“I found a routine, I mastered it,” says the young Florida woman. In one video, she excitedly reveals what many young bronzers strive for—extreme tan lines from her bikini straps, telling her followers, “You can literally achieve this so easily, I promise.”
And those trends are even influencing the next generation—Gen Alpha, born in 2010 or after—to get on the tanning bandwagon.
Similarly, Lucia, a Michigan 13-year-old with “pale and sensitive skin,” likes to sunbathe with a combo of tanning oil and sunscreen when the UVA index is at least 7. One of her aims, too, is to get tan lines. “With the style for summer 2025, there are a lot of tube tops and shirts that reveal that shoulder area, where you would want to show off your time in the sun,” she explains.
just me and my tattoo tan lines
In addition, 37% don’t know the risks of tanning, 57% believe common myths (such as thinking a “base tan” protects against sun damage, which it does not), and 25% say it’s worth looking good now even if it means looking worse later.
Vanchinathan is particularly worried about the trend of heading outside to tan when the UV index is high. “I actually give the opposite advice to my patients,” she says. “I tell them, ‘Check the UV index. And if it’s high, please don’t go outside. Or at least wear hats, reapply your sunscreen, or bump up your SPF to 50 or higher.’ So the fact that folks are actually intentionally looking for those numbers to achieve a tan is really scary.”
And sometimes that doesn’t take long, says Vanchinathan, who has seen several young patients with either basal cell carcinoma, the most common type of skin cancer, or melanoma, which is the deadliest.
Typically, though, it takes longer—with those who tanned in adolescence at a higher risk of developing skin cancer later in life.
Skin cancer in general is the most common type of cancer worldwide. In addition, according to the Skin Cancer Foundation:
If someone you love—such as your teenage daughter—is stubborn about their tanning habit, experts suggest you try some gentle education about the fact that there is no such thing as a healthy tan.
“The truth is, for UV to give your skin color, it has to create DNA damage,” says Vanchinathan. “So every single time we get a tan, it literally creates DNA damage in our skin cells,” meaning that the cells will not grow or function normally. “And that, in turn, is why every single tan, even if it’s just once, is going to increase our risk for skin cancer and premature skin aging.”
And there is a strong “misunderstanding” that skin cancer only affects older people, “and that it’s not necessarily something that needs to be on their radar,” she says, “when the truth is that melanoma is one of the deadliest cancers in individuals 18 and younger.”
To understand the roots of tanned skin being a beauty ideal—and for perpetuating the myth of that a tan is “healthy”—we can look, in part, to fashion icon Coco Chanel, who is widely credited with setting the trend back in 1923, when she accidentally got too much sun on a Mediterranean cruise. Post-vacation photos of Chanel with bronzed skin were such a hit, apparently, that they turned the pre-Industrial Revolution idea of a leisure-class pallor on its head.
Tanning was suddenly the new aspirational look of wealth and leisure—and it’s one that has persisted over time, with highs and lows, despite what’s been learned about the risks of sun exposure.
Fast forward to 2025, when young women and girls are being swept up by the same aesthetic—even, when they do understand the risks of sun exposure, in spite of it.
“I know that sun exposure can cause a lot of damage to your skin,” says the young Michigan tanning enthusiast, “and also give you skin cancer.” And that, she admits, “is super-duper scary.”
More on skin cancer:
