Change Your Profile Photo in Slack and Teams Without Mixing Up Accounts
Your profile photo appears next to the words you send. Replacing it should be a small job, not a tour through every account you own. Start by checking the workspace or account, then change the picture and inspect the result at chat size. These are the steps Slack and Microsoft document, followed by our suggestions for choosing a useful image.
Miles Crawford
Slack on desktop: upload, frame, save twice
Click your profile picture in the sidebar, select Profile, then Edit. Under Profile photo, click Upload Photo and choose your image. Adjust its framing, click Save, then click Save Changes. That final profile save is part of Slack's documented sequence, not an optional extra.
Slack specifies a picture at least 512 by 512 pixels and no larger than 1024 by 1024 pixels. A square image in that range is a useful starting file. Those are Slack profile-photo dimensions; do not reuse custom-emoji size guidance for this different upload.
Slack on your phone
Tap your profile picture at the top of the screen, choose View profile, then Edit Profile and Edit Photo. Take a photo or upload one from your device. Slack's iOS instructions include cropping if needed, tapping Choose, then Save. Its Android instructions say to wait a moment for the profile to update, then tap Save.
Removing a photo is different. Slack says removal is available in the desktop app or browser, not its mobile apps. On desktop, go to Profile, Edit, then Remove Photo beneath your picture. Confirm Yes, Remove Photo and finish with Save Changes. If the removal option is missing on your phone, switching to desktop is the documented route.
Teams on desktop: open the photo again
Select your profile picture at the top right of Teams. When the account manager opens, select your picture again. Choose Upload for a new picture or Remove to take the picture away, then select Save. The second click on the picture is the easy-to-miss step.
Microsoft warns that the new picture can take time to update across channels. Its help page says clearing the Teams cache may help it update sooner, but gives no fixed propagation deadline. Do not treat an older picture in another channel as proof that the upload failed, and do not promise colleagues that every view will change instantly.
Teams mobile and work-account restrictions
Microsoft's mobile sequence starts with your current picture or initials at the top left. Tap your name to open your profile, then Update photo to take or access a photo. Microsoft says a notification confirms that the profile photo was updated.
For a work or school account, Microsoft also documents the My Account portal: sign in, select the edit icon on the current photo, upload and resize the picture if needed, then Save. If you cannot edit it, the page says your IT or human resources department may restrict changes. That is a permission issue to check with the organization, not a reason to keep trying different files.
Choose recognition over decoration
Our suggestion: use a clear, current portrait if you are comfortable doing so and your workplace permits it. Leave breathing room around your face, avoid tiny lettering and inspect the crop as a small circle. A dramatic wide photograph can be attractive at full size while making it hard to recognize the person in a message list.
A profile photo, a status emoji and a custom reaction do different jobs. Keep the photo stable enough for recognition; put a temporary availability signal in your status instead. If you prefer an illustration or another non-photo image, follow your workplace's rules and make the shape easy to distinguish at small size. These are our design recommendations, not platform requirements.
Check the right account before you finish
Our final check is simple: confirm the workspace or account, reopen your profile and look at the result in context. Avoid replacing a work picture while thinking you are editing a personal account. Where a work profile is centrally managed, ask which system owns the photo before making repeated changes in several places.
Slack also notes that a matching Gravatar email can supply your profile picture; uploading a new photo in Slack is its documented way to change that picture. If you are checking the wider Slack profile at the same time, its View as option lets you preview how coworkers and external Slack Connect people see it. Do not assume every profile field has the same editing permissions as the photograph.
Sources
Checked October 27, 2026. Upload steps and limits follow the official pages below. Image-selection and account-checking advice is ours.