Face shape
The 7 face shapes
Face shape here is four measurements, not a vibe: proportion, jawline, top-to-bottom balance, and where the face is widest. Those are the four scores the questionnaire produces, so a verdict can always be traced back to the measurement that drove it.
The single most useful correction on this whole site is on these pages. Almost every guide to face shape says a face is "long" once it is about one and a half times its width. That threshold sits above the top of the published human range, so measuring yourself honestly against it puts nearly everyone in the same bucket. The pages below use bands converted from a published facial-index table instead, and each one shows its arithmetic — including which parts of it are this site's own operating rules rather than something we could cite.
- ProportionWider than long ↔ Longer than wide
- JawlineCurved ↔ Angular
- Top-to-bottom balanceForehead wider ↔ Jaw wider
- CheekbonesFlat ↔ Widest point
Measure before you read. Every page below opens with how to take the four measurements on yourself, at a mirror or on a front-facing photo, and what the common mis-measurement is for that shape. Reading the descriptions first and picking the one that sounds like you is how people end up misfiled.
The seven, shortest to longest
Round is decided by the jaw, not by the cheeks. Trace from your chin back to your ear and the line never breaks into a corner; the face is about as wide as it is long, and the widest point sits at the cheek. Softness alone does not make a face round — a soft covering over a square jaw is still a square jaw.
Square is three widths that come out nearly the same, closed off by a jaw that turns a real corner near the ear. It is not a soft face with a heavy lower half; it is a face whose outline is drawn with straight lines, and the cheekbones are not the widest thing about it.
also called Inverted Triangle
Heart is a face that gets narrower on the way down: the forehead is the widest measurement, the jaw is clearly the narrowest, and the chin finishes in a point. Also published as Inverted Triangle, which is the more literal name and the reason people end up on the wrong page.
Oval is the shape defined by nothing winning: cheekbones widest but only just, forehead and jaw within a hair of each other, a jaw that curves instead of turning a corner, and a face a little longer than it is wide. It is also the shape most often claimed by people who have not measured.
also called Pear, Base-Down Triangle
Triangle is the face that gets wider on the way down: the jaw is the widest measurement, the forehead the narrowest, and the outline opens outward from temple to jaw. Also called Pear. It is the exact opposite of the shape called Inverted Triangle, which this site publishes as Heart.
Diamond is the shape where the cheekbones win outright: wider than the forehead and wider than the jaw, by a margin you can see across a room, on a face that is clearly longer than it is wide. It is bone, not fullness — the width is a ridge you can feel, and it narrows at both ends.
also called Rectangle, Long
Oblong is length with nothing else going on: forehead, cheekbones and jaw all measure about the same, the sides run close to parallel, and the face is at least 1.45 times as long as it is wide. Also published as Rectangle, which describes it better — the jaw can be soft or sharp and it is still this shape.