LinkedIn post formats: which one to use for which goal

The limits below are the ones LinkedIn publishes in its Help Center. The "best for" column is our view for a small business.

Sources: LinkedIn Help: Post and share updates, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Share photos on LinkedIn, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Share videos on LinkedIn, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Upload and share documents on LinkedIn, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Document uploads on LinkedIn FAQ, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Create LinkedIn Polls, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Difference between posts, articles, reposts, and newsletters, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: LinkedIn Newsletter access criteria, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: LinkedIn Events overview, checked 15 October 2026

A plain text post is the fastest to make and often the best for opinions, lessons and answers to client questions. Posts can hold up to 3,000 characters; past that, LinkedIn suggests writing an article.

LinkedIn's creator guide describes the anatomy that works: a hook at the start, concise messaging, a personal perspective or story, and a question to spark conversation. White space helps on a phone: short paragraphs, one idea each.

The first line does most of the work, because it's what people see before they choose to read on. Lead with the problem, a surprising detail from your own work, or the conclusion. "We turned down a £40,000 job last month" is more likely to get a read than "Some thoughts on choosing clients". Then deliver on it: a hook that the post doesn't pay off teaches readers to skip you next time.

• Use for: "the question every client asks", lessons, opinions, quick tips.
• A post can carry either a link preview or an image, not both, so choose which matters more.
• Check length before you post with our free character counter.

Sources: LinkedIn Help: Post and share updates, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn for Creators: A guide to creating engaging LinkedIn posts, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Share photos on LinkedIn, checked 15 October 2026

Photos are the simplest way to show real work. LinkedIn's Pages guidance says images typically bring a 2x higher comment rate, and that custom collages of three or four images perform especially well for organisations.

You can add up to 20 images to a post. Each upload can be up to 5 MB, at least 552 by 276 pixels (LinkedIn recommends 1080 pixels wide), with an aspect ratio between 3:1 and 4:5. In a multi-photo post the layout follows the first image, so lead with the strongest one.

• Use for: before and after, project progress, team moments, events.
• Add alt text to each image for people using screen readers. LinkedIn has an ALT option in the editor.
• You can't edit or resize photos after posting.

Sources: LinkedIn Marketing Solutions: LinkedIn Pages best practices, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Share photos on LinkedIn, checked 15 October 2026

LinkedIn's Pages guidance says video gets five times more engagement and live video 24 times more. Those are LinkedIn's own figures for Pages, not a promise for any one post, but they explain why it's worth trying.

Uploads can run from 3 seconds (2 seconds from the mobile app) to 15 minutes, up to 5 GB, at aspect ratios from 1:2.4 to 2.4:1. You can add auto captions, which LinkedIn supports in 10 languages, or upload a caption file. Keep text and logos away from the edges so the app's buttons don't cover them.

• Use for: showing a process, introducing people, short tips to camera, client stories.
• Always caption. Many people watch on mute at work.
• You can't post directly to LinkedIn's immersive video feed; LinkedIn chooses videos for it based on quality and relevance.

Sources: LinkedIn Marketing Solutions: LinkedIn Pages best practices, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Share videos on LinkedIn, checked 15 October 2026

A document post shows a PDF, PowerPoint or Word file that readers page through in the feed, which is why people call it a LinkedIn carousel. LinkedIn suggests documents for career advice, culture stories, insights and trends, event content and knowledge sharing.

Files can be up to 100 MB and 300 pages, one document per post. Convert to PDF for the best quality, give it a title, and proofread: you can edit the description later but not the document itself. Readers can download it as a PDF.

• Use for: step-by-step guides, checklists, frameworks, a summary of a talk.
• Keep one idea per page and big text that reads on a phone.
• Our LinkedIn document carousel guide covers the upload steps.

Sources: LinkedIn Help: Upload and share documents on LinkedIn, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Document uploads on LinkedIn FAQ, checked 15 October 2026

These four formats need more planning but do jobs a normal post can't.

• Polls: two to four options, running one week by default. Use them to learn something you'll act on, then post the results.
• Articles: long-form pieces for in-depth expertise. Use them when an idea needs more than a 3,000-character post.
• Newsletters: subscribers get push, in-app and email notifications for each new edition, and people who start following you are invited to subscribe automatically. All members can create one; Pages need more than 150 followers or connections to be evaluated for access, plus a history of original posts.
• Events: online, in person or hybrid. To stream on LinkedIn itself you need LinkedIn Live access and a third-party streaming tool; otherwise run an external online event or an in-person one. LinkedIn recommends creating an event within a year of its date so attendees get notifications.

Sources: LinkedIn Help: Create LinkedIn Polls, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: Difference between posts, articles, reposts, and newsletters, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: LinkedIn Newsletters, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: LinkedIn Newsletter access criteria, checked 15 October 2026; LinkedIn Help: LinkedIn Events overview, checked 15 October 2026

Start from what you want the post to do, then pick the format. Hypothetical example: a small recruitment agency that wants employers in its region to see it as the local hiring expert might plan a fortnight like this.

• Rotate two or three formats each week rather than chasing whichever one is fashionable.
• Reuse: a strong text post can become a document a month later, and a document can become a short video.
• Match effort to the idea. A quick observation doesn't need a video, and a detailed process is wasted in a single text post that people can't save and come back to.
• Judge each format over several posts, not one. A single weak video says more about that video than about video on LinkedIn.

Zolyp, which publishes this guide, is our own product, so weigh this section with that in mind. Zolyp plans each slot with a format (photo, carousel, video or text) and creates the post with a caption written for LinkedIn and a visual or video sized for it; you can add your own photos too. Polls, articles, newsletters and events are made in LinkedIn itself. It publishes to Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google Business, X, TikTok, YouTube, Pinterest, and Threads, writes each post against your Brand Brain (your saved tone, services, audience and banned topics), and you approve the week before anything goes live. Plans that create the posts start at $29 a month, with a 3-day free trial.