Selfies exist since long before smartphones, but the super portable cameras mobile devices are equipped with made them so popular, they finally got their own word. There are many reasons and ways to take a selfie, and I think pretty much everyone’s social media feeds can attest for this.
Actors, music artists and famous people in general have greatly contributed to promoting the whole selfie trend. Regardless who is the subject in your selfies, you can take them to a whole new level by cleverly editing them where needed. Fortunately, there are tons of photo editing apps that make tweaking a selfie (and other photos for that matter) as easy as can be, and even a fun experience for some.
The endless face-enhancing capabilities these apps offer were previously reserved for the pros and available only in professional tools like Photoshop, but this is definitely not true anymore. For your convenience, we compiled a list of great photo editing apps, some specifically designed for tweaking selfies and others created with more versatility in mind.
Aviary – Android, iOS
Price: Freemium
Photo Editor by Aviary has a laundry list of image editing tools – from basic enhancements like adjusting brightness and contrast, sharpen and blur, and color balance to a collection of cosmetic tools for fixing red eyes, whitening teeth and blemish removal.
It can also make your selfies more shareable, as the app offers a variety of stickers, drawing and adding text capabilities as well as the option to create memes. There are quite a few IAPs, which mostly offer sticker and effect packs, although the free features may be enough for those who only do basic photo editing every now and then.
YouCam Perfect Selfie Cam – Android, iOS
Price: Freemium on Android, Free on iOS
YouCam Perfect Selfie is one of the most feature-rich selfie apps as it offers some amazing selfie taking features – it comes with an auto-beautify option that enhances your selfie as you snap it, a built-in timer and the hand wave gesture among others.
When it comes to cosmetic tools, the app certainly doesn’t disappoint: there are ways to perfect your entire body using tools like the skin smoother, blemish removal, face contouring, nose reshaping, eye enlarger, eye bag remover, double eyelid creator (bet you never thought you’d get something like this) and ways to make your waist look slimmer and lengthen your legs to look taller. I’m wondering why there’s no boob enhancer, but looking at the collection of face and body altering tools YouCam already has, I won’t be surprised if they add this too at some point.
Joking aside, YouCam is a treasure of selfie perfecting capabilities. It even has multi-face detection so you can touch up every face in your ‘usies’ – because yeah, group selfies are a thing too. Aside from this, the app also comes with the expected collection of filters (also available for videos and video selfies), frames, collages, frames and social sharing options.
Perfect365 – Android, iOS
Price: Freemium
The name of the app says it all – if you’re a perfectionist when it comes to your selfies, Perfect365 will help you achieve it. Besides touching up your facial features and correcting defects such as blemishes and under-eye circles, the app lets you modify every key point on your face.
Perfect365 is supposedly one of the go-to apps used by Kim Kardashian (who actually wrote a book on taking selfies) to make those famous mugshots of hers flawless, then throw them at the selfie-hungry social media channels. What’s particularly interesting about the app is it also lets you try on various makeup and hair styles – you could go as far as turning yourself into someone else or simply make some subtle adjustments to make up for the lack of sleep on the previous night.
FaceTune – Android, iOS
Price: $3.99
FaceTune has a lot of features found in other apps, but something rather unique about it is the ability to use its customizable filters on specific areas, not just on the entire photo. Other features such as photo enhancements, various filters, makeup application, reshaping your facial structure as well as hair coloring and correction only make this app even more desirable for selfie aficionados.
There’s also the possibility to defocus or blur the background to place you in focus and add some interesting textures and customizable frames.
BeFunky Photo Editor – Android, iOS
Price: Freemium
BeFunky Photo Editor is a great image editing app that offers an easy way to create collages, and add text on your photos using the built-in collection of fonts or your own. It offers straightforward ways to retouch photos with tools such as red eye remover, flash spot remover and teeth whitener among others.
The app sports a clean and intuitive interface where you can easily add photo effects, frames, stickers, shapes and patterns overlays as well as perform adjustments for the exposure, saturation and fill light of your photos. The app is free and it doesn’t feature any ads, although it does include various filter and effect packs you can buy.
Filterra – iOS
Price: Free
Filterra is an iOS-only app, but I decided to feature it as it’s an amazing free photo editor. It’s not just for selfies, but if you’re interested more in enhancing your image, and not so much on altering your face, you’re going to love it.
Besides the usual features such as filters and effects sets, the app lets you compare multiple effects to easily spot the perfect one, create custom collections of filters and effects so you can re-use them with ease and perform various image adjustments, all wrapped in a streamlined, modern layout. Filterra comes with a built-in store where you can purchase more effects, textures, filters and bundles – oddly enough all of them are listed as free right now, here’s hoping this stays permanent.
Retrica – Android, iOS
Price: Freemium
Retrica is another one of those apps that’s focused on both taking selfies and regular photos along with editing them. It offers live filters which you can preview before snapping photos, an automated collage tool that organizes the photos as you’re taking them, a vignette tool, the blur function for placing subjects in and out of focus and vignettes.
Furthermore, you get a built-in timer and even though Retrica is add-supported you can remove them for the small price of $0.99 as well as also expand your filter collection with one or more of the buyable packs.
What’s your go-to app for editing selfies and what are the most common touch ups you apply on your photos?
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