What is looksmaxxing - and why should we be worried?

Where self-care ends and looksmaxxing begins

If you’re a woman, you might be reading this thinking, same old story. After all, female appearance has been scrutinised and picked apart for as long as most of us can remember. It’s easy to assume that looksmaxxing is simply more of the same.

But in today’s landscape, the pressure isn’t falling solely on women and girls. Men feel it too - and in the case of looksmaxxing, the weight lands particularly heavily on teenage boys and young men - many of whom are navigating identity and self-worth at the very moment they’re being told their value can be calculated in angles, symmetry, and scores.

Dr Candice O’Neil, psychologist at Ontic Psychology, explains that looksmaxxing practices can range from standard grooming and skincare routines to more extreme techniques such as ‘mewing’ - a method claimed to alter your jawline and facial structure through specific tongue positioning.

“As looksmaxxing is heavily promoted on social media, it has the potential to influence young people's feelings about themselves and behaviours both implicitly and overtly,” she says. “This becomes unhealthy when it moves from general self-improvement and wellbeing practices into a preoccupation with their appearance - particularly when that involves constant comparison with others or extreme adjustments to food and exercise. This can also lead to deep feelings of poor self-worth and self-concept.”

It’s widely recognised that obsessing over your appearance and trying to make it as ‘perfect’ as possible has become one of the world’s most talked-about - and harmful - phenomena. Chasing often unrealistic standards of beauty or handsomeness can leave you feeling inadequate, both about yourself and your body, and can take a serious toll on your mental health.

“The psychological impact of a teen thinking of their value as a number in such communities is that they reduce themselves and all their qualities that make them uniquely them,” says O’Neil. “They lose the essence of their individuality. Conversely, a high rating might not only give them a sense of belonging but also reinforce their worth.

“Yet as Psychologists, we see people as whole people with a number of valuable traits - such as kindness, compassion, and patience."

O’Neil explains that in this situation, vulnerable teens start losing control over their choices, relying on external validation for their sense of value. This can fuel negative thinking patterns, anxious behaviours, and long-term low confidence.

The practices of looksmaxxing are often divided into two categories - softmaxxing and hardmaxxing. Both fall under the broader looksmaxxing trend but differ in intensity, with hardmaxxing involving more extreme measures to alter or change your natural appearance.

Here’s a brief overview of each:

• Softmaxxing – involves everyday self-care routines such as fitness, skincare, hygiene, grooming, and mewing, alongside curating a specific personal clothing style.

• Hardmaxxing – focuses on far more invasive procedures, including cosmetic surgery, leg-lengthening operations, and even the dangerous practice of 'bone-mashing,' which involves physically breaking bones to reshape your face.

O’Neil explains that, while softmaxxing may seem less physically disruptive than hardmaxxing, it can still pose serious hazards to your health.

“Softmaxxing may trigger negatively associated behaviours and feelings about yourself,” she says. “It can spark an acute awareness of the self in comparison to others, which may eventually lead some to try hardmaxxing methods for external validation. This can create a cycle of reinforcement, making certain patterns of thinking and behaviours harder to change.”

She also warns that, beyond these immediate mental health concerns, softmaxxing can contribute to longer-term issues, including obsessive and compulsive behaviours. These patterns can disrupt other areas of life, potentially leading to social withdrawal and isolation, self-harming behaviours, and disordered eating.

In case you didn’t already know, if you ever watch a video, or see an image, of an AI-generated face, it usually looks impossibly perfect - more like an aesthetically engineered robot than a real human. Because these images are created entirely from algorithms and not reality, they don’t represent a majority of people who naturally look that way.

“AI faces have become statistical fantasies,” says O’Neil. “The golden ratio - the so-called perfect ‘beauty balance’ - actually only applies to a small number of people. However, it’s treated as an objective measure of beauty when in fact beauty is a deeply subjective experience.”

She explains that the influence of these images can start off subtle, but over time, can become pervasive, occupying a teenager's thoughts at a stage when they are highly susceptible to outside influence, searching for a sense of belonging, and navigating major physical and emotional changes.

“These measures of beauty move us further away from psychological acceptance and towards something unattainable,” says O’Neil. “The quest can have major consequences for how we feel about ourselves. The process can sometimes be as follows - normal feels flawed, flawed feels wrong or unsafe, and differences are like failure.”

When the goalposts shift into dysmorphia

The impact of ratings systems and obsessive fitness habits can push someone towards developing conditions such as body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) and muscle dysmorphia.

O’Neil warns that chasing a so-called ‘perfect’ body can blur the lines between wellness, fitness, and beauty, as standards are constantly being pushed to unrealistic extremes.

“Take, for instance, extreme sports or endurance tests,” she explains. “It’s common for people who reach a goal weight or aesthetic to experience a misalignment between how they see themselves and how they actually look. This can make it easier to push past their self-imposed limits, leading to excessive behaviours that carry serious physical and psychological consequences.”