This week's TikTok beauty trick: Face tape to help banish wrinkles

GONE are the days of Botox and other fillers, as TikTokers have discovered a new natural method for getting rid of wrinkles and fine lines: sticky tape. Combined incidentally with a few hours' sleep, this hack could supposedly banish even the most stubborn signs of aging. But is it really such a miracle fix? We'll let you be the judge of that.

Is sticky tape the new beauty must-have for social media users? Not content with using it to achieve perfect cat-eye makeup, TikTokers are now using adhesive tape as a substitute for Botox.

And we're hardly even exaggerating. Known as "face taping," this method involves applying tape to certain parts of the face before going to sleep to help get rid of wrinkles and fine lines which are obviously a blight on the lives of TikTok users, many of whom are under 25 years old.

Botox has been a subject of much debate lately. A study recently reported multiple complications from botulinum toxin injections, while the United Kingdom has decided to ban this and other cosmetic fillers in teenagers under the age of 18.

So it's not so surprising to learn that some people are turning to more natural, albeit possibly less effective, methods in an attempt to rejuvenate their appearance.

Reducing the movement of facial muscles

On TikTok, the #facetape hashtag currently totals more than 7.2 million views, while #facetaping already has 1.4 million, showing a definite craze for the technique.

In the most watched videos, users can be seen applying facial patches or adhesive tape and that's cosmetic tape, for the face, of course, not rolls of parcel tape or duct tape to different parts of their face, from forehead to cheeks, lips and even under the eyes.

The theory goes that this helps "fix" the features of the face and reduce the movement of facial muscles during sleep.

In other words, the adhesive apparently helps stop you making facial expressions during the night, thus preventing the formation of wrinkles and lines.

Granted, there's reason to be skeptical about this natural method. Like many TikTok hacks, our ancestors already used it centuries ago, and, not surprisingly, it didn't (really) work.

Still, this beauty trick is pretty much safe, if you stick to applying the tape under your eyes, above your lips, on your forehead and cheeks. So why not give it a try?

On an account packed with beauty tips of all kinds, @naturalfacebible shows users the right way to go about optimal face taping, arguing that she owes her own baby-smooth skin to this method, combined with some facial massage.