Keke Palmer Reignites the Controversial Skinny Brow Conversation

Just when we thought bushy brows were on their way back, Keke Palmer put the skinny, thin-lined look back on the beauty map.

The 32-year-old actress was spotted sporting barely-there brows and red waves à la Princess Ariel during a morning stroll through New York City on Monday. The sharp, stick-straight eyebrows popped against the vibrant hue of her hair and the earth-toned shadow that melted over her eyes under a set wispy lash extensions.

To an observer from a distance, Palmer’s brows appeared faint and blurred, extending out from the bridge of her nose to her temples. The aesthetic, despite its lifted effect, has become a highly contested trend in the beauty space, with skinny brow detractors begging for the Y2K trend to be put to bed once and for all (kind of like the side part). However, with 1990s nostalgia fueling the return of matte minimalism in makeup, skinny brows aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. And Palmer isn’t the only A-lister who’s declared her allegiance to the look recently.

Alix Earle, and her younger sister Ashtin, have given the skinny brow trend their own proverbial thumbs up, plucking away their natural shape over the last year. In a TikTok shared by Ashtin in December 2025, the two sisters can be seen riding in an Uber on the way to their brow appointment. “Today we’re thinning Ashtin’s eyebrows,” Alix starts, to which Ashtin prefaces: “Just a little, little, little bit. I feel like people are going to be mad.”

“I feel like it was the biggest thing that changed my face,” Alix points out. “And I think that Ashtin has beautiful eyebrows and shouldn’t do too much, but just take a little off the edge.”

While neither sister sports brows as skinny as Palmer’s, the difference in their shape from two years ago to now is striking. At Alix’s 2023 brithday celebration, both girls were seen with boxy brows that formed a square-edged arch over their eyes. Today, their brows from a straight line with a slight bend at the end.

Palmer’s, on the other hand, appear as if they were sketched on, Gabbriette Bechtel style. The model, who said “I do” to Matty Healy earlier this month, has kept her brows razor thin for years, using the facial detail to bolster her “Gothic brat” aesthetic, which has, on occasion, included the bleached brow trend, too.

Indeed, the naked brow craze is now being forced out of style by the skinny brow. Stars such as Julia Fox and Bechtel have reverted back to their natural color after spending time with the platinum look, but keeping the shape ultra-thin. Even Jenna Ortega, the “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” star, turned her brow hue back to inky black after keeping them blond for all of 2025.