Facelift
SMAS Facelift Cost in Korea: What Sets It, and Who the Lift Suits
SMAS facelift cost in Korea comes down to how deep the lift goes, whether the neck is included and the anesthesia time those add. Foreigners pay the same surgery fee as Korean patients.
In this article
The short answer
Have you got two quotes for an SMAS facelift that look nothing alike, and no way to tell what either one is paying for? SMAS facelift cost in Korea comes down mostly to how far the surgeon works beneath the skin, whether your neck is part of the plan, and the anesthesia time those two choices add. If you're flying in, the nights you need near the clinic before it makes sense to board a plane go in your trip budget, separate from the surgery fee.
- SMAS facelift cost in Korea is driven mainly by how deep the lift goes and whether the neck is included.
- Two quotes that both say SMAS can describe very different amounts of surgery.
- Foreign patients pay the same surgery fee as Korean patients, with a written estimate.
- Hollow cheeks, or early jowls with a firm neck, may call for fat grafting or a mini lift instead.
- Hematoma is the early risk to understand; line up a doctor at home before you fly.
Hello, I'm Dr. Im Young Min, chief director and a board-certified plastic surgeon at VG Plastic Surgery in Gangnam, Seoul. I trained and was board-certified at Seoul St. Mary's Hospital, where I'm an adjunct professor of plastic surgery, and anti-aging surgery, facelifts included, is one of the centers I operate in.
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Im Young Min
Chief Director · Board-certified in Plastic Surgery
Three facts here bear directly on a facelift quote. Foreign patients pay the same surgery fee as Korean patients. Your anesthesia is handled by an anesthesiologist on staff who does not operate, so the surgeon's attention stays on the lift. And a medical interpreter for your language is provided at no extra charge, so the part of the consultation where we decide what goes into your plan happens in words you follow.
If you already have a quote, or only a jawline you're unsure about, send three photos on WhatsApp (front, a 45-degree angle and side profile, in daylight with your hair tied back) and ask which parts of a lift your jaw and neck would actually need. With your own face in the message, the answer starts from your jaw and neck, not from a menu name.
Send your face photos on WhatsApp
What does the SMAS layer have to do with the price?
The SMAS (superficial musculoaponeurotic system) is a thin sheet of fibrous tissue and muscle lying under your skin and facial fat. It runs down into the neck, where it continues as the platysma muscle. Jowls and a blurred jawline form largely because this sheet, and the fat attached to it, slides down over the years while the skin on top loosens with it.
Risks and side effects to know
A skin-only lift pulls on the outermost layer. Skin is a poor anchor: under tension, scars tend to widen and the pull tends to relax sooner. Lifting the SMAS itself moves the tissue that actually descended, and the skin can then be laid back over it with much less tension. That is why the SMAS lift exists at all.
The name covers a family of operations, though. In plication, the surgeon folds and stitches the SMAS without cutting it. In SMASectomy, a strip is removed and the edges are sewn together. In flap techniques, the layer is lifted free and repositioned, and a deep plane lift releases tissue further underneath so skin and SMAS move as one unit. Each step deeper means more dissection, more operating time and more time under anesthesia. Two quotes that both say SMAS can describe very different amounts of surgery.
On our menu the lifts are listed as Crystal, SMAS and mini. I've laid out how those three differ in our overview of the Korean facelift, so here I'll stay with what moves the cost of the SMAS version.
Five things that move an SMAS facelift quote
| What changes | Why it changes the quote |
|---|---|
| How deep the SMAS work goes | Folding, cutting, flap and deep plane work differ in dissection and operating time |
| Whether the neck is included | Tightening the platysma and treating neck skin adds incisions and time |
| What else happens in the same session | Upper eyelid surgery, a brow lift or fat grafting each add their own planning and time |
| Anesthesia and length of surgery | A longer operation means longer anesthesia, and the type is chosen for your health |
| A lift you've had before | Scar tissue from an earlier facelift makes the layers slower to separate |
The neck is the line people most often miss. Some faces need only the jaw and lower cheek; others have bands or loose skin under the chin that a lift confined to the face won't touch. When two quotes use the same name, ask each the same two questions: is the SMAS folded, cut or lifted as a flap, and is the platysma in the neck part of the plan? Those two answers explain most of the gap between quotes.
Flights, a hotel within easy reach of 635 Nonhyeon-ro in Gangnam, and the nights you keep for follow-up visits sit outside the surgery fee. Keep them out of the comparison, so that SMAS facelift cost in Korea stays the surgery figure you're actually comparing.
Here, a foreign patient pays the same surgery fee as a Korean patient, and the estimate is given in writing. You'll find the clinic's surgery centers, the facelift center among them, on VG Plastic Surgery's English home page. Ask on WhatsApp what an SMAS facelift would cost for your face, with your photos and a line saying whether your neck bothers you as much as your jaw. Deposit and payment method are worked out after the consultation, so you can raise those questions in the same message.
Send your face photos on WhatsApp
Does your face need an SMAS lift, or something smaller?
An SMAS lift tends to suit faces where the jawline has softened into jowls, the lower cheek feels heavy and the neck has started to loosen. That is usually somewhere between the late forties and the sixties, though age matters less than what the tissue is doing. The skin should still have some elasticity, and your general health should allow a longer operation.
Other faces are better served by less. If your cheeks look hollow and not much has fallen, volume is the problem, and fat grafting addresses that more directly; our fat grafting center judges the result by how much of the fat stays. If the loosening is limited to the lower face and the neck is still firm, a mini facelift with a shorter incision may be the right size. A heavy brow or hooded upper lids belong to a brow lift or eyelid surgery instead. If you'd like to see which layer has moved in your own face first, this guide to finding the layer that dropped goes through the signs.
Say you're 52. Your jawline has broken into jowls and two cords show in your neck when you grimace, but your cheeks still look full. In that face I'd be thinking about SMAS work along the jaw together with the neck, and I'd leave the cheeks alone. Now say you're 44 with early jowls, firm neck skin and good cheek volume. There I'd talk about a mini lift first, because a full SMAS lift would be solving problems you don't have yet.
I recommend only the operations a face needs and leave out the ones it doesn't. With a facelift, that is also what keeps the quote, the time under anesthesia and your recovery in proportion to the problem.
How many days in Seoul does an SMAS facelift take?
Plan your trip around two events: the first check after surgery and the removal of the stitches around your ears. In general practice, bruising and swelling are heaviest in the first week, stitches near the ear usually come out within one to two weeks, and the face looks presentable to strangers well before it looks like you to people who know you. In its recovery guidance, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons describes a bandage around the face and sometimes a thin drainage tube in the first days after a facelift.
A long flight soon after surgery raises two practical issues. Sitting still for hours raises the risk of blood clots after any operation, so ask about walking the aisle, fluids and compression stockings for the flight. Dry cabin air also makes a swollen face feel tighter. Book an aisle seat, keep your head upright, and pack a button-front top so nothing has to go over your head, a scarf for the incisions behind your ears and sunglasses for the bruising.
I've written more about swelling, stitches and the flight home after a lift if you want to see the first weeks laid out.
Hematoma, nerve weakness and numbness after a facelift
The common temporary effects are swelling, bruising, a tight feeling and numbness across the cheeks and in front of the ears. Normal sensation can take weeks to months to return. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons' list of facelift risks also includes bleeding under the skin (hematoma), infection, poor wound healing, hair loss at the incisions, visible scarring, facial asymmetry and injury to the facial nerve, which is usually temporary.
Hematoma is the one to understand before you fly. It usually shows up early, often within the first day, as swelling and pain that grows quickly on one side. High blood pressure, straining and blood-thinning medicines or supplements raise the risk, which is why you'll be asked to pause some of them beforehand.
Wait, or think twice, if you smoke or use nicotine and can't stop for the weeks around surgery (nicotine starves the lifted skin of blood), if your blood pressure isn't controlled, if you take blood thinners you can't pause, if you have a bleeding disorder, if you're pregnant, or if your weight is still changing a lot. How fast you heal and how long the lift holds vary from person to person, and suitability is settled at the in-person exam.
If something changes once you're home, such as one side swelling fast, a wound opening, fever or spreading redness, see a doctor locally that day; sudden, painful swelling is a reason to go to an emergency department. Before you leave Seoul, ask for a copy of your operation record, and before you even book, arrange a plastic surgeon or family doctor at home who agrees to see you if needed.
If you're still weighing the trip, send the dates you could be in Seoul on WhatsApp and ask the one question that matters most for your face: does my neck need to be part of this lift? At the consultation, the first thing I'll study is your jaw at rest and then your neck as you tense it, because that is where the size of the operation gets decided.
Related pages:
Facelift before & after — more cases
Real patients from our archive, all photographed 3 months after surgery. Tap a case to compare it full size.
Face Lift3 months after surgery
Face Lift3 months after surgery
Face Lift3 months after surgery
Face Lift3 months after surgery
Face Lift3 months after surgery
FAQ
Questions patients ask
Is an SMAS facelift the same as a deep plane facelift?
Both work beneath the skin. An SMAS lift treats the SMAS as its own layer, folding, trimming or lifting it, and then redrapes the skin separately. A deep plane lift goes under the SMAS and releases the ligaments holding the cheek down, so skin and SMAS move together. It reaches further into the midface, takes longer and brings the dissection closer to branches of the facial nerve. Which suits you comes down to where the descent actually is.
Can fat grafting be done in the same operation as the lift?
Often, yes. A lift repositions tissue but adds no volume, so a face that has both sagged and hollowed may need both. Fat is harvested from an area such as the abdomen or thighs, purified and injected in layers, which adds time under anesthesia and a second area to heal. Part of the grafted fat is reabsorbed in the first months, so the volume that stays is what counts.
How long does an SMAS facelift last?
It doesn't stop aging. Your face starts aging again from a lifted starting point, so years later you still tend to look younger than you would have without it. Sun exposure, smoking, large weight changes and thin skin shorten that window, and a skin-only tightening usually relaxes sooner than a lift of the deeper layer.
Where do the facelift scars go?
Usually in front of and around the ear, following its folds, then behind the ear toward the hairline; neck work may add a short incision under the chin. The scars are usually pink for the first months and fade over about a year. If you wear your hair up or short, include the hairline behind your ears in one of your photos, since it affects where an incision can sit.
Can men have an SMAS facelift?
Yes. The incision is planned so beard-bearing skin isn't pulled toward the ear and the sideburn isn't displaced.
Sources
This article explains general medical information. Whether surgery suits you, and which method, is decided only after a consultation with the surgeon.
Written by
Im Young Min
Chief Director · Plastic Surgery
- Ph.D. in Medicine
- Internship and residency, Seoul St. Mary's Hospital
- Board-certified plastic surgeon, Seoul St. Mary's Hospital
- Adjunct professor of plastic surgery, Seoul St. Mary's Hospital
- Former director, Topface Plastic Surgery
Next step
Send two photos. Get a surgeon’s answer.
Front and side, natural light, no filter. Dr. Im Young Min reviews them and tells you which method fits and how many days to stay in Seoul.
International patients pay the same surgical fee as Korean patients. Pricing policy
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