Guide

What is an app store feature graphic?

A 1024x500 landscape banner labeled FEATURE GRAPHIC floating beside a portrait phone-shaped screenshot labeled SCREENSHOT on a neutral studio background

A precise, indie-developer-focused definition of the app store feature graphic, contrasted directly against screenshots, with the exact specs and tooling considerations you need before submitting an app.

Published May 28, 2026 · 8 min read

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TLDR

A feature graphic is a single 1024x500 landscape banner Google Play uses as cover art and editorial promo. A screenshot is a device-sized portrait image of real in-app UI. The feature graphic brands; screenshots demonstrate.

What is an app store feature graphic and how is it different from a screenshot?

Answer: An app store feature graphic is a single 1024x500 px landscape banner uploaded to Google Play that promotes an app inside editorial surfaces, search, and as a video cover. A screenshot is a device-native portrait image of real in-app UI shown only inside the listing gallery. The feature graphic brands; screenshots demonstrate.

The terminology trips up most indie developers at first submission. The two assets share the word "image" and live in adjacent slots inside Google Play Console, but they do completely different jobs. The feature graphic is editorial cover art that Google reuses across surfaces you never directly control. Screenshots are listing-page UI samples that only ever appear once the user is already on your listing. Conflating the two leads to cropped logos, illegible cover art, or a cluttered listing that converts worse than it should.

Where the feature graphic actually appears on Google Play

Answer: The feature graphic sits above the screenshot row on the mobile Play Store listing and acts as the cover frame for the promo video when one is attached. Google also reuses it in Editor's Choice, Featured Games, search results, and App Campaigns ads. It is hidden in desktop browser views of the Play Store.

After the 2018 Play Store redesign, the feature graphic moved to sit below the app title as a video cover, not at the top of the listing as it once did. The bigger point most teams miss: the feature graphic is the only one of your store assets Google can promote outside the listing itself. Editor's Choice tiles, Featured Games rows, search result cards, and App Campaigns ads all pull from this single 1024x500 banner. The desktop web Play Store hides it entirely, which is why previewing your asset on a real phone matters more than checking how it looks in a browser tab.

Annotated diagram of a Google Play listing showing the feature graphic positioned above the screenshot carousel as a video cover, with the play button overlay and the horizontal screenshot row below

Feature graphic vs screenshot: specs, role, and rules

Answer: The two assets disagree on every dimension that matters. The feature graphic is one landscape banner at a fixed 1024x500 px with no alpha channel, used as cover art. Screenshots are multiple portrait images sized per device class, used to walk users through real UI. Both are mandatory, but they answer different questions.

A useful way to think about it: the feature graphic answers "why should I care?" in a single frame, while screenshots answer "what does this actually do?" across several frames. The table below maps the practical differences across dimensions, format, count, placement, and Apple's equivalent slot.

Attribute

Feature graphic

Screenshot

Apple equivalent

Dimensions

1024 × 500 (fixed)

Portrait, per device class

Promotional Artwork 4320 × 1080

Orientation

Landscape

Portrait

Landscape

Format

JPEG or 24-bit PNG, no alpha

PNG / JPG, no alpha

PSD template

Count

Exactly one

Up to 8 per device class

Exactly one (global)

Placement

Listing, editorial, search, ads

Listing gallery only

Today Tab editorial feature

Required?

Yes — mandatory to publish

Yes — per device class

Invite-only

Purpose

Brand and earn the click

Demonstrate and earn the install

Editorial brand feature

Editorial comparison card with two columns labeled FEATURE GRAPHIC and SCREENSHOT, listing dimensions, format, count, placement, and purpose differences

Google Play feature graphic technical specs in detail

Answer: Google Play requires the feature graphic at exactly 1024x500 px, saved as JPEG or 24-bit PNG with no transparency, under 15 MB. Keep critical content inside a roughly 70-80 px safe zone from each edge so the play button overlay and edge crops don't obscure your logo, tagline, or product imagery.

The dimension is rigid: 1024 pixels wide by 500 pixels tall. JPEG and 24-bit PNG are the only accepted formats, and Google's validator rejects any file with an alpha channel or transparent pixels. The 15 MB ceiling is generous enough that file size is rarely the bottleneck — composition is. The play button overlay sits roughly in the center of the canvas when a promo video is attached, and aggressive cropping on smaller surfaces eats into the outer edges. A safe zone of about 70 to 80 pixels from each edge protects logos, taglines, and product imagery from being clipped or obscured.

Spec illustration showing a 1024x500 landscape canvas with a dashed 80-pixel inner safe-zone rectangle and a translucent circular play button overlay centered on the canvas

Does the App Store have an equivalent? Promotional Artwork explained

Answer: Apple's closest equivalent is Promotional Artwork (sometimes called featuring artwork or, informally, a hero image), uploaded via a 4320x1080 PSD template in App Store Connect. It is invite-only, reserved for apps Apple selects for editorial featuring on the Today Tab, and forbids taglines, prices, and device models.

The vocabulary confusion is unavoidable. "Hero image" is what most developers Google when they want the iOS equivalent of a feature graphic, but Apple's official name is Promotional Artwork. It is delivered as a 4320x1080 PSD, not a flat image, and lives behind an invite gate in App Store Connect — you only see the slot if Apple's editorial team has tagged your app for featuring on the Today Tab. Apple also enforces strict content rules: no taglines, no prices, no device models, no weapons, no logos beyond your own. It is global and cannot be localized per country. In practice, most indie apps will never upload one, which is exactly why the terminology matters less than understanding that Google Play's feature graphic has no like-for-like Apple counterpart you can simply duplicate.

Why both assets exist: the conversion funnel logic

Answer: App stores ask for both because each asset serves a different stage of discovery. The feature graphic earns the click from editorial surfaces, ads, and search rows where there is no room for a gallery. Screenshots earn the install once the user is on the listing and wants to see what the app actually does.

Treating the feature graphic and screenshots as one project is the most common mistake first-time submitters make. The feature graphic is an acquisition surface — it has to work standalone, with no context, often shown beside competitors in a horizontal scroll. Screenshots are a conversion surface — they assume the user has already committed enough attention to open your listing and now wants proof that the app delivers. One acquires the attention; the other earns the install. Neither can replace the other, and skimping on either side of the funnel costs measurable installs.

Producing both assets locally without uploading unreleased UI

Answer: Producing a 1024x500 feature graphic plus a full set of device-sized screenshots normally means Figma re-layouts, a SaaS subscription, or a designer. A native, one-time-purchase generator that runs offline on macOS or Windows keeps unreleased UI off third-party servers and outputs upload-ready PNGs sized correctly for every store surface in one pass.

The friction is in the redundancy. Figma forces you to maintain a separate canvas per output dimension; touch the master and you re-layout each one by hand. Web-based generators avoid that, but at the cost of uploading raw simulator captures of unreleased UI to a third-party server, where the asset, its hash, and any embedded marketing copy can be cached or indexed before launch. An offline cross-platform workflow keeps every frame on your own machine and outputs the 1024x500 feature graphic alongside every required iOS, Google Play, and Microsoft Store screenshot size from a single canvas. If you want the full screenshot dimension table to pair with this guide, the App Store screenshot sizes 2026 complete reference covers iOS, Google Play, and Microsoft Store dimensions next to this definition.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

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Feature graphic and every screenshot, locally

One-time $15.99. No subscription. Native desktop app for Mac and Windows that batch-exports a 1024x500 Google Play feature graphic alongside every required iOS, Google Play, and Microsoft Store screenshot from a single canvas.

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