Server banner: 960 by 540 pixels (16:9). Needs Boost Level 2; animated banners need Level 3. Profile banner: 600 by 240 pixels (5:2). Needs Discord Nitro. Avatar: square, 512 by 512 works well, and Discord shows it as a circle. Animated avatars need Nitro. Welcome or announcement cards: any size works, and 800 by 450 (16:9) fits nicely in a message. The Boxtype GIF maker has a preset for each of these under Output → Canvas.

Discord rarely shows the whole image. Avatars are cut into a circle, which hides the corners. Profile banners sit behind your avatar on the left side. Server banners are shown at different widths on desktop and mobile, and the server name sits on top of the lower part. Keep text and important shapes in the middle of the canvas, away from the edges. For avatars, keep everything inside the circle: Boxtype's avatar preset shows a circle guide over the preview and adds padding so text stays inside it.

Banners are seen for a second while someone scrolls. Use one to three words, a heavy weight and strong contrast with the background. A dark background with bright text is the safest choice because it works with every Discord theme. If you use a photo background, darken or blur it so the text stands out.

Banners loop forever, so gentle motion is easier to live with than flashing. A slow wave, a shine passing over the letters or a soft color cycle all work well. An entrance animation, where letters drop or fly in, gives a nice reveal each time the loop restarts. Avoid fast flashing or strobing effects. Besides being tiring, rapid flashes can be a problem for people with photosensitive conditions.

Discord accepts banners and avatars up to about 10 MB, so size is rarely a problem for text animations. If a GIF is too large, use fewer frames, a slower speed with a shorter loop, a smaller canvas, or a flat background instead of a photo. Gradients and photos make GIFs much larger, because GIFs store a limited palette for each frame.

Server banner: Server Settings → Server Profile (or Overview) → Banner, as the owner or with the Manage Server permission. Profile banner and avatar: User Settings → Profiles. Upload the GIF, then position it in the cropping window. You can also set a different avatar and banner for each server under Server Profiles. If an animated upload turns into a still image, the account or server doesn't have the Nitro or Boost level that animated images require.

1. Type one to three words, like your name or your server's name. 2. Choose a size preset: Avatar for a profile picture, Profile Banner or Server Banner for the wide strips, or Welcome Card for announcements. 3. Pick a font or emoji letters, an effect and a background. Calm effects such as wave or a slow color shift work best for things people see all the time. 4. Make the GIF, check the file size, then upload it in Discord's profile or server settings. The Avatar preset shows a circle guide, so you can keep the text inside the area Discord shows.

Animated avatars and profile banners need Nitro, and animated server banners need Boost Level 3. Without them, Discord shows a still image. If you are not sure the animation will be shown, make sure the GIF's first frame looks good on its own, because that is the frame Discord uses as the still. Entrance effects that start from an empty frame are a poor choice in that case.

Profile pictures are often shown at 32 to 40 pixels next to messages, which is tiny. One or two letters, or a single short word, is the most an avatar can carry. Bold, wide fonts like Bungee and Bebas Neue survive shrinking far better than script fonts. Banners have more room, but are viewed quickly while scrolling, so the same rule applies: one short phrase, big and high-contrast.

Discord's dark theme is the most common, but plenty of people use the light theme, and your avatar appears on both. Avoid pure black text on a transparent background, which vanishes on dark mode, and pure white, which vanishes on light mode. A colored background or an outline around the letters keeps them visible everywhere. Strong contrast between text and background matters more than the exact colors you choose.