Glovo Photo Size in Bulgaria: How to Prepare Menu Images

What Glovo actually publishes for Bulgaria

Glovo's integration documentation states that uploaded menu images are reviewed manually, and that is the only rule available in public sources for Bulgaria. There is no published minimum resolution, aspect ratio, file-size cap or format list for this market. Any page quoting a specific pixel number for Glovo Bulgaria is repeating a figure the platform has not confirmed.

Practically, that means the upload screen is the authority. Open the image upload step in your Glovo partner dashboard before you shoot anything, and look at what it accepts and how it frames the preview. If the screen shows a square crop window, plan for square. If it shows a wide banner, plan for wide. Take a screenshot of that window so whoever edits the photos sees the same thing.

Because review is manual, a technically clean photo is not the same as an approved photo. Reviewers look at whether the image shows the dish you are selling, whether it looks like real food, and whether it matches the menu text. A sharp, well-lit photo of the wrong dish will be rejected just as fast as a blurry one.

Build one master file that survives any crop

Shoot in landscape (3:2 or 16:9) even though most delivery thumbnails end up square. Landscape gives you room to reposition the crop later, and the square you need is a subset of it. If you shoot square only, you lose the ability to rescue a photo where the plate sits slightly off-center.

Compose so the entire dish, rim included, sits inside a centered square that you can draw on the back of the camera. Keep that square at least 60 percent of the frame width, with the plate centered and a few centimeters of table visible on every side. Then any crop, square or wide, keeps the whole dish visible.

Light from one side at roughly 45 degrees to the table, not straight down. Side light gives texture to bread, grilled meat and pastries; overhead light flattens them. Use a window or a single diffused light and a white card opposite it to lift the shadow side. Avoid mixing daylight with warm restaurant bulbs, which pushes white plates yellow and makes sauces look dull.

Export a large JPEG, quality 90 or above, sRGB color profile, long edge around 2000 pixels. That is big enough to downscale cleanly to any size the upload screen asks for and small enough to upload without problems. Do not sharpen aggressively; downscaling to a thumbnail exaggerates sharpening halos. Keep the RAW or original file so you can re-export if the platform changes its crop.

Matching the photo to the Bulgarian menu text

Glovo menus in Bulgaria are written in Bulgarian, and the photo has to agree with the description line by line. If the menu says the dish comes with lyutenitsa, the photo should show lyutenitsa. If it lists olives and the photo has none, a reviewer or a customer will notice. Read the Bulgarian description next to the exported file before uploading, not after.

Watch the garnish and side dishes. A shopska salad photographed with extra feta that the description does not mention, or a portion size that looks twice what the text implies, creates a mismatch. Photograph the actual portion the kitchen sends out, on the actual plate, and let the description do the selling.

Keep one visual style across the menu. Same background surface, same light direction, same camera height for every dish. Mixed styles make a menu look assembled from different restaurants and make portion comparison harder for the customer. A plain light gray or warm neutral surface works for most Bulgarian dishes and does not fight with red peppers, white cheese or dark grilled meat.

Bulgarian dishes that are hard to photograph

Shopska salad is the classic problem: white cheese, pale cucumber and white plate merge into one bright mass. Use a darker plate or a mid-tone wooden board, and grate or crumble the cheese so it has visible texture rather than a flat cap. Shoot slightly above table level, around 45 degrees, so the tomato and pepper colors show.

Moussaka and kavarma collapse into brown. They need low, side light and a visible edge: serve in the clay pot or a dark dish, and let a spoonful be pulled slightly aside so the layers read. Add a small garnish of fresh parsley or a wedge of pepper only if the menu description mentions it.

Banitsa and other filo pastries look like flat pale rectangles under soft light. Shoot them at a low angle with raking side light to catch the layers, and show a cut piece so the filling is visible. Sarmi and stuffed peppers benefit from being shown cut open, again only if the filling in the photo matches the description.

Grilled meats and kebapche need a hot, direct side light and a quick shot before fat sets and turns matte. Photograph them on a dark surface so the char reads. Tarator and cold soups are best shot in a glass or dark bowl at a slight angle, with the surface texture visible, not from directly above where the soup becomes a flat disc.

Allergen rules and what a photo may not imply

Under EU Regulation 1169/2011, allergen information for the 14 regulated allergens must be available for food sold without packaging, and for distance selling such as delivery apps it must be available before the purchase is concluded. In practice: the allergen details must be on the Glovo listing or reachable before the customer pays, not in a photo and not in a message after the order.

Photos never replace that information. A picture of a dish with walnuts on top does not discharge the duty to declare nuts, and a picture without them does not mean the dish is nut-free. Keep the allergen field filled in and treat the photo as decoration only.

A photo should also not suggest ingredients the dish does not contain. Do not add a cream swirl to a dairy-free soup for looks, do not scatter sesame on a dish whose description omits it, and do not show a bread basket that is not part of the order. This is both a legal risk and a source of complaints and refunds.

Pre-upload check before the photos go live

Run every image through the same short check, then upload. If the dashboard preview looks wrong, fix the file rather than hoping the reviewer passes it.

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 delivers each photo as a kit of sizes. It cannot guarantee approval by Glovo, so the final check against the upload screen and the Bulgarian menu text stays with you.