Bolt Food Photo Specs: Image, Menu and Upload Guide

What Bolt Food actually publishes

Bolt Food's public help pages do not list image dimensions, aspect ratios, maximum file size, or accepted file formats for menu item photos. There is no official spec sheet to cite. Treat any blog post that states a fixed pixel count as unofficial, even if it looks authoritative.

The upload screen in the Bolt Food partner portal is the only reliable source. Open it before a shoot, note what it accepts, and screenshot it for your team. Requirements can also differ by market and change without notice, so recheck before each menu refresh.

• Check the partner portal upload screen for accepted formats and any size warning
• Test one dish photo end to end before shooting the full menu
• Keep the notes with your photo files so the next person does not repeat the work

Shoot for a square crop, not a wide frame

Delivery apps display menu items in small square or near-square tiles. A plate shot in a wide 16:9 frame loses its edges when cropped, and a dish arranged across the full width gets cut in half. Compose with the square in mind from the start.

Place the plate centered and leave breathing room on all four sides. If your dish is long, like a kebab or a whole fish, angle it diagonally so both ends stay inside the square. Shoot from directly above at 90 degrees for bowls, pizzas, and salads, or from about 45 degrees for burgers, sandwiches, and plated mains where height matters.

• Camera height: 90 degrees overhead for flat dishes, 45 degrees for stacked dishes
• Keep the dish within the middle of the frame, roughly the central two thirds
• Leave a margin of empty table or background around the plate
• Fill the frame with the food, not the table, then crop tighter in editing

Lighting and color that survive small thumbnails

A thumbnail is judged in under a second, so contrast matters more than fine detail. Use soft daylight from one side, ideally near a window, and a white or neutral card on the opposite side to lift shadows. Avoid direct overhead ceiling lights, which put a hard shadow under every bun and garnish.

Accurate color is the bigger risk. Bolt Food customers order from a photo and then compare it with what arrives. Shoot in a neutral white balance and avoid heavy warm filters, which make fries look orange and salads look yellow. If your kitchen has warm bulbs, set white balance manually rather than relying on auto.

• Shoot near a window, side-lit, with a white card as a bounce
• Turn off mixed lighting: no ceiling lights plus daylight in the same frame
• Set white balance manually and keep it identical across the whole menu
• Check the photo on a phone at thumbnail size before you approve it

Background, props, and what to leave out

A clean background separates the dish from the tile. A plain wood board, a matte dark surface, or a simple paper backdrop works better than a busy tablecloth. Keep props minimal: one napkin, one utensil, or a single sauce dish is enough. Too many props shrink the food and confuse the eye at small size.

Show the dish as the customer receives it. Use the actual portion, the actual packaging if it is a delivery-only item, and the actual sides included. If a combo comes with a drink, show the drink. Photos that imply more than the container holds cause complaints and refunds later.

• One surface, one or two props maximum
• Match the portion size to what the kitchen sends out
• Include packaging when the item arrives in it
• Remove crumbs, spills, and fingerprints from the frame

Export and upload checks

Export as a high-quality JPEG at the largest size the portal accepts, and avoid re-saving the same file repeatedly, which adds compression artifacts. If the upload screen shows a file size warning, reduce quality slightly rather than shrinking dimensions, because small files look soft on larger screens.

Name files by menu item and market, for example chicken-rice-bowl-tallinn, so a mixed folder does not cause the wrong photo to land on the wrong dish. After uploading, open the live menu on your own phone and check every item. Reviewers and customers see the app version, not your editing software.

• Export JPEG at high quality, then check the file size against the portal
• Keep one master file per dish and derive the upload version from it
• Verify the live app view after publishing, not just the portal preview

Review problems to avoid

The most common rejection causes are not technical. They are photos that misrepresent the dish, show a different item than the one listed, include another restaurant's branding, or carry text overlays and promotional badges baked into the image. Keep the image about the food.

If a market's rules restrict edited or generated imagery, use a real photo of the real dish and confirm the current policy with Bolt Food directly rather than assuming. FoodPhoto takes a real photo of the restaurant's own dish and improves light, background and crop for menus, delivery apps and social, keeping the food as it is, and every photo comes as a kit of sizes. It cannot guarantee approval by any platform.

Frequently asked questions