Target 1280 px
Resize an image to 1280 px
1280 pixels is the practical width for an image sitting inside a column of text, at roughly a third of the weight of a full-HD file.
Chasing an upload limit instead? Resize to a file size →
The in-article size
1280 pixels is the practical width for an image inside a body of text. It stays sharp on high-density phone screens, where a column is rarely wider than 400 CSS pixels, while weighing roughly a third of a full-HD file.
It is also the standard width for HD video thumbnails and for most documentation screenshots, where legibility matters more than size.
Screenshots deserve care
Screenshots are the case where resizing does the most damage: scaled-down text turns fuzzy much faster than a photograph does. If your image is a screenshot with small text, resize it as little as you can, and consider cropping to the relevant part instead of shrinking the whole window.
Photographs are the opposite case. They are almost always larger than they need to be, and 1280 px removes weight that will not be missed.