21-Day Face Yoga Challenge

This 21-day face yoga challenge is three weeks of one small routine a day: 5 to 10 minutes of gentle moves, a new focus each week, and an easy day at the end of every week. Week 1 teaches the basic moves, week 2 adds holds and massage, and week 3 puts everything together into a full routine. The whole plan is below, free, with a printable tracker and an honest look at what three weeks can and can’t do.

How the 21-day challenge works

The challenge is built to make face yoga a habit, not to hit a deadline. It mirrors the shape of the 3-week plans in the Gluvy app: short daily sessions that build gradually.

• 5 to 10 minutes a day. Short enough for busy days; two minutes still counts.
• One focus per week. Learn the moves, then add holds and massage, then do the full routine.
• An easy day each week. Days 7, 14 and 18 are lighter, to give your face and jaw a break and keep the challenge from feeling like a chore.
• Same time, same place. Attach the routine to something you already do, like brushing your teeth.
• Gentle is the point. Light pressure, slow movements, teeth slightly apart.

Every move is described in our free guides. The main reference is the 5-minute face yoga routine for beginners, plus our 12 face yoga exercises for every area and the jawline exercises guide.

Safety first: stop any move that hurts, clicks or makes you dizzy. Check with a doctor, dentist or physiotherapist before you start if you have jaw joint (TMJ) problems, a neck condition, or recent facial surgery or injectables.

Week 1: learn the moves

Week 1 is about form, not effort: learn the eight beginner moves in two halves, then put them together. Use a mirror to catch frowning or lifted shoulders.

Day	Focus	Moves	Time
1	Upper face	Palm Tap Activate, Forehead Smooth Down, Temple Lift, Under-Eye Slide (twice through) + day-1 photos	5 min
2	Lower face and neck	O-Shape Pump, Jawline Press & Pull, Sky Smile, Neck Circle (twice through)	5 min
3	Full routine	The 8-move beginner routine, forehead to neck	5 min
4	Forehead and cheeks	Beginner routine + Palm-Supported Brow Raise + Cheek Puff and Roll	6–7 min
5	Mouth and lips	Beginner routine + Upper Lip Stretch + Pucker and Smile	6 min
6	Full routine	The 8-move beginner routine, a little slower	5–6 min
7	Easy day	Forehead Smooth Down, Neck Circle, 1 minute of slow nose breathing	2–3 min

Cues for week 1:

1. Go slower than feels necessary. Each move runs for about 30 to 40 seconds; use the whole time rather than racing through reps.
2. Use a little oil or moisturiser for gliding moves, so Forehead Smooth Down, Temple Lift and Under-Eye Slide never drag the skin.
3. Keep the forehead still during cheek and mouth moves. If it wrinkles during the O-Shape Pump, make the movement smaller.

On day 1, take your starting photos before the routine (see “Track it” below).

Week 2: add holds and massage

Week 2 adds short holds, which slow you down, and gentle massage for the jaw and neck. Gua sha days are optional, with a hands-only version.

Day	Focus	Moves	Time
8	Holds	Beginner routine, holding Sky Smile and O-Shape Pump for 3 slow breaths each round	6–7 min
9	Jaw and chin	The 4-minute jawline routine (Jawline Press & Pull, Thumb Jawline Massage, U-Pinch Glide, Under-Chin Sweep, Side Jaw Stretch, Sky Smile, Tongue Reach) + Chin Tuck	5 min
10	Massage (optional gua sha)	A neck-to-forehead gua sha routine, or by hand: Forehead Smooth Down, Temple Lift, Jawline Press & Pull, Thumb Jawline Massage	5–8 min
11	Full face with holds	The 12-move face yoga workout at an easy pace, holding the brow raise and lip stretch for about 5 seconds	8–10 min
12	Jaw and neck	The 4-minute jawline routine + Chin Tuck + Neck Circle	5–6 min
13	Massage (optional gua sha)	Repeat day 10	5–8 min
14	Easy day	Forehead Smooth Down, Jawline Press & Pull, slow breathing, and a short journal note	3 min

How to get week 2 right:

1. Hold, don’t squeeze. Keep a gentle position while you breathe. If your face shakes or aches, shorten the hold.
2. Keep the jaw loose, teeth slightly apart and lips lightly closed. If you tend to clench, our guide to jaw tension relief has more slow, relaxing moves.
3. For gua sha, use oil and a flat stone. Follow the order and stroke direction in our gua sha routine: neck first, light pressure, no marks.

Week 3: full routine

Week 3 is the full routine most days, so you finish with one sequence you know by heart.

Day	Focus	Moves	Time
15	Full routine	The 12-move face yoga workout	10 min
16	Full face + jaw	Beginner routine + the 4-minute jawline routine	9 min
17	Full routine	The 12-move face yoga workout	10 min
18	Easy day	Gua sha or hand massage, gentle and slow	5 min
19	Full routine	The 12-move face yoga workout, with your week 2 holds	10 min
20	Your routine	6 to 10 of your favourite moves, top of the face to the neck	5–10 min
21	Finish	The 12-move face yoga workout + day-21 photos + a journal note	10 min

The 12-move workout runs forehead to neck: Forehead Smooth Down, Palm-Supported Brow Raise, Temple Lift, Under-Eye Slide, O-Shape Pump, Cheek Puff and Roll, Upper Lip Stretch, Pucker and Smile, Jawline Press & Pull, Tongue Reach, Sky Smile and Chin Tuck, after about 30 seconds of light fingertip taps. Short on time? Do the 5-minute beginner routine instead; it still counts.

Want a different length? Week 1 on its own works as a 7-day face yoga challenge. For a 28-day or 30-day face yoga challenge, add a fourth week that repeats week 3, with one easy day, and finish with your second set of photos on the last day.

Track it

Track two things: the days you practise, and two sets of photos taken the same way.

A printable tracker

Print or screenshot this table and keep it by your mirror. Write the minutes you practised each day, and at the end of each week add one line about how your face, jaw and neck feel.

Week 1	Week 2	Week 3
Day 1: ___ min	Day 8: ___ min	Day 15: ___ min
Day 2: ___ min	Day 9: ___ min	Day 16: ___ min
Day 3: ___ min	Day 10: ___ min	Day 17: ___ min
Day 4: ___ min	Day 11: ___ min	Day 18: ___ min
Day 5: ___ min	Day 12: ___ min	Day 19: ___ min
Day 6: ___ min	Day 13: ___ min	Day 20: ___ min
Day 7: ___ min	Day 14: ___ min	Day 21: ___ min
How I feel:	How I feel:	How I feel:

If you miss a day, leave the box empty and carry on with the next day in the plan. You don’t need to start over.

Photos on day 1 and day 21

Take a set of photos on day 1 and again on day 21 under the same conditions, so any difference isn’t just lighting or angle: the same spot and light, the same time of day, your phone at eye level on a self-timer, no makeup or filters, a neutral expression, and three angles (front, 45 degrees and profile). Add a short note next to each set about your sleep, salt or drinks the night before, and anything new in your skincare. Our guide to face yoga before and after photos explains the full setup and how to compare sets fairly.

What to expect after 21 days

The realistic result of a 21-day face yoga challenge is a habit, not a new face. Expect to know the moves by heart, to notice tension in your forehead and jaw sooner, and perhaps to find the few minutes relaxing. Nobody can promise visible change in three weeks, for two reasons:

• Habits take longer than 21 days to feel automatic. In a study of 96 volunteers who repeated a new daily behaviour for 12 weeks, the estimated time for it to feel automatic ranged from 18 to 254 days, and missing a single day didn’t materially set people back (Lally et al., 2010). Treat day 21 as the start of the habit, not the end.
• The face yoga research used much longer programs. In the best-known study, 27 women aged 40 to 65 enrolled and 16 completed 20 weeks of facial exercises: 30 minutes a day for 8 weeks, then every other day (Alam et al., 2018). Dermatologists rating standardised photos saw fuller upper and lower cheeks, and the average estimated age fell from 50.8 to 48.1 years. It was small and had no control group, so larger controlled studies are needed. Our review of whether face yoga works covers the rest of the evidence.

When you compare your photos, look at specific things, like how relaxed your brows look or how your jaw sits at rest. If you can’t see a difference, that’s normal at three weeks. Judge the challenge by how your face feels and whether you want to keep going.

After day 21, you can repeat week 3, move on to a plan for the area you care about most, or settle into the 5-minute routine on most days. Our guides to face yoga over 50 and face yoga for men have more ideas for keeping the routine going. Still have questions? See the Gluvy FAQ.

Do the challenge in Gluvy

If you’d rather follow along than read tables, Gluvy’s face yoga video workouts follow a similar shape: 3-week plans of about 5 to 10 minutes a day, built from more than 200 guided video exercises, with a timer on every step. You choose a focus area, such as the forehead, eyes, cheeks or the chin and jawline, and the app lays out each day for you.

Reminders help you keep the same time every day, and the progress journal keeps your day-1 and day-21 selfies in one place. For the skincare side of a glow up challenge, the app’s Glow Up Challenge lesson sits alongside its other skincare lessons, and the gua sha video courses cover the massage days. Gluvy is an iPhone app and free to download; see pricing for what Gluvy Pro adds. When you’re ready, download Gluvy and start on day 1.

Sources

• Lally P, van Jaarsveld CHM, Potts HWW, Wardle J. How are habits formed: Modelling habit formation in the real world. European Journal of Social Psychology, 2010.
• Alam M, et al. Association of Facial Exercise With the Appearance of Aging. JAMA Dermatology, 2018.