stitching

Ideal Overlap Percentage for Panoramic Shots (Photoshop Stitching), 2026

Ideal Overlap Percentage for Panoramic Shots (Photoshop Stitching), 2026 The ideal overlap percentage for panoramic shots is about 30% for a standard or telephoto lens, and 40-50% for a wide-angle lens, because wider lenses bend the edges of each frame and Photoshop needs more shared detail to align them. Below 20% overlap, Adobe Photomerge often fails to assemble the panorama at all; above 50% you simply shoot more frames for no extra coverage. Drop your focal length, sensor, sweep angle, and overlap into our Panorama Calculator(/tools/panorama-calculator) to see exactly how many frames your sweep needs. On a trip to Zion I shot a 180-degree canyon panorama handheld at 35mm in portrait orientation. My first attempt used six frames at roughly 20% overlap, and Photoshop's Photomerge dropped two of them and left a torn seam across the sky. I reshot the same sweep with eight frames at 35% overlap, and all...