It all started with a doggy face filter. You know the one… floppy ears, chocolate brown button nose and a Looney Tunes tongue that rolled out in videos. When Snapchat debuted its cartoonish filter in 2016, the world just couldn’t get enough. It flooded group chats, dominated Instagram stories and quickly became the internet’s favourite party trick. But behind its cute façade was a feature that kept us hooked. While painting a goofy picture, the filter quietly enhanced each face it sat on – skin gently smoothened, shadows softened and features nudged into symmetrical proportions. And with that, a whole new language of aesthetic aspiration was born.
Today, facelifts – the process of having incisions cut around one’s face and lifting the superficial musculoaponeurotic system (SMAS) to correct sagging – are increasingly seen as not just an option for the rich and famous in their 60s and 70s, but a necessity for everyday beauty consumers in their late 20s and 30s. And our world of filters may well be the reason behind the shift.
For Dr Tatjana Pavicic, dermatologist and educator in aesthetic medicine, the surge in serious structural changes to the face among younger patients across the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and Kuwait may have started with the pandemic. “People were suddenly spending hours on video calls and constantly looking at their own faces on screen. It made many more aware of the facial features they had previously not paid attention to,” she explains. “At the same time, aesthetic medicine became far less stigmatised and conversations around cosmetic treatments moved into the mainstream. Initially, younger patients were more interested in skincare and minimally invasive treatments. Over time, these conversations broadened to long-term facial ageing and surgical options such as facelifts. By 2021, it had become a regular topic of discussion in consultations.”
Surgeons across the region are witnessing the same shift. Plastic and maxillofacial surgeon Dr Alexander Glushko notes, “Over the past five years, we’ve seen a noticeable shift in how younger patients approach facial aesthetics. Those in their 20s and 30s often arrive at consultations already aware of surgical options.” To add to that, facelifts have also gained the interest of 20-somethings, thanks to their trust in influencers online. “Instagram and TikTok have played a role in changing mindsets and for many patients under 40, social media is one of the first triggers for exploring aesthetic treatments,” Dr Pavicic further adds. “For years, people used filters for photos and videos, but these digitally altered images have started to influence what they perceive as normal or ideal. In some cases, this leads to filter dysmorphia, in which patients begin comparing their real appearance with a filtered version of themselves and develop unrealistic expectations of how they should look.”
Interestingly, the terminology being used in clinics mirrors the vocabulary circulating online. As Dr Simon Ivanov, endoscopic facelift specialist and breast and body surgeon, explains, “Younger patients rarely ask for a ‘facelift’. Instead, they use terms from social media trends, such as ‘snatched jawline’, ‘fox eyes’ or ‘baby facelift’. Our role is to translate these requests into realistic anatomical solutions and explain what’s achievable safely.”But how far should one go? “There’s a popular conversation online that Gen Z is ‘ageing like milk’, while millennials are ‘ageing like wine’, but this is more of a social media narrative than a clinical reality,” Dr Pavicic notes. “Gen Z grew up in a digital environment shaped by filters, contouring and curated beauty standards, which can make faces appear more mature at a younger age. Millennials, however, entered aesthetic medicine later in life and approached it more gradually.” Dr Glushko sees the same divide in his consultations. “Millennials ask how they can maintain a youthful facial structure and delay ageing. Gen Z focuses on improving specific facial features or achieving certain proportions.”
The problem arises when the effects of AI have patients coming in with concerns that seem disproportionate to what’s clinically visible. “I have had patients in their mid-20s describing in great detail a skin fold or facial asymmetry that, even under careful clinical examination, is barely visible,” Dr Pavicic says. “The concern is very real to them and the distress they feel is genuine, but the clinical finding may be minimal or sometimes even absent.”
Despite this, there are cases where surgeons believe a lifting procedure is justified. Dr Ivanov recalls a patient of his in her early 30s with premature jowling. “She felt her lower face looked heavier than it should for her age. We performed a minimally invasive lift that repositioned the deeper facial tissues, and the result was subtle yet transformative. After that, her friends kept asking if she’d simply taken a long vacation because she looked noticeably refreshed.”
While Dr Pavicic sees solutions in less invasive treatments like neuromodulators to relax the masseter muscles, carefully placed dermal fillers to define the jawline and ultrasound-based therapies to tighten skin and underlying tissue, Dr Ivanov highlights that surgery can sometimes achieve what non-invasive procedures cannot. “Non-surgical treatments such as injectables, lasers or energy-based devices can improve skin quality, restore volume and provide temporary tightening,” he agrees, “but they cannot reposition the face’s deeper structural layers. When facial tissues have descended significantly, surgery is the only way to restore the original anatomical position.” Looking back at his younger clients, the doctor recalls, “One of the most meaningful reactions came from a patient who told me that for the first time in years she felt comfortable appearing in photos without editing them or using filters.”
For Pavicic, however, the growing fascination with early surgical intervention remains a concern. She believes that in many cases a more conservative approach can prevent long-term complications. “A facelift is designed to correct structural ageing changes such as sagging facial tissues and loose skin. These changes typically develop later in life and are generally not present in healthy individuals in their mid to late 20s and early to mid-30s. So when surgery is performed on tissue that has not yet aged in the way the procedure is designed to address, the result can look unnatural over time.” Among the many undesirable effects of early facelifts are unnatural or ‘windswept’ appearances, distorted hairlines and facial asymmetry. While she acknowledges that in certain cases, for example, when a patient has undergone severe weight loss, nothing will do the job of a pull-up, the overall risk-to-benefit ratio almost always remains too low.
Ultimately, the balance tips between caution and clinical possibility. As the internet continues to showcase youngsters with freshly stitched faces, experts insist that timing and patient selection are the most important factors to consider. As Dr Glushko puts it, “A facelift does not stop the ageing process. But if a surgery is performed appropriately, a patient can still look younger than they would have otherwise.”
This article originally appeared in the April 2026 issue of Vogue Arabia
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