Nasal width ratio: a real proportion, distorted most by how close the phone was held.

Nasal width ratio compares two frontal widths:

• Alar base width — the widest point of the nose, from nostril wing to nostril wing.
• Intercanthal distance — the gap between the inner corners of the eyes, not the pupils.

Looksmax.org threads and rhinoplasty-outcome literature both discuss a rough 1:1 target between the two, though the exact figure cited varies by source — some forum posts put the target closer to 0.78, while outcome studies analyzing rhinoplasty results use a target of 1.0. It's a proportion between two widths on one face, not a comparison against a fixed external template.

A 2018 study in JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery (Ward, Ward, Fried, and Paskhover) modeled and measured this distortion directly, rather than describing it in general terms:

• A photo taken at roughly 12 inches — a typical selfie distance — makes the nasal base read about 30% wider than the same nose photographed from 5 feet away.
• The nose projects forward from the rest of the face, so at close range it sits nearer to the lens than the eye corners do, and perspective projection stretches nearer surfaces more than farther ones.

That means the alar-width numerator in this ratio inflates faster than the intercanthal-distance denominator as the camera gets closer — the ratio itself shifts with distance alone, independent of anything about the actual face.

Mogalytics' own breakdown of why scores swing between scans names camera distance as one of four variables that move a geometry read; this is a specific, published, quantified case of exactly that effect.

The fix isn't a closer or more flattering photo, it's controlling distance the same way each time:

• Pick a consistent distance from the camera and keep it fixed between readings.
• Check whether the ratio holds across repeated sessions — the practice guide covers framing and distance in more detail.

If your reading still moves once distance is controlled for, that's a more meaningful signal than any single selfie can give you.

Mogalytics does not compute or display a separate nasal width ratio number. Its six-measurement composite reads live from a front-facing camera feed, and the closest measurement sharing the same nose region is:

• Nose bridge ratio — reads bridge height against bridge width, a different proportion on the same feature, not base width against eye spacing.

For the intercanthal denominator itself, see how it differs from a commonly confused figure on interpupillary distance explained — intercanthal distance is measured at the inner eye corners, not the pupil centers, and the two are frequently substituted for each other in forum shorthand despite being different landmarks.

Nasal width ratio shares its nose-region focus with one measurement Mogalytics reads live, and its distance-sensitivity with a broader pattern across the site. If you're auditing the rest:

• Nose bridge ratio — same nose family, a height-to-width proportion sensitive to camera angle instead of distance.
• Interpupillary distance — the pupil-center figure often confused with the intercanthal distance this ratio actually divides by.
• Eye separation ratio — another ratio Mogalytics doesn't compute directly, sharing the same distance-and-depth sensitivity from a different pair of landmarks.
• Nasal tip projection (Goode ratio) — another nose measurement, a profile projection distance rather than a frontal width proportion.
• Why scores swing between scans — the full breakdown of camera distance, angle, lighting, and expression as the four variables that move any geometry read.