Graphical abstract maker with journal sizes

$$\begin{array}{rl}\text{pixels}& =\text{inches}\times \text{dpi}\\ & =\text{mm}÷25.4\times \text{dpi}\end{array}$$$$\text{print size (in)}=\text{pixels}÷\text{dpi}$$

Sizes and units. Publishers state the size of a graphical abstract in one of two ways. Cell Press, Elsevier, Springer Nature’s BMC titles and MDPI give pixels; ACS, RSC, Wiley and Angewandte give a printed size in inches or centimetres, to be supplied at 300 or 600 dpi. The tool works in points (1/72 inch) of the printed size, so a 12 pt label is 12 pt whatever the journal: a pixel size is taken at 300 dpi, the resolution those publishers ask for, so Elsevier’s 1328 × 531 px is a $4.43\times 1.77$ inch canvas and Cell Press’s 1200 px square is 4 inches. On export, a pixel size is written at exactly the journal’s pixels (or a whole multiple, where the journal accepts larger images of the same shape), and a printed size at the dpi you choose: $3.25\times 300=975$ by $1.75\times 300=525$ pixels for an ACS TOC graphic. The PNG records its DPI, so it opens at the printed size.

Rules the canvas shows. Each preset lists what the journal’s own guideline says and links to it: Cell Press wants one square panel, Arial or Avenir at 12–16 pt, no data of any kind, sparing text and a clear reading direction; Elsevier shows the image scaled into a 500 × 200 px window, so the tool shows that view and how tall your smallest text is there; Angewandte asks for text of at least 6–7 pt. Where a size could not be confirmed on the publisher’s own page (the Wiley Advanced journals and Nano Research, read in copies of their instructions) or applies only to some journals (Springer Nature has no portfolio-wide size), the preset says so. The dashed safe area keeps text and icons 4 % of the shorter side from the edges, a LabCanvas margin rather than a journal rule, because the image is scaled down and sometimes cropped in tables of contents.

How to design a graphical abstract

What the evidence says. Graphical abstracts help most where a picture is what people see first. In a crossover study of 44 Annals of Surgery articles, tweets with a visual abstract had 7.7 times the impressions (23,611 vs 3,073 on average), 8.4 times the retweets and 2.7 times the article visits of tweets with the title alone (Ibrahim et al. 2017). In a randomised crossover trial of 40 American Journal of Nephrology articles, tweets with a visual abstract were viewed about twice as often as citation-only tweets and had 5 times the engagement, although the authors note that any image might have had part of that effect (Oska et al. 2020). In a randomised trial of 41 surgical papers, visual abstracts drew more engagement than plain-English summaries, but engagement was low in every group (Chapman et al. 2019). There is no good evidence that a graphical abstract raises citations: in Molecules, papers published with one had fewer PDF downloads, abstract views and citations than papers without (Pferschy-Wenzig et al. 2016). Make one because the journal asks for it and because it is what readers see in the table of contents and on social media, not to win citations.

Design rules that hold up. Jambor and Bornhäuser (2024) give ten rules: decide the one message first, pick a few key visuals, design the layout around a reading direction, keep text to short labels, use colour sparingly and consistently, and ask colleagues who do not know the work for feedback. Hullman and Bach (2018) analysed 54 graphical abstracts from many fields and publishers’ guidance, describing their layouts, how they show time, how they use text and the kinds of pictures they use; inconsistent visual styles, unclear relationships between pictures and missing annotations were the common problems. In practice:

1. One message. Write the take-home sentence first. If it needs “and”, it is two graphical abstracts.
2. One reading direction. Left to right (or top to bottom), as the layouts do; arrows carry the order, not numbers.
3. Few words. Label things; do not explain them. The checks count the words in the image and warn above 30, a LabCanvas guide figure; Cell Press asks for no paragraphs.
4. Text at the journal’s size. 12–16 pt for Cell Press; for Elsevier, text that stays readable when the image is shown 200 px high; for ACS, RSC and Angewandte, about 6–8 pt at the printed size.
5. One visual style. Use icons from one set, one line weight and two or three colours with a meaning (problem, method, result). The palette is Okabe–Ito, readable with red–green colour blindness.
6. New findings, not data. Cell Press forbids data in the graphical abstract; elsewhere, a simplified schematic of the result reads better than a plot at this size.

Icons and licences. The icons are LabCanvas drawings from the figure editor’s own pictogram generators, not a third-party set, so there is no outside licence to check before you publish. Cell Press asks that every element is your own or licensed for commercial use.

References. Ibrahim AM, Lillemoe KD, Klingensmith ME, Dimick JB. Visual abstracts to disseminate research on social media: a prospective, case-control crossover study. Ann Surg 2017;266:e46–e48, doi:10.1097/SLA.0000000000002277. Oska S, Lerma E, Topf J. A picture is worth a thousand views: a triple crossover trial of visual abstracts to examine their impact on research dissemination. J Med Internet Res 2020;22:e22327, doi:10.2196/22327. Chapman SJ, Grossman RC, FitzPatrick MEB, Brady RRW. Randomized controlled trial of plain English and visual abstracts for disseminating surgical research via social media. Br J Surg 2019;106:1611–1616, doi:10.1002/bjs.11307. Pferschy-Wenzig E-M, Pferschy U, Wang D, Mocan A, Atanasov AG. Does a graphical abstract bring more visibility to your paper? Molecules 2016;21:1247, doi:10.3390/molecules21091247. Jambor HK, Bornhäuser M. Ten simple rules for designing graphical abstracts. PLoS Comput Biol 2024;20:e1011789, doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1011789. Hullman J, Bach B. Picturing science: design patterns in graphical abstracts. In: Diagrammatic Representation and Inference (Diagrams 2018), LNCS 10871, 183–200, doi:10.1007/978-3-319-91376-6_19.

1. Elsevier, problem → method → finding. Choose Elsevier and the first layout. The canvas is 1328 × 531 px, which at 300 dpi is $1328÷300=4.43$ by $531÷300=1.77$ inches ($4.43\times 25.4=112$ by 45 mm), the 5 : 2 shape Elsevier asks for. The headline is 15 pt and the labels 12 pt. Elsevier shows the image scaled into a 500 × 200 px window, a factor of $min(500/1328,200/531)=0.377$; a 12 pt label is $12/72\times 300=50$ px tall in the file and $50\times 0.377=18.8$ px on screen, so it stays readable, while 6 pt text would be 9.4 px. Replace the three placeholders (for example a cancer cell, a drug-delivery nanoparticle and a mouse), write three labels of two or three words, and export: 1328 × 531 px, or 2656 × 1062 px at 2× for sharper print, both 5 : 2.

2. Cell Press, mechanism → applications. Choose Cell Press: one square of 1200 × 1200 px, 4 × 4 inches at 300 dpi (288 × 288 pt). The layout starts its labels at 12 pt and its headline at 16 pt, the two ends of the 12–16 pt Cell Press asks for, and the checks turn red if text goes outside that range. Put the mechanism in the circle of arrows on the left and three applications on the right, keep it to about a dozen words, and export a 1200 × 1200 px PNG with 300 dpi recorded.

3. ACS and RSC at their printed sizes. An ACS TOC graphic of 3.25 × 1.75 in is 975 × 525 px at 300 dpi and 1950 × 1050 px at 600 dpi. An RSC graphical abstract of at most 8 × 4 cm at 600 dpi is $80/25.4\times 600=1890$ by $40/25.4\times 600=945$ px. Text of 7 pt on these is $7/72\times 600=58$ px tall at 600 dpi.

Start from a full template instead. The LabCanvas graphical abstract templates are complete designs, for example CRISPR diagnostics, bacteriophages against biofilms and nanozymes; each opens in the editor with every layer editable, and the graphical abstract size guide covers each publisher in more detail. For the figures inside the paper, the journal figure size checker gives column widths and dpi, and the multi-panel figure maker lays out panels at those widths.