Adding cover and thumbnail images - Gumroad Help Center

Adding cover and thumbnail images

In this article:

• Filetypes
• Adding cover images
  • Recommended specifications
  • Embed videos
  • Selecting and using multiple files
  • Removing cover images
  • What customers see
• Thumbnails
• Known issues

You can upload a cover image after adding a product file or license. Cover images can be images or videos (independent of the file you've uploaded as your product file) that advertise, help describe your product, or offer a taste of what's to come.

You can upload multiple "preview" files to a product, and your customers will be able to scroll through them before purchasing.

Compelling cover images (or videos) double conversion rates, contribute to your brand, and give your product its own identity.

We recommend using an image as your first cover and putting your videos in the product description instead. The carousel controls that tell customers more covers exist — the white circles at the bottom of the frame — are hidden while a video is showing, so a video-first page gives no visible hint that anything else is there. To add a video to your description, open the description editor, click 'Insert', choose 'Insert video', and paste a YouTube or Vimeo link.

Filetypes

A cover image can be a PNG, JPEG, MOV, or GIF file. You can also link to a YouTube or Vimeo video.

Adding cover images

After you have created a product, click 'Upload images or videos' under Cover to add the cover image/video. You can upload the file from your device or paste an external URL (like YouTube or Vimeo). You can add up to 8 covers to your product.

Recommended specifications

As a rule of thumb, if you are going to upload an image as a cover image, it should be 1280 pixels wide x 720 pixels tall at least 72 DPI (dots per inch).

Image covers must be smaller than 50 MB. If an image you upload is larger than 4096 pixels on its longest side, we automatically resize it down to that size shortly after upload. Covers display at a much smaller size, so this does not change how your product page looks. GIFs are not resized, so their animation is preserved.

Covers do not have to be widescreen. Each cover is shown in a frame that matches its own shape, so a tall cover, such as a video filmed on a phone held upright, is shown as a tall cover rather than being stretched or cropped to match the first one. A cover that is taller than it is wide is never shown in a frame taller than 80% of the window, so a very tall cover is scaled down and centered instead of pushing your product title and the buy button out of view. Covers that are wider than they are tall, such as a 1280 x 720 image, are always shown at their own shape and fill the frame edge to edge. Covers we have no recorded dimensions for, which includes some uploaded before we started reading them, are shown in the standard frame as before.

Note: Because each cover is shown at its own shape, the page shifts a little as customers move between covers of different shapes. If you are uploading multiple covers, we still recommend making them the same shape for the best look.

Embed videos

Hit 'Upload from an external website' and paste your share link.

If your cover video is hosted on YouTube or Vimeo, simply find the URL or share the file link, for example:

After you copy the URL, paste it into the box and hit the upload button!

Selecting and using multiple files

You can add multiple files at once by holding down the control or command key while selecting the images/videos you would like to upload.

To upload additional files, click on the box with the plus sign and it'll prompt you to choose a file or add another embeddable link.

Once you have your files uploaded, simply click and drag to change the order in which they appear. Click on the file thumbnail for a larger preview of the image/video.

Removing cover images

To remove a cover image, simply click the "X" at the top right of the cover thumbnail. The following image in the line will appear.

What customers see

When customers land on your product's page, they will see the image you selected to show first. White circles at the bottom of your cover image and arrows on the side of the image will indicate that there are other cover images to check out. The circles are hidden while a video cover is showing so they do not sit on top of the video's playback controls, which is the main reason we recommend leading with an image.

Thumbnails

Thumbnails are entirely separate from your cover images; you do not need to use them. If you choose to add one, your thumbnail will show up in customers' libraries, Gumroad Discover, and on your profile page. Make these images, as the page shows, at least 600 x 600 pixels.

Known issues

• If the filename of the image/video file contains one of these characters: #, $, _, +, &, ;, :, %, please rename your cover image to something simple like "hello.png" and try uploading it again.
• You cannot upload a PDF as a cover image.
• If you see "Cover images must be smaller than 50 MB. Please resize or compress the image and try again." the image file is over our 50 MB limit for image covers. Reduce the file size (for example by exporting it as a JPEG or compressing the PNG) and upload it again.
• You can use free image-editing software like Canva or Gimp to generate thumbnails & covers in the correct sizes.
• Old Cover Image Showing in Preview on X (formerly Twitter)

When you share your Gumroad product link on X, that platform caches the link preview, including your cover image. Because X no longer offers a tool to refresh link previews, your updated cover image might not appear immediately.

The only reliable solution is to wait — X will automatically update the preview over time when it re-scrapes your link.