A group of friends’ idea to cap off one of their meetings by collectively getting temporary face tattoos went from joy to terror as they soon discovered the ink was anything but removable.

Many of them desperately tried to wash the tattoos off their faces, necks, and other areas to no avail. After rubbing their skin to the point of it turning red, the tattoos refused to disappear despite them being made using “temporary” ink.

The hilarious-yet-uncomfortable experience was captured in a video collage made by user @onemicirci, and became an overnight sensation on TikTok, amassing more than 5.1 million views since it was uploaded on December 9.

“The way the face ones are rubbed raw, I can’t imagine the defeat,” one user commented. 

A group of millennials went viral after finding out the embarrassing temporary tattoos they put on their faces would last until next year

Image credits: onemicirci

The clip, which has more than 2800 user comments, starts with the image of a disappointed muppet with the caption: “Our faces when we discovered that the ‘temporary’ tattoos done the night before won’t come off until January 2025.”

The video then cuts to a group of people crowded around a computer, reacting to the information they’d just found about their supposedly “removable” drawings.

Their tattoos ranged from strange symbols on their foreheads to barbwire on their necks and arms, and more innocent ones like a dolphin on the side of the face and the WWF bear below one of the girl’s eyes.

Image credits: Yannic Läderach / Unsplash

One of the friends with a forehead triangle, a man with glasses, caught the attention of viewers due to the violence with which he tried to remove his tattoo, going as far as to seemingly peel off a layer of his skin in the process.

The ages of the people in the video, revealed by its caption, “We’re in our 30s,” led netizens to label the video as “peak millennial content.”

Sadly for these millennials, temporary tattoos come in a wide variety of types, each with their duration ranging from 3 days to as long as 15 months

Image credits: onemicirci

The easiest to remove tattoos come in the form of stickers, which are decal images attached to a removable sheet applied by wetting and pressing them directly on the skin’s surface.

These kinds of tattoos are so easy to apply and remove that, for a time, they were included as promotional items with snacks for kids. They can last as little as 3 days.

Image credits: onemicirci

Then comes henna tattoos, a paste-like dye made from powder extracted from the henna plant. Henna is applied without a needle, using a variety of brushes to paint on the client’s skin, and usually lasts between 1 and 2 weeks.

Image credits: onemicirci

Bored Panda presented the group’s case to Valentina Danyau, a painter, tattoo artist, and owner of Sandia Ink, a studio in Santiago, Chile.

Initially, Danyau believed the tattoos were the result of the latest technology in temporary body art. “Lately, new types of ink have been developed that can last for a long time, but to achieve those results it must be injected in the dermis, the second skin layer,” she explained.

The technology Danyau touched upon was developed by Ephemeral, a company that specializes in temporary tattoos.

They use biodegradable ink that breaks down over time and is eventually eliminated by the body as it naturally sheds its skin. These revolutionary tattoos can last for as long as 15 months and are applied in the exact same manner as the regular kind, using a needle.

The TikToker revealed in the comments that they had bought a sheet of sticker tattoos from Amazon but didn’t read the instructions

Image credits: onemicirci

@onemicirci eventually revealed the kind of tattoo that had put her and her friends in such a predicament, explaining that they were sticker tattoos from a brand called Colofalla and that the group had bought them on Amazon.

“I need to know what product you used because, to me, this is great advertising!” a viewer asked.

“My friend bought it on Amazon; the brand is Colofalla!” the uploader replied, causing others to ask her for links to buy them.

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Image credits: onemicirci

Colofalla tattoos come in sheets of up to 90+ temporary stickers, which match the ones the group of friends hilariously decided to plaster on their faces.

Interestingly, the description for the product on Amazon specifically states that these stickers are meant to last from 2 to 4 weeks, due to them being made out of a more durable and waterproof material than the usual sticker tattoos.

The reveal came as a surprise to Danyau, who doubted that the group’s tattoos would last for the entire four weeks.

“No ink applied to the epidermis can last that long because our skin is constantly renewing itself,” she said, putting aside the fears of some viewers who theorized the group tattoos would take as long as a year to come off.

“Especially facial skin, which is regularly exposed to the sun and other factors that cause any product to wear off more quickly.”

Aside from laughing to their hearts’ content, users also reacted with concern, and many gave the millennial group advice as to how to proceed

@onemicirciwe’re in our 30s♬ Like a Prayer (Choir Version From “Deadpool & Wolverine”) – I’ll Take You There Choir

“Y’all need to get to a Sephora or Ulta and invest in some theatre-quality concealer,” a user said.

“Mum of two who struggled for years with temp Tats here. Perfume on a cotton pad. The alcohol in it will break it down,” another shared.

“It happened to me in high school. I scrubbed them off my face until I looked like a rugby player. Apparently, baby oil helps. Wish I had known,” one viewer wrote.

“Please keep them!” Viewers laughed both along with—and at—the group of friends and their “accidental” face tattoos

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