Umax alternative without a score: what to use if the number isn't the point
Umax scans your face and returns a score out of 100 behind a weekly subscription. If what you actually want is to know what to change, a score is the wrong tool. An honest comparison, with prices.
Updated 15 September 2026 · 4 min read
What Umax actually gives you
Umax is a phone app. You take a selfie, it analyses the face, and — after a paywall — shows a score out of 100 plus sub-scores for things like jawline, cheekbones, skin and "masculinity", with a list of suggestions. The scan is free; seeing the result costs a weekly subscription, listed at $3.99 a week at the time of writing (check the App Store listing, since in-app prices change). Left running, that is around $200 a year.
None of this is hidden and the app is upfront about what it is: a score. The question is whether a score is what you want.
What a score can and cannot do
It can: give you a number, and give you a slightly different number after you change something, which some people find motivating.
It cannot:
- Tell you what to change first. A sub-score of 6.4 for "jawline" does not say whether a beard, a haircut, a photo from a different angle or nothing at all is the right response.
- Measure the face rather than the photo. The scan is a close-range selfie, and at arm's length the nose appears roughly 30% wider and the face narrower than it does from a normal distance. The score is partly a score of your phone's position.
- Capture the half of attractiveness that is personal. Research on how people rate faces finds that roughly half of the variation in ratings is individual taste, not shared agreement. A single number is, by construction, only about the shared half.
- Separate face from everything else. How you come across at first glance is hair, grooming, clothes, expression, light and posture as much as bone — and those are the parts you can actually change. A face score leaves them out.
The deeper problem is that a score answers a question — "where do I stand?" — that people ask when what they mean is "what should I do?". Those need different tools.
What to use instead, depending on what you want
If you want to know what to change: Auraspire
Auraspire is built for the second question and does not answer the first. You take one photo. In about half a minute you get your face shape, your face type and how a stranger is likely to read you in the first second; the full result adds the changes that would move it most. There is no score, no rating, no ranking against other people, and nothing about weight, height or anything medical.
The honest limit: it is a read from photos, written by software following a method, not a measurement. Two readers might weigh things slightly differently. What you get is judgement, not a number, because judgement is the thing a number cannot give.
If you want to know how strangers react: crowd feedback
Photofeeler-style services show your photo to other users who vote on perceived traits (attractive, smart, trustworthy, and so on). The output is still numbers, but they are about the photo and the reaction to it, which is closer to reality than a geometry score. Trade-offs: you need enough votes to mean anything, the voters are other users of the service rather than the people you are trying to impress, and it does not tell you what to change.
If you want it free and human: a friend with taste
Ask one person whose judgement you trust, show them two photos, and ask which looks more like you and why. This is free, fast and often better than any app. The limit is that friends are kind, and that most people do not have a friend who will say "the shirt is too big".
If you want hands-on: a stylist or barber consultation
An in-person consultation gives you the changes without any photo at all. It costs more and takes longer, and it is one axis at a time — the barber will not tell you about your shirt.
A fair word for Umax
If what you want is a number to watch, and you know it is a number derived from a close-up selfie, Umax delivers that consistently and quickly. Some people use it as a motivational scoreboard and cancel the subscription, and that is a reasonable use. The concern is not that the number exists; it is that the number gets mistaken for a plan.
In one table
| Umax | Auraspire | |
|---|---|---|
| Output | 0–100 score + sub-scores + tips | Face shape, face type, first impression, ranked changes |
| Score / rating | Yes | No |
| Input | One close-range selfie | One photo; flags when it was taken too close |
| Human involved | No | No |
| Price | Free scan; ~$3.99/week to see results (listed) | Free scan and face type; $6.99 once for the full result |
| Subscription | Yes, weekly | No |
| Covers | Face | Face shape, hair, beard, glasses, photos, expression |
Prices as listed at time of writing; check the store before you decide. And whichever you choose, take the photo from a metre and a half away — see why you look different in selfies — because every tool is only as good as the photo you give it.
Questions people ask
- Is Umax accurate?
- It is consistent, which is not the same thing. It returns similar scores for similar photos, but the score is based on a single close-range selfie, and close-range photos distort facial proportions — the nose reads roughly 30% wider at arm's length than from 1.5 metres. Any score built on that photo is scoring the distortion as much as the face. There is a full guide on what face-rating apps measure and miss.
- Is Auraspire a face-rating app?
- No. It does not rate or score anything, and it never ranks you against anyone. The face scan takes one photo and gives your face shape, your face type and how a stranger is likely to read you in the first second, then the changes that would move that most.
- What does Auraspire cost?
- The scan and your face type are free. The full result is a one-time $6.99 on the web, with nothing that renews.
- What about the ads for Umax that show huge before/after changes?
- Those are user-submitted or illustrative and are not evidence of what the app does. The app returns a score and generic suggestions; the change in any before/after came from the person, not the number.
Sources
- Apple App Store listing: Umax – Become Hot — in-app purchase pricing as listed; check the listing, since prices change
- Ward B, Ward M, Fried O, Paskhover B. Nasal Distortion in Short-Distance Photographs: The Selfie Effect. JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery, 2018. — why a score computed from an arm's-length selfie is measuring a distorted face
- Hönekopp J. Once more: is beauty in the eye of the beholder? Relative contributions of private and shared taste to judgments of facial attractiveness. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 2006;32(2):199–209. — about half of the variation in attractiveness ratings is individual taste rather than shared agreement — a single number cannot capture that half