Should you smile in a professional headshot?
Usually yes, and the reason has nothing to do with looking friendly. A held smile is what goes wrong, not smiling itself. Here is how to get one that looks like you.
Short answer: usually yes, and more than you think.
Longer answer: the question people actually have is not whether to smile. It is why their smiling photos look strange, which makes them suspect that not smiling is safer. It is not. The problem is almost never the smile. It is the held smile.
Why the serious headshot usually loses
There is a version of the not-smiling headshot that works beautifully. It is the one photographers do on purpose, with proper lighting and a subject who is relaxed and thinking about something, and it reads as calm and self-possessed.
That is not what happens when you set a timer on your phone and decide not to smile. What happens then is a neutral face held under pressure, which reads as flat at best and irritated at worst. A face doing nothing in particular is not neutral to a viewer. It gets read as a mood, and rarely the one you intended.
A small genuine smile is far more forgiving. It survives bad lighting, an awkward angle and a phone camera. It is the reliable option, which is a different claim from it being the correct one.
Context still matters. A criminal barrister, a funeral director and a stand-up comedian are not all aiming for the same face, and you know your own industry better than any blog does. But if you are staring at two frames and cannot decide, take the one where you look pleased to be there.
The actual problem is duration
Here is the thing nobody mentions. A real smile lasts a second or two. Hold one for ten seconds and the muscles that make it genuine give up before the ones that make it wide do, and you end up with a mouth doing something your eyes are not part of. That is the rictus everyone recognises in their own photos and cannot explain.
The fix is mechanical, not emotional.
Relax your face completely between frames. Let it go slack. Then smile on the shot, and let it go again. Shoot in short bursts rather than holding a pose while the timer counts down.
If you are using a self-timer, do not smile at 3, 2, 1. Smile at 1. The waiting is what kills it.
Getting the eyes involved
A smile that only uses the mouth is the one that reads as fake, and you cannot fix it by smiling harder with your mouth. You have to give your eyes something to do.
The trick that works for most people is absurd and effective: think of something specific and slightly funny about ten seconds before the shot. Not “be happy”. A particular thing. Your face does the rest without being asked.
The other reliable one is to look slightly away, breathe out, then look back at the lens and shoot immediately. The moment of re-engaging is naturally alert, and the camera catches it before you have time to arrange your face.
If you are being photographed by someone else, get them to talk to you. A photo taken mid-answer usually beats a photo taken when you were told to smile.
Teeth or no teeth
Either. Both work.
Pick the one you do naturally, which is usually the one you do in photos with friends. A closed-mouth smile on someone whose real smile is wide looks withheld. A wide toothy smile on someone who does not smile that way looks performed.
If you genuinely do not know, shoot both in the same session. At normal profile-photo size the difference is smaller than you think, and you will know immediately which one looks like you.
A few things that go wrong
The chin. Almost everyone tucks their chin down when concentrating, which does no one any favours. Push your chin slightly forward and then down a fraction. It feels ridiculous and photographs well.
The squint. Smiling narrows your eyes, and combined with bright light you can end up looking like you are in pain. Turn away from the brightest part of the room or move into softer light.
The shoulders. Square-on to the camera reads as confrontational. Turn your shoulders roughly thirty degrees away and bring your face back to the lens.
The frozen third frame. By your third attempt the smile is a muscle position rather than an expression. Stop, look away, shake it out, start again. Thirty relaxed frames beat three careful ones.
What software can and cannot help with
Expression is the one thing that has to be right in the original. Nothing can add a smile that was not there, and nothing should try: that would mean redrawing your face rather than improving the photograph of it.
What processing does help with is everything that makes a good expression look worse than it was. Harsh light flattening your face. A cluttered background pulling attention off you. Shine on the forehead. A crop that puts your eyes in the wrong place, which makes even a great expression feel off without anyone knowing why.
So the division of labour is simple. You get the expression and the focus. Software handles the light, the background and the framing.
Take thirty frames, pick the two where you look like yourself, and run one through the generator to see it with studio lighting and a clean background behind it. It runs in your browser and nothing is uploaded. If you have not shot them yet, our phone guide covers the setup in about ten minutes.
Frequently asked questions
Should you smile with teeth in a professional headshot?
Either works. Choose whichever matches how you actually smile, because the mismatch is what reads as artificial, not the teeth themselves.
Is it unprofessional not to smile?
No. A relaxed neutral expression is a legitimate choice and works well in some fields. The risk is that an unsmiling face done badly reads as unfriendly, while a small smile done badly still reads as fine.
Why do my smiles look fake in photos?
Usually because you held the smile. Genuine smiles last a couple of seconds, and the muscles around the eyes relax before the mouth does. Smile on the shot rather than through the countdown.
Should I smile in a LinkedIn photo specifically?
For most professions, yes, a small genuine one. LinkedIn is a place where people decide whether to start a conversation with you, and looking approachable is not a small thing.
Does a smile matter at small sizes?
Yes, more than most details. At the size a profile photo is usually seen, expression and head shape survive when everything else has blurred away.