How to make a LinkedIn PDF carousel people actually page through
A document post is a small book in the feed. The same rules apply: a cover, one idea a page, and a reason to turn.
On LinkedIn, a carousel is a document post: you upload a PDF and LinkedIn shows it in the feed as pages people swipe or click through. It is the closest thing the platform has to a small printed piece, and it is treated by readers the way a booklet is: they judge it by the cover and leave the moment a page gives them no reason to turn.
The page
- Portrait, 4:5. A 1080 by 1350 page takes the most room in the feed on a phone. Square works too; landscape pages appear small.
- Type at reading size on a phone. If you would not read it at arm's length, it is too small. That usually means fewer words than you think.
- Margins. LinkedIn places page controls over the edges. Keep anything important away from them.
The cover
The first page is all most people see. Treat it like the cover of a book: one clear promise, no logo first, nothing that needs explaining. A good test is whether it would make sense as a single image post on its own.
The pages after it
- One idea per page. If a page has two, it is two pages.
- Eight to twelve pages. Long enough to say something, short enough to finish. LinkedIn accepts far more, but few people get there.
- An end that is an end. The last page should conclude, not just stop. If you want people to do something, say it there, once.
Exporting the file
Export a PDF with fonts embedded and images at full size, then open it on your phone before posting. Check the file size: LinkedIn accepts documents up to 100 MB and 300 pages, which is plenty, but a page full of uncompressed images can get there quickly.
The title
LinkedIn asks for a title when you upload a document, and shows it to readers on the post. It is easy to leave the file name there by accident, which is how posts end up titled "carousel_final_v3". Write it as you would the title of the piece.
Scheduling one
Listo posts PDF carousels to your personal profile with the title you give it, and checks that title the same way it checks captions: a file name or a placeholder stops the post before it goes out. From an agent: Post six-shapes.pdf to LinkedIn on Tuesday at 8, titled Six shapes: notes on a ceramics identity.
