Start with the light

Light from directly above or far to one side creates different shadows from light coming from in front of you. Those shadows can make the areas around your eyes, cheeks and mouth look more pronounced. Bright highlights can hide detail elsewhere.

For a useful comparison, face a window with indirect daylight and keep the brightest light out of the background. Take another photo without changing your expression or camera position. Compare where the shadows fall before comparing the age estimates.

Camera distance changes proportions

A close selfie can make nearby features look larger relative to features farther from the lens. Adobe and Princeton researchers describe this perspective effect in their work on portrait correction. It is a change in how the camera represents your face, not evidence that your face changed.

Try placing the phone farther away at roughly eye level and using a timer. Keep your whole face visible. Cropping afterward can change the framing, but it cannot undo the perspective of a photo taken too close.

Check what happened between capture and upload

The image you see may have been sharpened, smoothed, brightened or compressed. A screenshot of a photo may also contain less useful face detail than the original. Comparing a filtered selfie to an unedited camera photo changes several things at once.

Use the original image when possible, and turn off optional beauty effects for a repeatable starting point. A more natural-looking photo does not guarantee a particular age estimate. It simply makes the conditions easier to understand.

A quick check before you try again

Look at the photograph itself before treating the number as a conclusion about your appearance.

  • Is your face evenly lit, with detail visible on both sides?
  • Is the camera near eye level and far enough away for comfortable framing?
  • Are your eyes, cheeks and mouth visible and in focus?
  • Are you comparing original photos with the same editing settings?

An older estimate is still an estimate

Lucentage reads a photograph and returns a predicted age. It does not know your birthday or measure how everyone else perceives you. Its model can be wrong even on a clear, well-lit image.

If two photos receive different estimates, that is a reason to examine the photos and the model limitations. It does not establish that one photo reveals your true appearance.