Online mirror

Press Start camera and your webcam, laptop camera or phone camera becomes a mirror on screen. The image is flipped like a real mirror, you can zoom in on a detail, and a white light frame around the picture brightens your face in a dark room. Everything happens in your browser: the video is never recorded or sent anywhere.

Press Start camera and allow access when your browser asks.

Press Start camera to use your camera as a mirror.

The video stays on this device: nothing is recorded or uploaded.

How to use the online mirror

Press Start camera and allow camera access when the browser asks. The permission is for this page only and you can withdraw it from the icon next to the address bar.
If you have more than one camera, for example a laptop camera and a USB webcam, or a front and back camera on a phone, pick one under Camera.
Use Zoom to look closer at a detail. The zoom is digital: it enlarges the centre of the picture, so the image gets softer as you zoom in.
Raise Light frame to surround the picture with a bright border, and choose a warm, neutral or cool colour. Turning up the screen brightness makes it stronger.
Press Full screen for the largest mirror, and Save snapshot to keep a picture of what you see. The file goes to your downloads and nowhere else.

Why the picture is flipped

A mirror shows you reversed left to right, and that is the face you are used to seeing. Cameras record the unflipped view, which is how other people see you. Mirror preview is on by default so the screen behaves like a mirror; turn it off to see yourself the way a video call or a photo shows you. Text on a shirt or a sign behind you reads correctly only when the mirror is off.

The saved snapshot follows the same setting: mirrored when the mirror is on, unflipped when it is off.

Getting a clearer, brighter image

Light from in front: face a window or a lamp. A bright window behind you turns your face into a silhouette.
Use the light frame in a dark room and turn the screen brightness up; on a laptop or tablet the screen itself becomes a soft light. For a stronger fill light, open the screen light on a second device.
Clean the lens with a soft cloth; a fingerprint on a phone or laptop camera makes everything look hazy.
Choose a higher resolution under Resolution if your camera supports it, then zoom less: digital zoom on a 480p image gets blurry quickly.
Keep still for a moment: in low light many cameras slow down and smear movement.

If the camera does not start

The message under the buttons says what went wrong: access blocked, no camera found or camera in use by another app. The most common fixes are allowing the camera for this site, closing video-call apps that hold the camera, opening a privacy shutter or pressing a camera key on the laptop, and checking the camera privacy setting of your system. The laptop camera not working guide goes through these step by step, and the webcam test shows the resolution and frame rate your camera really delivers.

Privacy

The camera picture is shown only on this screen. The page does not record video, does not upload anything and does not keep the stream after you press Stop, switch to another tab or leave the page. Snapshots are created in your browser and saved straight to your device. If you want to be sure the camera is off, look for the camera light on your device or the camera icon in the browser tab.

Questions

Is the online mirror free and private?

Yes. It is free, needs no account or download, and the video never leaves your device: nothing is recorded or uploaded.

Why does my mirror look blurry?

Webcams have small sensors and many laptops have 720p cameras, so they cannot match a glass mirror. More light, a clean lens, a higher resolution setting and less zoom all help.

Can I use it on a phone?

Yes. Open the page in your phone browser, allow the camera and choose the front camera. On some phones the browser picks the back camera first; switch it under Camera.

Why is the light frame not very bright?

It can only be as bright as your screen. Turn the screen brightness up, use a larger window or full screen, and choose the neutral or cool colour for the most light.