What The Most Scientifically Beautiful Woman Looks Like
Yes, there is such a thing as perfection.
Konstantin Mishchenko | Pexels Actress Amber Heard has been in the news a lot these past few years. That's not unusual for a Hollywood star, to be sure. I mean, we live through our celebrities and allow them not one moment's peace. That said, Heard's divorce from Johnny Depp has sadly been the main source of attention.
But that's not the only reason the actress had been in the press. Aside from her new role in "Aquaman 3" and the recent addition of twins to her family, Heard has been, since 2016, also holding the title of most beautiful woman according to science. Nine years later, it's time to pass the torch, however. According to the golden ratio, a few new celebrities have stepped up and have since held the title.
In 2016, Amber Heard was named the most scientifically beautiful woman on Earth.
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In 2016, London-based plastic surgeon Dr. Julian De Silva claimed that Heard's face scored 91.85 percent accurate to the Greek Golden Ratio of Beauty Phi. If that sounds like made-up nonsense, you are only partially onto something.
In ancient Greece, the golden ratio was used to determine the true beauty of a face using balance and mathematics. To put it simply, if you draw a line down the middle of a face and examine both sides, the closer to symmetrical each side is, the more beautiful. The actual numbers are a lot more precise, but short of taking a ruler to your face, that's basically the gist.
A few years ago, De Silva put the ratio to the test, mapping the faces of Hollywood starlets and ranking them according to this ancient practice, because, you know, we needed to find new and exciting ways of objectifying the women who serve as our role models.
In 2019, Bella Hadid took the honor of the most scientifically beautiful woman.
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In 2019 (so, apparently, we were still doing this in 2019), model Bella Hadid snatched up her crown. She was found to have a 94 percent match to the ratio. Of Hadid, De Silva said, “Bella Hadid was the clear winner when all elements of the face were measured for physical perfection." Singer Beyoncé came in second place, and Heard followed in third. Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande also made up the top five.
These facial mappings made the news because De Silva had created a new computer program to rate faces. "We have devised a brand new computer mapping technique which can calculate how to make subtle improvements to facial shapes," he said. "With this ground-breaking technology, we have solved some of the mysteries of what it is that makes someone physically beautiful."
That's right — somewhere in London, there is a machine that will straight-up tell you if you are objectively beautiful.
In 2024, Anya Taylor-Joy was named the most scientifically beautiful woman.
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Dr. De Silva is at it again, and this time he has named 28-year-old actress Anya Taylor-Joy the golden ratio winner. According to the doc, the star of "The Queen's Gambit" scored "94.66% accurate to the Golden Ratio of Beauty Phi." That's pretty darn close to perfect.
He broke down the percentages in case you were curious. “She had the highest overall reading for the positioning of her eyes, with a score of 98.9%, which is only 1.1% away from being the perfect shape." The surgeon went on to say, “Anya also had the highest score for her eyebrows and was close to the top in almost every category, apart from her lips."
Zendaya took the second spot in 2024, followed by the 2019 winner, Bella Hadid.
It's cool that technology and equations exist defining beauty objectively, but the truth is that beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder. There are so many more factors that come into play. Personality plays a huge role, and so does individuality.
If we all had the money to make ourselves as close to golden ratio perfection as possible, everyone would look the same. Suddenly, what is scientifically most beautiful would be completely meaningless. And maybe that's truly the point.
There's nothing wrong with wanting to look your best and feel beautiful, but that comes from being the best you there is. It does not come from a machine in a plastic surgeon's office that measures how far apart your eyebrows are.
Rebecca Jane Stokes is a writer and the Senior Editor of Pop Culture at Newsweek with a passion for lifestyle, geek news, and true crime.
