Background

Question

How do I make background picture smaller in the "fit" mode?

Answer 1

When you choose Fit, it will always scale the picture so that either its width or its height fits the screen, whether horizontally or vertically.

Do you know your picture's dimension? If it is bigger than the screen resolution, you need to resize it before using it for background. If it is smaller than the screen resolution, you want to choose the "center" option instead.

If you need help finding out the picture dimension, locate the picture file in File Explorer, then right click > properties to review the dimesion.

To find out the display resolution, review it in Settings > System > Display.

Answer 2

In Windows 10, when the desktop background is set to Picture and Fit, Windows automatically scales the image so its entire height or width fits the screen while keeping the aspect ratio. There is no separate control to “make it smaller” than that in Fit mode.

To effectively make the background appear smaller, use one of these approaches:

1. Pre‑shrink the image in an editor
   1. Open the picture in an image editor (for example, Photos, Paint, or any graphics app).
   2. Resize the image to a smaller resolution than the screen (for example, if the screen is 1920×1080, resize the image to something like 1280×720 or smaller).
   3. Save the resized copy.
   4. In Settings → Personalization → Background, choose Picture, select the resized image, and keep Fit as the Choose a fit option. Because the image itself is smaller, it will show with borders (bars) around it instead of filling as much of the screen.
2. Use Center instead of Fit
   1. Go to Settings → Personalization → Background.
   2. Under Choose a fit, select Center instead of Fit.
   3. If the image is smaller than the screen, it will appear at its original size in the middle with a border around it. To make it visually smaller, resize the image in an editor first (as in method 1) and then use Center.
3. Use Tile with a smaller image
   1. Resize the image to a smaller size in an editor.
   2. In Settings → Personalization → Background, choose Picture and select the small image.
   3. Set Choose a fit to Tile. The image will repeat across the desktop; each tile will be at the smaller size.

Windows does not provide a direct “scale percentage” for background images in Fit mode, so resizing the source image and/or changing the fit option (Center or Tile) are the available ways to make it appear smaller.

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References:

• Change the desktop background in Windows