Brace Yourself: Is Mewing BS?

Jaw-aerobics Get Chewed Over

Science journalist’s Sadie Dingfelder’s writing has appeared in National Geographic, the Washington Post, and Washingtonian magazine. She is the author of Do I Know You? A Faceblind Reporter's Journey Into the Science of Sight, Memory, and Imagination. She appears on The Gist to discuss science-based claims in the recurring segment “Is That Bullshit”.

Hemsworth and Cera, each handsome in their own way

Have you ever wished your jawline was nice and square — more Chris Hemsworth than Michael Cera? Well, two (disgraced) orthodontists have a (questionable) solution for you: mewing.

Sometimes called, “mouth yoga,” mewing is an exercise meant to force your upper palette to grow by pushing your tongue against it, which then will cause your lower jaw to broaden and square.

Mewing was invented by British orthodontist John Mew in the 1970s, but it only gained popularity after he was kicked off of UK's General Dental Council registry (the UK equivalent of losing your medical license) in 2017.

This cleared the way for John’s son Mike to take over the practice, and he started posting instructional videos online. These videos went viral when sexually frustrated young men found them, dubbed the Mew’s exercises “mewing,” and promoted them as a way to become more masculine-looking and attractive to women. (Mike Mew recently followed in his father’s footsteps, as he lost his license in 2024.)

Tooth and Consequences: The Mew Legal Saga

There is no evidence that mewing works — and even the Mews admit that it shouldn’t work for adults, as jaws finish growing at puberty. However, they encourage full-grown people to try anyway — and they have. The orthotropics subreddit is full of tutorials and compelling “before and after” pictures.

There’s also no evidence that mewing works for children — and there’s some evidence that it can harm you. In 2023, a team of dentists from Germany presented a case study of a 16-year old boy who practiced mewing seven hours a day for three months. His commitment to mewing (probably) resulted in a salivary gland cyst that had to be surgically removed.

Given how many people are doing it, the DIY version of mewing is probably largely harmless. The version you get as an actual patient of the Mews, however, could leave you physically and mentally scarred for life.

One patient of theirs, a 6-year-old known only as Patient B, was forced to wear head and neck gear eight hours a day, an "expansion appliance" 18 hours a day, and "removable upper and lower appliances" which he could only take out when brushing his teeth. As a result, he developed emotional trauma (according to a dentist who worked with Mike Mew) and “seizure-like episodes.” Dental experts reviewing the kids’ records say that his jaw development was normal and didn’t need any intervention.

This price tag for this treatment? £12,500 ($15,596).

A second 6-year-old, known as Patient A, was fitted with unnecessary neck-gear appliances and referred for unneeded tongue surgery. The result? “A photograph showed Patient A's upper and lower teeth slanted forward, that she had recession of the lower front teeth and an unaligned upper tooth following the treatment, as well as an ulcer.” Sounds bad to me.

The Good Mews

The knowledge that mewing is ineffective has seemingly percolated to Gen Alpha, for whom the word “mewing” means a particular gesture, one where you put your finger over your lips as if to say ”hush”, and then trace your jawline.

This means “Please be quiet, I am busy mewing.” It reminds me of the old trope, “Sorry, I can’t go out, I’m washing my hair,” as it is an intentionally lame excuse; just a tiny bit more polite than saying the truth — that you are not interested in further social engagement.

So. Is that Mandible-shit?

There’s no evidence that mewing works, and no one seems interested in running a good study on it, probably because both Dr. Mews are clearly quacks.

Given everything we know about tooth and jaw development, there’s no reason it would work for adults any better than, say, making a shrine to the Goddess of Jawlines, Angelina Jolie.

As for young children, mewing might work — though I can’t imagine getting a kid to do this for hours a day without using whips and chains, techniques that most orthodontists now consider unethical.

As an adult, the only effective way to get a squarer jawline is whatever kind of surgery John Mulaney (may have) had.

However, a stubborn fact remains, one that I haven’t told you until now: Roughly 200 years ago, nearly everyone had nice roomy jaws and no problems with tooth alignment. What happened? It’s in dispute, but the top suspects include soft foods, a move away from breastfeeding, and pacifiers.

If you want to raise a future model (or even just avoid jaw and tooth alignment problems), you may want to breastfeed for as long as you can possibly stand it (up to age 2), avoid pacifiers and purees, and give your kids hard foods to chew on.

And before you shell out thousands of dollars for braces from a legit orthodontist, remember that 70%- 90% of the time, your teeth will relapse into their crooked ways.