australian Passport Office or any government agency.