---
title: "Ricketts E-Line Calculator: See Where Your Lips Sit | CEVO"
canonical_url: https://cevolab.com/tools/ricketts-e-line-calculator
markdown_url: https://cevolab.com/tools/ricketts-e-line-calculator.md
publisher: CEVO (cevolab.com)
method: 478-point MediaPipe face map · 11.7 mm iris ruler · too-close photos are retaken, never edited
last_verified: 2026-10-27
ai_summary: "Free Ricketts E-line calculator: add a side photo and 4 dots find your nose tip, lips and chin, to see whether your lips sit behind, on or past the line. The photo stays in your browser. CEVO's scan reads your iris size to tell how close the camera was, and asks for a retake if the photo was taken too close."
---

# Ricketts E-line calculator. See where your lips sit.

> **AI & Retrieval Summary (`ai-summary`):** Free Ricketts E-line calculator: add a side photo and 4 dots find your nose tip, lips and chin, to see whether your lips sit behind, on or past the line. The photo stays in your browser. CEVO's scan reads your iris size to tell how close the camera was, and asks for a retake if the photo was taken too close.

- **Canonical HTML Route:** [https://cevolab.com/tools/ricketts-e-line-calculator](https://cevolab.com/tools/ricketts-e-line-calculator)
- **Machine-Readable Markdown Twin:** [https://cevolab.com/tools/ricketts-e-line-calculator.md](https://cevolab.com/tools/ricketts-e-line-calculator.md)
- **Free scan from one front photo:** [https://cevolab.com/start](https://cevolab.com/start?utm_source=seo&utm_medium=markdown&utm_campaign=ricketts-e-line-calculator)
- **Meta Description:** Free Ricketts E-line calculator: add a side photo and 4 dots find your nose tip, lips and chin, to see whether your lips sit behind, on or past the line.

Pick a side photo or add your own: the 4 dots find your nose tip, lips and chin tip. See whether your lips sit behind, on or past the line.

Free, and your photo never leaves this device.

## What your result means

- **It's about where your lips sit** Against a line from nose tip to chin. Most lips sit a little behind it.
- **Your heritage matters** Ricketts' targets came from European faces. Fuller lips that touch the line are normal for many other faces.
- **The photo matters** A close phone makes the nose bigger and moves the line. Shoot from about 1.5 m (5 ft).

## What a chin beard changes

Your bones stay the same. A chin beard moves the chin end of the line, so it changes where your lips seem to sit.

- Clean-shaven Chin beard **A chin beard, longer at the front:** Brings the chin end of the line forward, so lips that sit close to or past it sit a little further behind.

## Where lips can sit

Tap one to see what it means.

## How the free scan works

1. **Take a selfie:** Prop your phone at eye level, about 1.5 m away. Too close, and CEVO asks for another photo.
2. **See your face shape and what suits you:** Free: your face shape, your strengths and your first tips, in plain words.
3. **Decide if you want more:** See how many more tips are waiting for you. Unlock them only if you want them.

Your face shape and what suits you, free.

## What CEVO gives you. From one selfie.

- **A 478-point face scan:** Every point of your face mapped from one selfie, plus a side photo for your profile.
- **169 tests, region by region:** Twelve regions of your face measured, from brows to jawline, plus the age your face reads as.
- **A natural glow-up on your own face:** Hair, brows and skin changed on your photo. Your bone structure stays as it is.
- **Hairstyles on your own face:** The cuts that suit your face shape, side by side.
- **Brows, beard and makeup:** Brow shape, beard length and makeup picked for your features.
- **A 90-day routine:** Hair, skin and grooming steps to follow for 90 days, made for your face.

- $29 **Basic Readout:**
  - Up to 10 front-view tests
  - Your facial balance breakdown, feature by feature
- $59 Recommended **Complete Clinical Dossier:**
  - Front and side: all 169 tests
  - Glow-up and up to 3 hairstyles on your own face
  - 90-day routine and your facial age
- $119 **Master Suite, the surgery pack:**
  - Surgical simulation with a millimetre change map
  - Surgeon-ready PDF and up to 10 hairstyles
  - 4 re-scans over a year

One payment, no subscription. Every report is checked by our team and ready within 24 hours.

## Questions

### What is the E-line?

A straight line from your nose tip to your chin tip. The calculator shows whether each lip sits behind, on or past it.

### Why do some people's lips sit closer to the line?

The original targets came from European faces, and lip fullness varies, so a Close to or past the line result can be normal for you.

### Do my lips stick out, or does my chin sit back?

A chin that sits further back moves the line, so ordinary lips can look like they cross it. The [side profile analyzer](https://cevolab.com/tools/side-profile-analyzer) shows how your profile lines up.

### Can styling change how my profile looks?

Yes, with no change to bone. A slightly longer chin beard brings the chin forward, and gloss or matte lip colour changes how full lips look from the side.

## How the calculator measures your lips

### How the calculator measures your lips The dots, the targets we compare you with, why selfies move the line, and the studies behind it.

We draw a line from your nose tip to your chin tip and measure how far each lip sits from it, as a share of that line's length. We compare that with Ricketts' targets (upper lip about 4 mm behind, lower about 2 mm, on an average face). Below: the dots, the targets and our sources.

### **How your nose, lips, and chin line up on a side photo:**

When you look in the mirror straight on, you can see how wide your smile or cheekbones are, but you cannot see how far forward your nose, lips, and chin project. The E-line needs four points along the centre of your profile:

- **Nose tip (`pronasale`)** The furthest forward point of your nose, the top end of the line.
- **Upper lip (`labrale superius`) & lower lip (`labrale inferius`)** The furthest forward points of your top and bottom lips. The calculator measures how far each sits from the nose-to-chin line, as a share of that line's length.
- **Front chin tip (`pogonion`)** The bottom anchor of your Ricketts E-Line. Because the line connects your nose tip to your chin tip, a small chin can make normal lips look like they stick out, even when your lips and teeth are completely normal.

Lip offset = distance from each lip to the nose-tip-to-chin line, measured square to it and divided by the line's length, negative behind it

### **What the calculator compares your lips with:**

Robert Ricketts (1968) set two targets for adults: the upper lip about `4 mm` behind the line from nose tip to chin, and the lower lip about `2 mm` behind it. The standard texts quote about `2 mm` either side of the lower-lip target, and the targets came from European-ancestry faces.

Many East Asian and African faces naturally have fuller lips, so lips that touch or pass the line are common and normal there. If that is you, read a *Close to or past the line* result as normal for your face.

A phone photo has no ruler in it, so the calculator never reads millimetres off your photo. It measures each lip's distance from the line as a share of the line's own length, and turns Ricketts' targets into the same shares for a line of average length (about `65 mm`). With a window of about `2 mm` either side (for the upper lip we use the same window as the lower lip), an upper lip reads just behind the line from about `2 mm` to `6 mm` behind it on an average face, and a lower lip from about `0.5 mm` to `4 mm` behind it. On a nose-to-chin line of that length, the shares work out to the millimetres below.

| Reading | Target | Where it comes from | What the calculator says |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Upper lip | about 4 mm behind the line | Ricketts (1968); the window is ours | From about 2 mm to 6 mm behind the line: just behind the line. Further back: further behind. Further forward: close to, on or past the line. The 2 mm window is the lower lip's, used for the upper lip too. |
| Lower lip | about 2 mm behind the line, give or take 2 mm | Ricketts (1968) | From about 0.5 mm to 4 mm behind the line: just behind the line. Further back: further behind. Closer: on or past the line. |
| On the line | within about 0.5 mm of it | Our rule | A lip this close reads On the line; further in front reads Past the line. |
| At the edge | up to about 0.75 mm past the edge of the window | Our rule | Still reads Just behind the line, and the result names the answer that lip is close to. A dot on a phone photo can't be placed closer than that, so a lip this close to the edge never gets a firmer answer. |
| One lip off | the two lips read differently | Our rule | The result names the lip, for example Upper lip further behind the line. |
| Both lips | one off each way | Our rule | One lip further behind and the other close to or past the line reads One lip back, one forward: check both lip dots first. |

### **Why close-up phone selfies move the E-line:**

Ward et al. (2018) showed that a photo taken from about `30 cm` (12 in) makes the nose look wider than one taken from about `1.5 m` (5 ft). Bryan et al. (2012) found that people read faces differently when the photo is taken from close up. On a side photo, the nose sits closest to the lens, so it looks bigger and the nose-to-chin line moves.

Holding the phone in one hand and looking out of the corner of your eye to tap the shutter also turns your head a little toward the camera. Even a small turn moves the nose tip and hides part of the chin. Prop the phone about `1.5 m` away, turn your whole body sideways and use a timer.

### **How styling changes where your lips seem to sit:**

Braces and surgery change teeth and bone. A chin beard changes where the chin end of the line falls, and lip colour changes how full your lips look from the side, with no change to the bone:

#### **Chin beard:**

If you'd like your chin to look further forward, a beard kept a little longer on the front of the chin, with the hair under the jaw trimmed short, brings the chin end of the line forward. A long front does the opposite for lips that already sit further behind the line: it pushes the chin end out, so they sit even further behind it.

#### **Lip colour:**

If you'd like your lips to look fuller from the side, gloss and lighter shades help. Matte and deeper shades make them look less full.

### **Sources:**

1. Ricketts RM (1968). *Esthetics, environment, and the law of lip relation.* American Journal of Orthodontics, 54(4), 272–289. [DOI: 10.1016/S0002-9416(68)90278-9](https://doi.org/10.1016/S0002-9416(68)90278-9)
2. Holdaway RA (1983). *A soft-tissue cephalometric analysis and its use in orthodontic treatment planning. Part I.* American Journal of Orthodontics, 84(1), 1–28. [DOI: 10.1016/0002-9416(83)90144-6](https://doi.org/10.1016/0002-9416(83)90144-6)
3. Arnett GW, Jelic JS, Kim J, et al. (1999). *Soft tissue cephalometric analysis: diagnosis and treatment planning of dentofacial deformity.* American Journal of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics, 116(3), 239–253. [DOI: 10.1016/S0889-5406(99)70234-9](https://doi.org/10.1016/S0889-5406(99)70234-9)
4. Powell N, Humphreys B (1984). *Proportions of the Aesthetic Face.* Thieme Medical Publishers (New York).
5. Ward B, Ward M, Fried O, Paskhover B (2018). *Nasal Distortion in Short-Distance Photographs: The Selfie Effect.* JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery, 20(4), 333–335. [DOI: 10.1001/jamafacial.2018.0009](https://doi.org/10.1001/jamafacial.2018.0009)
6. Bryan R, Perona P, Adolphs R (2012). *Perspective distortion from interpersonal distance is an implicit visual cue for social judgments of faces.* PLoS ONE, 7(9), e45301. [DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0045301](https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0045301)

## More tools and guides

- [Side profile analyzer: How your profile lines up](https://cevolab.com/tools/side-profile-analyzer)
- [Upper jaw test: Where the middle of your face sits](https://cevolab.com/tools/maxilla-recession-test)
- [Jaw angle calculator: How sharp your jaw corner is](https://cevolab.com/tools/gonial-angle-calculator)
- [Why selfies change your face: What a close phone does to your face](https://cevolab.com/research/24mm-selfie-distortion-study)
- [CEVO vs. Qoves Studio: Price, wait time and photo rules, side by side](https://cevolab.com/vs/qoves-studio-alternative)

## See what suits your face. Free, from one selfie.

A few minutes: your face shape, your strengths and your first tips.

---
## CEVO reports and prices

| Tier | Price | Delivery | What you get |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Free scan | $0 | A few minutes | One front photo: your face shape, your strengths and your first tips in plain words, plus a count of the tips your report unlocks ([cevolab.com/start](https://cevolab.com/start)) |
| Basic Readout | $29 | Within 24 hours after the photo is accepted | Up to 10 front tests and a facial balance breakdown, feature by feature (front photo only) |
| Complete Clinical Dossier | $59 | Within 24 hours after the photos are accepted | A side photo and the 169-test analysis, your facial age, a natural glow-up on your own face, up to 3 hairstyle renders, brow, makeup or beard previews and a 90-day routine |
| Master Suite (the surgery pack) | $119 | Within 24 hours after the photos are accepted | Everything in the $59 report plus the surgical simulation, up to 10 hairstyle renders, a surgeon PDF and quarterly re-scans |

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