Would you change your eye color if you could?
I was doom scrolling on TikTok when I noticed a worrying trend: people undergoing eye color changing procedures to transform usually brown or darker eyes into lighter shades like gray, green, or gold. The results are anything but natural. The colors often look flat, almost painted on, like digital filters made permanent.
What the procedure really is
The surgery is called “keratopigmentation,” sometimes referred to as corneal tattooing. It wasn’t born out of the beauty industry at all, but rather, out of medicine—originally designed to mask corneal scars or improve the appearance of damaged or blind eyes. Over the years, however, it has been repurposed for aesthetics.
The technique is surprisingly high-tech: Surgeons use a femtosecond laser to create a microscopic tunnel within the cornea, then deposit mineral pigments designed to mimic natural iris colors. In a single session, a pair of deep brown eyes can emerge as icy blue, moss green, or light lilac. And unlike colored contact lenses, which can be slipped in and out, keratopigmentation is marketed as permanent, the kind of transformation that appeals to anyone weary of daily upkeep.
But permanence is more complicated than it sounds. Some pigments fade, shift, or blur with time. And because cosmetic keratopigmentation is still relatively new, the scientific community doesn’t yet have decades of data to prove how stable or safe those pigments will be in the long run.
The question of safety
Eye doctors tend to be very cautious about these surgeries, and it’s easy to see why. On TikTok, videos of keratopigmentation rack up hundreds of thousands of views and hundreds of comments, some admiring, many calling the look artificial, and others outright fearful. But what rarely makes it into the captions are the real medical risks.
The cornea is one of the most delicate structures in the body, densely packed with nerves and critical to vision. Thus, changing your eye color puts two key areas at risk: the iris, which controls how much light enters your eye, and the cornea, the clear dome that allows you to see.
Any procedure that alters these areas can open your eyes to serious problems like infection, scarring, or even permanent vision loss. While clinics market keratopigmentation as quick and minimally invasive, doctors point out that there simply isn’t enough long-term research to know how safe it really is.
The American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) has even issued formal warnings against cosmetic eye-color surgeries, including iris implants and keratopigmentation. JoAnn A. Giaconi, MD, clinical spokesperson for the AAO, explains: “No surgery is free of risk. With purely cosmetic surgeries on the eye, it’s just not worth the risk when it comes to your good vision.”
And the list of possible complications is daunting: corneal damage that causes scarring or leakage, pigment reactions that trigger inflammation, dangerous new blood vessel growth, or infections that can permanently cloud vision. Some cases may even lead to increased eye pressure, pigment migration, and irreversible blindness. For many eye doctors, the warning is clear: just because the surgery exists doesn’t mean it should be done.
Yet clinics tell another story. French ophthalmologist Dr. Jorge Alió, who helped pioneer the modern version of keratopigmentation, has described it as “safe and effective when performed with the correct technology and patient selection.” Supporters emphasize that complications are rare, pigments are biocompatible, and that, for carefully chosen patients, the risks are comparable to more familiar procedures like LASIK or cataract surgery.
But why do people do it?
This divide between medical authorities urging restraint and surgeons positioning the procedure as innovative but safe leaves patients caught between two worlds: one shaped by scientific caution, and another, by glossy marketing and the promise of transformation.
Which raises a bigger question: Why do people desire lighter eyes in the first place? For some, it’s pure novelty—it’s the thrill of transformation in a world that encourages endless self-modification. But beneath that lies a more complicated reason. Across cultures, lighter eyes have long been idealized, a beauty standard intertwined with colonial histories and colorism. Blue or green eyes are often coded as elite or aspirational in places where the majority are born with brown eyes.
The cultural reactions are just as mixed as those on TikTok. Some see eye color surgery as an empowering form of self-expression, no different from other body modifications. Others see it as capitulating to harmful beauty ideals that rank certain features above others.
The ethics of elective eye surgery
Should doctors be offering elective procedures for something as superficial as eye color? Cosmetic medicine has always walked this tightrope. Botox and fillers, after all, were once dismissed as frivolous before becoming mainstream. But with eyes, organs so essential to the quality of life, the stakes feel higher. Unlike a wrinkle or a nose, there’s little margin for error.
Even among medical professionals, opinion is divided. Some argue that if a patient is informed and willing, doctors have no right to say no. Others believe the risks are disproportionate to the reward, and that medicine shouldn’t cater to beauty standards when sight could be on the line.
Perhaps the better question isn’t whether keratopigmentation will last as a trend, but whether our fixation on changing what we’re born with has gone too far.
