How To Remove Wrinkles in Photoshop

To remove wrinkles in Photoshop, add a new empty layer, select the Spot Healing Brush or Healing Brush, set it to sample all layers, and paint over each wrinkle with a brush just wider than the line. Then lower that layer’s opacity to around 40 to 60 percent so the wrinkles are softened rather than erased. That last step is what keeps the face looking real.

Below are the four methods that do the job, from quickest to most precise, along with settings, the mistakes that make retouching obvious, and how to decide how far to go.

Reduce Wrinkles, Do Not Erase Them

Wrinkles are part of how a person looks. Remove every line from the face of someone in their fifties and they look like a wax figure, and people who know them notice at once. Most good portrait retouching reduces wrinkles so they are less prominent but still present, and leaves expression lines such as smile lines and crow’s feet softened rather than gone.

A useful test: the person should look rested, not different. If a friend would ask “what happened to your face?” you have gone too far.

Also separate temporary marks from character. Creases from a pillow or a tight collar, a stray hair, or a temporary blemish can be removed completely. Lines that move when the person smiles belong to their face and should only be softened.

Before You Start: Work Non-Destructively

1. Open the image in Photoshop.
2. Add a new empty layer above the background (Layer > New > Layer) and name it “Wrinkles”. All the healing goes on this layer, so the original stays untouched and you can lower the effect or delete it later.
3. Zoom to 100 percent or more on the area you are working on, but keep a second window or the Navigator panel open at normal size so you can see the overall effect.

Duplicating the background layer also works, but an empty layer is smaller and makes it easier to see exactly what you changed. If layers are new to you, see layers and masks in Photoshop.

Method 1: Spot Healing Brush (Fastest)

The Spot Healing Brush is the quickest way to get rid of fine lines and small creases. It needs no source point: it looks at the skin around your stroke and blends texture, color and tone in automatically.

1. Select the Spot Healing Brush (J; press Shift+J to cycle through the healing tools if another one is showing).
2. In the Options bar, set Type to Content-Aware and turn on Sample All Layers. Without that checkbox, the tool sees nothing on your empty layer and does nothing.
3. Set the brush slightly wider than the wrinkle. Use the bracket keys, [ and ], to change size as you go.
4. Paint along the wrinkle in one short stroke, or dab it in a few clicks along a longer line.
5. If a stroke pulls in the wrong texture (an eyelash, the edge of a lip), undo it with Ctrl+Z (Cmd+Z on a Mac) and try a shorter stroke or a smaller brush.

The Spot Healing Brush is excellent on cheeks, foreheads and open skin. It struggles close to edges such as the eye, the hairline and the lips, because it may borrow from those areas. Switch to the Healing Brush there.

Method 2: Healing Brush at Reduced Opacity (Most Natural)

The Healing Brush works like the Spot Healing Brush but you choose where the replacement skin comes from. That control is why it is the standard tool for softening wrinkles under the eyes and around the mouth.

1. Select the Healing Brush (J).
2. In the Options bar, set Sample to Current & Below (or All Layers).
3. Hold Alt (Option on a Mac) and click on smooth skin near the wrinkle that has the same brightness, color and texture. Skin on the same cheek or just below the line usually works best.
4. Paint along the wrinkle with a brush slightly wider than the line.
5. Resample often. Skin texture and tone change across the face, and one source point used everywhere leaves repeating patterns.
6. When the area is done, lower the layer’s opacity until some of the original line returns. Somewhere between 40 and 60 percent usually looks natural.

Lowering opacity is the step that turns removal into softening. You heal the wrinkle completely, then decide how much of it to bring back, which is easier to judge than trying to heal “halfway”.

Method 3: Clone Stamp at Low Opacity (Most Control)

The Clone Stamp copies pixels exactly instead of blending them. At full strength it leaves obvious patches on skin, but at low opacity it lets you build the effect up gradually.

1. Make a new empty layer and select the Clone Stamp (S).
2. In the Options bar, set Opacity to 20 to 40 percent and Sample to Current & Below. Use a soft-edged brush.
3. Alt-click (Option-click) on smooth skin of similar tone next to the wrinkle.
4. Brush over the wrinkle several times. Each pass covers a little more, so you can stop the moment it looks right.

The Clone Stamp is especially useful for evening out the shadow inside a deep line, where the healing tools sometimes smear.

Method 4: Dodge and Burn (Keeps All the Texture)

A wrinkle is visible mainly because of its shadow: a thin dark line with a lighter ridge beside it. Lightening just the dark line makes the wrinkle fade while every pore of the real skin stays in place. This is how high-end retouchers handle wrinkles, and it is covered in full in dodge and burn.

1. Choose Layer > New > Layer, set Mode to Soft Light, and tick “Fill with Soft-Light-neutral color (50% gray)”. The gray layer is invisible until you paint on it.
2. Select the Brush (B), set the color to white, the opacity to 5 to 10 percent and the hardness to zero.
3. Paint only inside the dark line of the wrinkle, with a brush about as wide as that line. Build up with several light passes.
4. If you lighten too much, paint with black at the same low opacity to bring the shadow back.

It is slower than healing, but the result survives close inspection and large prints, because no texture has been copied or blended.

Frequency Separation for Deep Wrinkles

Frequency separation splits the image into two layers: one holding color and tone (low frequency), and one holding fine texture (high frequency). You can then soften the shading of a deep wrinkle without smearing the skin texture, or fix the texture without shifting the color. The full technique is explained in frequency separation; the short version for an 8-bit image is:

1. Duplicate the background layer twice. Name the lower copy “Low” and the upper copy “High”.
2. Hide High, select Low, and apply Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur just strong enough that pores disappear, often a few pixels to around 10 pixels depending on the image size.
3. Show and select High. Choose Image > Apply Image, set Layer to Low, Blending to Subtract, Scale to 2 and Offset to 128.
4. Set High’s blend mode to Linear Light. The image should look exactly like the original.
5. On Low, use a soft brush or the Clone Stamp at low opacity to even out the dark band of the wrinkle. On High, use the Healing Brush (set to Current Layer) to fix the crease itself.

For 16-bit images the Apply Image settings are different (Add, with Invert ticked, Scale 2, Offset 0). If the result looks shifted when you turn on Linear Light, check the bit depth under Image > Mode.

Smoothing skin overall rather than single lines? How to make smooth skin in Photoshop covers whole-face skin softening that keeps texture.

Which Method to Use Where

• Forehead lines: Spot Healing Brush or Healing Brush, then reduce opacity. Keep some lines, especially if the person has expressive brows.
• Under-eye lines and bags: Healing Brush at reduced opacity, or dodge and burn. Never remove them completely; a face with no shape under the eyes looks strange.
• Crow’s feet: Healing Brush, then lower the layer to about 50 percent opacity or less. These are expression lines and should stay visible when the person is smiling.
• Smile lines (nasolabial folds): Dodge and burn or frequency separation. They define the shape of the face, so lighten their shadow rather than healing them away.
• Neck lines: Healing Brush, sampling along the line rather than across it.
• Wrinkles in clothing: Healing Brush or Clone Stamp at full strength, since fabric creases do not need to be kept.

Common Mistakes

• Removing every line. The most common mistake by far. Reduce, then lower opacity.
• Working only at 100 percent zoom. Close up, every remaining line looks like a problem. Zoom out to normal viewing size often; most retouching that looks heavy-handed was judged too close.
• Using one sample point everywhere. Skin on the forehead, cheek and chin differs in texture. Resample near each wrinkle.
• Retouching on the background layer. You lose the ability to dial the effect back. Always use a separate layer.
• Uneven treatment. If you soften the forehead heavily and leave the eyes untouched, the face looks patched. Treat similar lines in a similar way.
• Smooth, plastic patches. If a healed area has lost its pores, it reads as fake from across the room. Undo and use a smaller brush, or switch to dodge and burn.

Light Matters More Than Retouching

Hard, low-angled light carves deep shadows into every line, while soft light from a large source in front of the subject fills them in. If you photograph the person yourself, soft window light or an overcast sky will reduce wrinkles before you ever open Photoshop. The difference is explained in hard vs soft light, and lighting setups that flatter faces are in portrait lighting patterns.

Try This

Take one portrait and spend 10 minutes on it. Duplicate the file so you have two copies. On the first, remove every wrinkle you can find with the Spot Healing Brush at full strength. On the second, use the Healing Brush on its own layer and lower the layer to 50 percent. Put them side by side at normal size, then show both to someone who knows the person. Ask which one looks like them.

Wrinkle Retouching FAQ

What is the best tool to remove wrinkles in Photoshop?

The Healing Brush on a separate layer, with the layer opacity lowered afterward, gives the most natural result for most wrinkles. The Spot Healing Brush is faster for small lines on open skin, and dodge and burn is best when you need to keep all the original texture.

How do I soften wrinkles instead of removing them?

Heal the wrinkles completely on their own layer, then lower that layer’s opacity until some of each line returns. Around 40 to 60 percent is a good starting point, adjusted by eye at normal viewing size.

Why does the Spot Healing Brush do nothing on my new layer?

Sample All Layers is turned off in the Options bar. With it off, the tool only looks at the empty layer you are painting on. Turn it on and the tool will sample the photo underneath.

How do I remove wrinkles from clothes in Photoshop?

Use the Healing Brush or Clone Stamp at full strength on a new layer, sampling from smooth fabric of the same color and following the direction of the weave. For large folds, dodging the shadow of the crease often looks more natural than cloning.

Can I reduce wrinkles in Lightroom instead?

Yes, to a degree. Lowering Texture or Clarity with a masked local adjustment over the skin softens fine lines, and the healing tool in spot removal handles individual creases. For precise work around the eyes and mouth, Photoshop’s layers give you more control.

Retouching a whole portrait, not only wrinkles? Photo retouching covers the full workflow from blemishes to color.