How to Check Your Teeth for Food When There's No Mirror Around

The quick, imperfect tricks

• Tongue sweep: run your tongue firmly across the front of your top and bottom teeth. Catches the big stuff, misses anything flat against the enamel or between teeth.
• Water swish: a mouthful of water swished hard dislodges most loose bits. Doesn't tell you whether it worked.
• Ask someone: reliable, if you're comfortable baring your teeth at a colleague.
• Dark phone screen: the lock-screen reflection is too dim to see between teeth.

The reliable method: front camera, zoomed, well lit

Your iPhone's front camera at 1.5–2× magnification, with light on your face, shows more than a bathroom mirror does — you can see between teeth and along the gum line. The Camera app can do this, but you'll end up with a photo of your own gritted teeth in your library. A mirror app does it without saving anything.

What to look for

Smile wide, then lift your top lip and pull the bottom lip down. Check between the front six teeth, the gum line, and the corners of your mouth (lipstick and sauce collect there). Ten seconds, done.

Prevention, for next time

Keep floss picks in your bag or desk drawer and drink water with lunch. Leafy greens, seeds and anything with herbs are the usual offenders.

How to do it in Mirrorly

In Mirrorly, the whole check takes about ten seconds:

1. Open Mirrorly — it's a full-screen mirror straight away.
2. Drag the zoom slider to around 2× (or pinch).
3. Tap the light-bulb if the room's dim so you can see between teeth.
4. Smile wide, check top and bottom, corners of the mouth.
5. Close the app. No photo of your teeth exists anywhere. (Expect a comment from the mirror, though — "step back, detective.")