Measured from the platform's own overlay, or labeled as a guide
Facebook Reels safe zone
Short answer
Meta publishes Facebook Reels safe-zone figures in its ads guide: leave roughly 14% of the top, 35% of the bottom and 6% of each side free of text, logos and key creative. Put on the 1080 x 1920 frame, that reserves a 269 px top band, a 672 px bottom band and 65 px at each side.
Key takeaways
- These are Meta's own words on the Facebook Reels page of the Ads Guide: "Consider leaving roughly 14% of the top, 35% of the bottom, and 6% on each side of your asset free from text, logos, or other key creative elements to avoid cropping key elements or covering them with the profile icon or call-to-action".
- That page is the one of the two Reels specifications that names what covers the margins: the profile icon and the call to action.
- Scaled to the same 1080 x 1920 frame, 14% of 1920 works out at 268.8 px and 6% of 1080 at 64.8 px, both rounded here to 269 px and 65 px.
- These are ad figures. The ads guide does not address the organic Facebook Reels player.
The overlay
Facebook Reels carries the same published margins as Instagram Reels because Meta publishes one set for both. The overlay is generated from the percentages on Meta's Facebook Reels page.
Official guidance (approximate) · Sales Video Ad Specs on Facebook Reels (Meta Ads Guide) · Last checked 2026-10-05
On a 1080×1920 frame, leave the top 269 px, the bottom 672 px, the left 65 px and the right 65 px free of text and faces.
Meta publishes this for Facebook Reels ads; organic Reels can differ.
Surfaces on this platform
One surface, verified. If you cross-post to Instagram Reels the same overlay covers it, and the Instagram Reels page links here.
Reel
VERIFIED · Sales Video Ad Specs on Facebook Reels (Meta Ads Guide) publishes these figures, and Koldflux checked them on 2026-10-05. The download carries the same numbers.
- Top
- 14% · 269 px
- Bottom
- 35% · 672 px
- Left
- 6% · 65 px
- Right
- 6% · 65 px
Source: Sales Video Ad Specs on Facebook Reels (Meta Ads Guide). Checked 2026-10-05.
The Facebook Reels sentence, and the two words that are different
The Facebook Reels video ad specifications say: "Consider leaving roughly 14% of the top, 35% of the bottom, and 6% on each side of your asset free from text, logos, or other key creative elements to avoid cropping key elements or covering them with the profile icon or call-to-action".
Two details in that sentence do not appear on the Instagram Reels page. The first is "roughly", where Instagram says "at least". The second is the reason clause: "to avoid cropping key elements or covering them with the profile icon or call-to-action". The Instagram page gives numbers without saying what covers them.
That reason clause is why the numbers are lopsided. A 35% band at the bottom is a lot of frame to give up unless something big sits there, and Meta says what it is on this page: the profile icon and the call to action.
Same arithmetic, different page
The numbers are identical to Instagram Reels, so the arithmetic is identical: at 1080 x 1920 px, 14% of 1920 is 268.8 px, 35% of 1920 is 672 px, and 6% of 1080 is 64.8 px.
What is left is a box measuring 950 by 979 px, sitting between x = 65 and x = 1015 and between y = 269 and y = 1248. That box holds 930,050 px of the frame's 2,073,600 px, a share of 44.85%.
Side percentages are of the width and top and bottom percentages are of the height. That is why the overlay generator divides left and right by 1080 and top and bottom by 1920, and why a percentage read against the wrong axis gives a plausible-looking but wrong rectangle.
If you cross-post one Reel to both surfaces, one overlay covers both. There is no second set of numbers to reconcile, because Meta published one set.
What is not covered by these numbers
Both Reels specifications sit under Reels ads. A Reel posted organically is not the object the sentence describes, and the organic player is not addressed anywhere in the pages Koldflux read on 2026-10-05.
The Meta pages Koldflux read on 2026-10-05 carry no overlay image for Facebook Reels either, where the TikTok In-Feed help page links one, so there is no second artifact to measure these percentages against. The percentages on this page are transcribed from that one sentence.
One further limit worth knowing, from the same guide rather than from this page: the figure is a floor. "Roughly 14%" does not license putting a face at 13%.
Downloads
Reel
These come from the Facebook Reels placement page of Meta's Ads Guide, and they include the clause naming what covers the margins. The file carries that document and the date it was read on its face.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Facebook Reels safe zone?
Meta's Facebook Reels page asks for roughly 14% at the top, 35% at the bottom and 6% at each side. On a 1080 x 1920 frame that is 269 px, 672 px and 65 px.
Are the Facebook and Instagram Reels safe zones the same?
The numbers are the same, 14 / 35 / 6, because Meta publishes them on both placement pages. The sentences differ: Facebook says "roughly" and explains the margins are there to avoid covering the profile icon or the call to action, while Instagram says "at least" and gives no reason.
Do these apply to organic Facebook Reels?
They are published for Reels ads. The organic Facebook Reels player is not addressed by the ads guide, and this page labels them as ad guidance.
Can I use one overlay for both Facebook and Instagram Reels?
Yes. Meta published one set of margins for both placements, so a single 1080 x 1920 overlay covers a Reel published to either surface.
Sources
- Meta Ads Guide: Sales Video Ad Specs on Facebook Reels (checked 2026-10-05)
The Facebook Reels placement page is written for Reels ads and is silent about an organic Reel, so the page presents the numbers as ad guidance and not as a crop boundary for a feed post.