Viral FaceApp challenge: Your face, just 60 years later; celebrities jump in on the trend

Viral challenge has taken Twitter and Instagram by storm with age transformations

KOLKATA: Unless you have been living under a rock in the social media world over the past week, you will have seen your friends posting wrinkly old photos of themselves or of celebrities with the hashtag #FaceApp.

The app has gone viral in the region and across the globe this week; all thanks to a simple face mapping AI trick. Celebrities and regular folks alike have been sharing on Instagram and Twitter images of what their faces would look like in 60 years; and let's be honest, the 'old' selfies look extremely realistic.

What is it?

FaceApp is a mobile application designed to create realistic transformations of faces using various filters and features, the first version of which was released in 2017. The free version offers a limited choice of filters including the one that is going viral right now.

The feature that has tweeps going crazy for the app is the ‘old’ option where the app gives you three versions of your face – two young and one that looks really old and spookily probable.

While many users have been posting photos of their favourite celebrities and sportspeople with the filter, some celebrities and influencers have also jumped on the bandwagon. The collage created by a user (posted below) of the Indian cricket team is being shared widely across social media platforms.

'Old' versions of Bollywood actors Varun Dhawan and Arjun Kapoor have garnered hundred of thousands of likes on Instagram, while Malayalam actor Hareesh Kanaran used his Faceapp post to pay a compliment to fellow actor Mammootty's seemingly eternal youth.

Emirati-Yemeni singer Balqees Fathi posted her photo with nine million Instagram followers. She captioned it to say, "My potential photo when I’m 70 or 80 if God blesses us Inshallah. I see a wise and beautiful woman and on the timeline on her face, lessons, and knowledge that she passed to her grandchildren. By the way, the image 100% looks like my grandmother from my father’s side, ‘Alzahraa’. I look a lot like her when she was younger."