Guys, an expert has said the TikTok aged filter is how we’ll actually look when we get old

By now we’ve all seen the TikTok aged filter dominating the FYP and the slightly weird obsession of making ourselves look sickly and decrepit is nothing new. In fact, it screams 2017 mums using Face App to age everyone in the family and posting it to Facebook captioned “LOL!”. But I concede – the trend is mildly entertaining and curiosity has clearly gotten to the best of us all. But my relationship with this trend is mixed – I don’t love how I look as an OAP anyway, but now it’s turned out that experts are saying that the TikTok aged filter is accurate and a good mimic of what we’ll look like when we get older. Hot girl summer is already grey and depressing enough, this is not the news I need.

My first bone to pick is why the filter decided to make me look so haggard. And I know that’s not the default because it’s made some of you look like actual gilfs. Why do I look like I’ve spent a decade lost at sea or abusing sunbeds when half of you look middle aged? How does that work? But the real blow was finding out that the filter is actually really realistic.

A plastic surgeon has said the filter is really accurate

A plastic surgeon has shared her take on the accuracy of the filter, breaking down the features and their similarities to the of skin of the older patients she treats. Breaking down the science, Dr Monika Kieu explained on TikTok how age causes a loss of structural support from the skin and cartilage, making our noses appear wider and drooping.

But it gets worse. Apparently, an additional loss of bone when we age causes the eyes to look more hollow and the loss of the desirable v-line shape of the jaw, which often becomes wider at the bottom.

If you thought the loss of skeletal support was the worst bit, Dr Monica continued to explain the reasons behind skin pigmentation, another element which makes the filter appear so realistic. She highlighted that as we get older, we produce more melanin, which creates areas of hyperpigmentation, and less collagen, which causes wrinkling and thinning of the skin.

To test the theory, people have been using the filter on old pictures of celebrities and comparing the likeliness to them in real life – and some of them are wildly accurate. Like, come on, the one of Sarah Jessica Parker could not be more spot on. While I love seeing people testing the theory with celebs, I’m high-key mad that I look more like Mother Gothel from Into the Woods than actual Meryl Streep. Even Kylie Jenner tried it and had the nerve to complain about looking late forties, at a push. Get a grip, Kylie.

Luckily, I’m not the only one who thinks so as there seems to be a community of unlucky sods like myself who have been truly humbled by this filter. Dr Monica stresses that all of these changes are part of a natural process and aren’t a bad thing. But that’s easy for her to say, as she doesn’t look a day over 55 in her video.

While I’m impressed the TikTok aged filter is accurate, I’m not happy with where I’m headed. There seems to be no way of controlling how much it ages you either, so my resolution has been to purge the trend from my FYP and hope this all blows over quickly, for my own sanity’s sake.

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