SSC CGL document requirements

What SSC CGL 2026 asks you to upload

For the SSC Combined Graduate Level Examination, the file work is lighter than on many portals, but it is still easy to trip up. The table above lists what the Staff Selection Commission asked for in the SSC CGL 2026 notice, under which applications ran from 21 May to 22 June 2026. The only image you prepare yourself is your signature. Your photograph is not picked from your gallery at all. It is captured live, through a webcam or the mobile app, while you fill in the form.

Everything here follows that 2026 notice (para 9.6 and Annexure-IV). SSC can change its rules between cycles, so check the latest notice on the SSC website and read the CGL 2026 notice PDF before relying on any number on this page.

The live photo: prepare the room, not a file

Since the camera takes the picture on the spot, there is nothing to resize or compress. What matters is what the lens can see. The notice asks for a plain background and no cap, mask or glasses. A few general habits make the capture go smoothly:

• Face a window or a bright lamp so the light falls evenly on your face. A light behind you turns your face into a dark outline.
• Sit in front of a bare, light-coloured wall. Move posters, shelves and patterned curtains out of the frame.
• Take your glasses off before you begin, even if you wear them all day.
• Keep the phone or laptop camera at eye level, perhaps propped on a few books, so it is not looking up at you.
• Wipe the lens. A thumb smudge is a very common reason for a soft, hazy picture.

Try a practice shot with your normal camera app first. If your face is sharp and there is no shadow across one cheek, you are ready for the real capture.

Getting the signature into the 10 to 20 KB range

The signature must be a JPG or JPEG file of at least 10 KB and no more than 20 KB. The notice describes it as about 2 cm tall. On width it is less consistent: one place says about 6 cm and another says about 4 cm. The notice also warns that blurred or tiny signatures are rejected, so the strokes must stay clear at the size you upload.

Here is a simple routine that works on a phone:

1. Sign on clean white paper with a dark pen, pressing firmly enough that the line is easy to see from arm's length.
2. Photograph it in daylight, holding the phone flat above the page so the signature does not look slanted.
3. Open Crop Image and trim away the desk and spare paper, leaving only a slim margin around the ink.
4. Load the cropped file into Image Fit to KB, set the target to 10 to 20 KB and save it as JPG.
5. Run the result through Portal Preflight for SSC CGL to confirm the format and size before you go to the form.

All of these DocNimble tools run inside your browser. Your signature is processed on your own phone or computer and is never uploaded to DocNimble.

Too big, too small, or the wrong type

A fresh phone photo is usually a few megabytes, far above the 20 KB ceiling. Cropping before you shrink keeps the ink thick and readable, because the file size is spent on the signature rather than on empty paper. The opposite problem catches people out too. A tightly cropped, mostly white signature saved at low quality can fall below 10 KB, and the form will not take it. In that case Meet Minimum Size lifts the file over the minimum without changing how it looks.

File type is the other trap. iPhones often save pictures as HEIC, and screenshots are usually PNG. Renaming a file so it ends in .jpg does not change what is inside, and an upload checker can still spot the real type. Convert it properly with Image Convert instead.

Common reasons a signature upload goes wrong

• The file is a PNG, HEIC or PDF rather than a JPG or JPEG.
• It is just over 20 KB, or just under 10 KB, after an editing app saved it again.
• The ink is blurred because the phone moved or the room was dim.
• The signature looks tiny because it sits in the middle of a large white area that was never cropped.
• Ruled lines or a coloured page show through, making the strokes hard to read.

When the notice changes

This page reflects the CGL 2026 notice only. A later notice may move the KB range, settle the width question, or change how the live photo is taken. If the notice you are applying under says something different from this page, follow the notice. Portal Preflight checks against the figures recorded here, so treat its result as a helpful second opinion rather than the final word.