Is there an ideal chin for men? That’s up for debate, but having a weak chin can hurt you in all areas of your life: dating, acquiring a new job, relationships, and self-confidence. The chin is a focal point of the face and needs to be on point.
The ideal chin for men should be balanced and proportional to the face. It should line up with the facial plane and should neither be retrusive nor over-projecting. A masculine chin will be much broader when compared to a feminine chin.
The proportions of the chin differ from person to person because of several factors. You might be surprised to know, though, that an ideal chin is not all about genetics. If mewing from an early age, your chin could be as developed as if you had perfect genetics. A balanced chin ensures that your facial features are well proportioned, and makes you look stronger and more assertive.
Because the chin is essentially an extension of the jawline, some of the techniques for optimizing your jawline could also apply to your chin.
A “strong chin” and “strong jawline” are what scientists call secondary sexual characteristics. They are traits that are influenced by male hormones. This results in an angular look that gives you a strong alpha-male vibe.
However, according to evidence, women can still select males who may not have traits associated with masculinity and testosterone, meaning men with less prominent chin or jawlines.
Little et al, (2011) mention that men with less testosterone may still be attractive. Some theories are that testosterone is too expensive for an organism to maintain as it comes with the cost of maintaining extra muscle and females are unlikely to pick a high testosterone male when they want commitment
Chin Width
The jawline is a prominent feature, and your chin makes up a significant part of the jawline. The chin emphasizes your eyes, nose, cheeks, lips, and brow ridge. It’ll make your good features stand out. One of the most important of these is the width. There are no strict guidelines for how wide the chin should be. But the chin is one of the most sexually dimorphic traits, and the wider your chin is, the more masculine it appears. This is based off your prenatal and teenage testosterone exposure.
However, it’s not always the case that you need a more masculine chin. Sometimes balanced sex hormones lead to a more aesthetically pleasing result.
Brad Pitt has one of the widest jaws in Hollywood, but his chin isn’t too masculine. If it was broader, Brad would come off as much more masculine, but it would kill his prettyboy aesthetic.
Zac is similar to Brad in that he rocks the prettyboy look, but his chin is wider and more masculine looking. He pulls it off while still retaining a prettyboy look.
Ernest Khalimov on the other hand has a highly masculinized chin. And yes, this is a real person. Remember, a chin is one of the most sexually dimorphic traits. Because his chin is so masculine, it veers his face too far into the direction of masculinity. And unfortunately, masculinity and beauty are not correlated the way femininity and beauty are.
Chin Projection
A strong chin is continuous with a strong jawline. The chin should be slightly above your hyoid bone, but not too much. This is an indication of proper posture. For more info on the hyoid and how it affects the jawline, see our article. Ideally, the chin should not be over-projected, as it will throw off your side profile. Likewise, a small or receding chin can make the nose look bigger.
The appearance of your mouth is also affected by your chin. From a frontal view, a well-formed chin will further emphasize the contour of your vermillion border, or the area where your lips change over into skin.
For a normal facial profile, the ideal positioning of the chin is to have it extend a few millimeters right behind a vertical line drawn from the vermillion border of the lower lip. According to Canadian University researchers, surgeons estimate that 1 mm to 3 mm of posterior extension from the vertical plane is ideal for aesthetic harmony (Fanous & Yoskovitch, 2003).
Keep in mind that drawing this line requires your head to be in natural head position, which is difficult for the layperson to estimate and usually requires the eye of an experienced plastic surgeon.
If you have poor posture or other poor tendencies like craning your neck forward, your head will not be in natural position and lead to craniofacial dystrophy, which leads to more poor posture over time. It’s a vicious cycle.
If you can correct your chin projection, do so. However, listen to your surgeon. You don’t want to over augment the chin without also taking care of the jaw.
How to Get an Ideal Chin
The quality and aesthetics of your chin are not completely determined by your genes. However, if you’re done growing and your chin is receded, your options are limited.
The best short-term option to get a good chin is to get a chin implant. The best long-term option to optimize your chin is through dedication to mewing, though mewing can never fix a retrusive chin or jawline after you’re done growing.
We have discussed at length in other articles how mewing works. It will not necessarily line up your chin with your facial plane, but it might bring your mandible forward
Of course, to improve your chin, you should also improve your jawline. They are ultimately both parts of the same feature. For more info about the jawline, see our in-depth article. We discuss how to improve your jawline. As such, a strong chin complements a jawline like a good shoe complements an outfit.
Finally, the fastest and most obvious solution to a weak chin is to get a chin implant as discussed previously.
The above implants can be specially designed to custom fit your face. A CT scan is done and then a computer-generated model can show you what you would look like after the surgery.
The above showcases an example of a chin implant being used to correct an under-projecting chin.
