Does smiling make you look younger?
Almost everyone believes it: smile and you'll look younger. Science is less sure. Some studies found that happy faces get younger guesses, and a whole series of experiments found the opposite: compared with a neutral face, a smile can add a year or two. The answer depends on your age and on what the smile does to your eyes.
The study that started the debate
In 2015 a researcher showed people photos of the same faces, smiling and neutral, across several experiments and photo sets. Smiling faces were consistently judged older than neutral photos of the same people (Ganel, 2015). The likely reason: the wrinkles a smile creates around the eyes, which observers fail to ignore. In press coverage, the author put the effect at about one to two years.
We believe the opposite, even after seeing it
A follow-up asked people to estimate ages and, right afterwards, to recall which faces had looked younger. They had rated smiling faces as older than neutral ones, which in turn looked older than surprised faces. Yet afterwards they remembered the smiling faces as the younger ones (Ganel and Goodale, 2017). The belief that a smile rejuvenates is so strong that it overrides what we have just seen.
It depends on your age
A 2021 study looked across the lifespan. The ageing effect of a smile was clear for adults aged 20 to 39 and disappeared for those aged 60 to 79. In between, from 40 to 59, it showed up in men's faces but not in women's, which had fewer and less prominent smile wrinkles (Ganel and Goodale, 2021). When a face already has age lines, the extra lines of a smile weigh less. Even with a face mask on, smiling faces still looked older, because the eyes stay visible (Ganel and Goodale, 2022).
So why do some studies say the opposite?
A large study with 154 raters and 2,052 photos compared six expressions. Neutral faces were judged most accurately, and happy faces were the most likely to be guessed younger than they were, compared with angry, sad, fearful or disgusted ones (Voelkle and colleagues, 2012). The two lines of research used different photos and asked slightly different questions, and there is no final verdict yet. What both agree on: expression moves the guess, and a frown or a tired face does you no favours.
How to smile in a photo
If you're in your twenties or thirties and want the youngest-looking photo, try a soft, relaxed smile that doesn't crinkle the corners of your eyes, or a calm, friendly neutral face. From your sixties onwards, smile freely: the smile no longer adds years. Whatever your age, avoid tense or forced smiles. More practical tips in how to look younger in photos and how to guess someone's age.
Want to see the effect on your own face? On AgeDart strangers guess your age from a selfie; share your own link with friends and compare a smiling photo with a neutral one. Start with how old do I look?
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