Lip wrinkles

Do delicate lines form on your lips or around your mouth? Then you’re dealing with lip wrinkles, which are also known as mouth wrinkles and, in smokers, smoker’s wrinkles. Fortunately, there’s something you can do. Find out what they are and how you can prevent them here.

  • Lip or mouth wrinkles are fine lines caused by both your facial expressions and skin aging.

  • The fine wrinkles can be treated very well with many options.

  • Your personal lifestyle has an impact on the formation of wrinkles around the mouth – specifically smoking and going to the tanning salon.

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Medically reviewed by:

Medically reviewed by:

Lip wrinkles: Simply explained!

Lip or mouth wrinkles are wrinkles that form either directly on the lips or above and to the side of the mouth. The main cause is quickly found: The breakdown of the structural protein collagen. If we look at the folds, they can be divided into vertical and radial. In the vertical variant, fine lines form, often covering the entire mouth area. Above the mouth, the wrinkles usually appear as distinct lines between the upper lip and the nose. The region is usually bordered by the nasolabial fold on the left and right side of the face. The radial folds owe their name to the radial alignment around the mouth and are thus dependent on the underlying muscle course – but more on that later.

When lip wrinkles become a problem

Regarding your health: never. But the subjective well-being is quite different. This is because the fine lines around the mouth can often give the impression of wrinkled, old skin even at a young age. You’ll probably agree with us there: a sensual mouth area definitely looks different. And if you are not averse to cigarettes or smoking in general and also like to spend time in the sun, wrinkles can become a visual problem very early on. You don’t have to let it get that far.

What causes lip wrinkles

Vertical wrinkles on the lips and around the mouth, like most facial wrinkles, are part of the aging process of the skin. They develop when, with increasing age, the proteins collagen and elastin are no longer produced in the skin to the same extent as in youth. However, your personal lifestyle has a significant influence on how quickly and how intensively the process of wrinkle formation takes place.

Smoking is especially harmful for beautiful, full lips. It is not for nothing that we also speak of smoker’s wrinkles. Other factors that can lead to early and pronounced lip wrinkles are frequent lack of sleep, excessive alcohol consumption, lack of exercise and a poor diet. In the case of radially aligned wrinkles, in addition to skin aging processes and lifestyle aspects, there is another issue. The radial wrinkles belong more to the dynamic facial wrinkles such as forehead or nose wrinkles, because they dig deeper into the skin year after year as a result of the mimic muscles – especially due to the activity of the orbicularis oculi muscle (mouth ring muscle).

What are the first signs

In the early stages, you usually only notice the wrinkles at second glance when you look at your mouth area in the mirror. They announce themselves as dynamic wrinkles that only become visible as soon as the lips move. Over time, the skin folds dig in more and more until they are finally visible to the naked eye right away, even on the resting mouth. Did you know? Marionette lines or a strawberry chin can also become visible at an early stage.

When should lip wrinkles be treated

Simply put, lip wrinkles should be treated as soon as they start to bother you. The earlier you start, the better results you can achieve. Because with time the skin “breaks”. This means that wrinkles will remain regardless of your facial expressions. The good thing is that fine lip wrinkles can be kept at bay for a long time with an appropriate lifestyle and sufficient skin care. On the other hand, they are very treatable. The range of options extends from peeling and microneedling to hyaluronic acid in jections as well as Botox injections.

Any questions? Our FAQ section has the answers!

Lip wrinkles are both dynamic and actinic. This means that on the one hand you get them because of your personal facial expressions and on the other hand they are the result of years of sun exposure on your skin. That is why regular sunbathers and solarium visitors tend to develop wrinkles around the mouth especially early.

Individual small mouth wrinkles are most easily injected with hyaluronic acid using the blanching technique. In this procedure, tiny amounts of hyaluronic acid are injected very superficially into the skin. The result: the skin becomes whitish-pale for a short time and the wrinkle smoothes out. In addition, it brings you a demonstrable improvement in your skin moisture – this has already been confirmed by studies.

However, if there are already quite a few creases, this technique would mean many pinholes. Then the optimal alternative is microneedling or vampire lifting. This involves the use of collagen induction and the optional addition of the patient’s own blood to smooth out wrinkles. You can learn more about this in our treatments.

You can conceal wrinkles in the area of the lips as well as eye wrinkles by clever make-up. If you were expecting a concrete guide to concealing here, then we’re sorry to disappoint you, as we’re 100% focused on the medical part. But various well-known beauty magazines and websites offer you numerous tips on this.

With a healthy diet, you can do a lot to delay and mitigate the appearance of mouth and lip wrinkles. Plant foods with high protein content and polyunsaturated fatty acids are well suited for prevention (e.g.: legumes or nuts). Also, make sure to drink enough water or unsweetened teas. This is how you keep your skin’s moisture balance in check. When the sun is shining, you should wear sun-protective headgear and apply a cream with a sun protection factor to your lips. And regular visits to the tanning salon are absolute no-goes if you want to avoid lip wrinkles.

More questions? Simply make a personal consultation appointment online.

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Last updated: 06.02.2023