Reviews · 6 min read

Jaw Trainers Did Nothing For My Jawline In A Year. Training My Neck Did In 12 Weeks.

A year of jaw trainers and $207 of receipts: zero change. Twelve weeks of weight plates on my head: the photo on the right. A 1997 MRI study explains why only one of those could ever work.

By Dan Whitfield

Contributing writer · Sep 14, 2026 · 6 min read

A Year Of Jaw Trainers. Twelve Photos. Zero Change.

A guy on my phone with a jaw like a shovel said the fix was a rubber ball you bite. Chew it twenty minutes a day, work up through the levels, and the jaw carves itself out.

I bought the ball. Then the four-level kit. Then the gum, the tape and the app that came with the program. Twenty minutes a day at my desk, in the car, in front of the TV. Same profile photo on the first of every month, same mirror, same light.

A man in glasses checking the line of his jaw in a bathroom mirror, two fingers pressed along his chin

By month four the photos were not moving, so I bought more. The receipts, in the order I paid them:

Jawline exercise app, the full paid tier$39.99

Jaw exercise ball, one-size starter$29.99

The four-level jaw ball kit, once the starter got "too easy"$79.99

Mastic gum, three packs at $13.99$41.97

Mouth tape, a 30-night pack$14.99

A year of chasing my jaw$206.93

Twelve photos. Put the first next to the last and you cannot tell which is which.

A blue silicone jaw exercise ball, an open foil pack of mastic gum, a roll of mouth tape and a phone face down on a wet bathroom counter

Why It Was Never Going To Work

The jaw ball is cheap and it is a real exercise, for one muscle: the masseter. That is the chewing muscle, and it sits on the side of your face up by your ears. A bigger masseter is a wider face, not a sharper line under the jaw. Five months of biting rubber gave me a slightly wider face and the same jawline.

Mastic gum is the ball with worse math. The app was the best explanation of the theory, and the theory is the problem: it treats the jawbone as something a workout can carve. No trial has ever shown a jaw exerciser changing the shape of an adult jawbone. Mouth tape stopped my dry mouth at night and did nothing for the shape of anything.

So what actually decides the line from your ear to your chin?

Three tiles: the jawbone, which only surgery changes, the fat under the chin, which only diet changes, and the neck and upper trap muscle, which training changes

The Muscle Under The Line

Look at any fighter or lineman in profile. The jaw looks cut because the neck under it is thick and the traps behind it are high. Thin neck, soft line. Thick neck, hard line. Same bone.

And the neck grows like any other muscle, if you load it. In 1997, Conley and colleagues put 22 college students on the same twelve-week program of squats, deadlifts, rows and push presses. Eight of them also did three sets of ten head extensions, face down, lifting a loaded head. Everyone got MRI scans before and after.

Bar graphic of the 1997 study: the group that added a loaded head extension grew its neck muscle 13 percent, the squat and deadlift only group 0 percent, the untrained group 0 percent

The lifters who skipped the neck work grew nothing there, even though their thighs grew 7 percent. The neck group went from 19.5 to 22.0 square centimetres, about 13 percent, and got a third stronger. Twelve weeks, three sessions a week, ten minutes each. That is the number in the headline, and it is theirs, not mine.

So here is the rubric. Anything I tried next had to clear all four.

Load the neck directly. Squats and deadlifts do not count. The scanner checked.
Add weight in small steps for twelve weeks. A fixed band or ball runs out in a month.
Front, back and both sides. The muscle that frames the jaw runs from behind the ear to the collarbone.
Ten minutes at home at 6 a.m. Anything I have to drive to dies in week three.

I priced what could pass. A chain head strap is $35 at DMoose: cheapest, packs flat, plates swing on the chain and sides are awkward. The Iron Neck halo lists at $349 and the Pro at $599, and it is the best thing here for rotation and rehab work. A four-way machine is the gym standard, and Titan sells one for $539.97 or a $149.97 version that bolts to their rack. It wins on stability and it needs a room.

12 Weeks With Plates On My Head

A man in a grey t-shirt in his bedroom, a yellow tape measure wrapped around his neck under the jaw, checking it from the side

What I ended up doing is embarrassingly simple. A two-pound nylon frame on my head, a threaded sleeve over each ear, a small weight plate on each sleeve, and neck curls, extensions and side bends three mornings a week at the kitchen table. The frame is the Kensui EZ-HELM V2: $199, one size with three pad sizes, in stock.

A shirtless man standing in a squat rack wearing the plate-loaded neck helmet with a green and a yellow plate at each ear, his neck and jaw in three-quarter view

A helmet with no top, a chin strap, front and back pads, and two detachable 3.5 inch sleeves that take any standard 2 inch Olympic plate. Kensui rates it to 100 lb. I started with a 2.5 pound plate a side, which felt like nothing for six reps and then very much like something.

The Verdict

Kensui EZ-HELM V2

$199 · one size, in stock · 4.75 out of 5 from 135 reviews

Real plates at ear height, so the load goes up 2.5 pounds a side at a time for as long as you want. Rubric one and two.
Front, back and both sides from one frame, standing, on a bench or in a plank. Rubric three.
Two pounds empty, fits in the bag it ships in, ten minutes at the kitchen table. Rubric four.

A buyer's phone photo of the helmet loaded with four grey iron plates, resting on a bench

A man seen from behind doing a pull-up with the loaded neck helmet on, the upper traps and neck under load

Timeline of my twelve weeks: 36 sessions of ten minutes, from a 2.5 pound plate a side in week one to 10 pounds a side by week twelve

What changed, exactly. My jawbone did not move a millimetre, and no ball was ever going to move it. My neck got thicker, my upper traps came up, and the soft line under my jaw got a shelf under it because the muscle pushing up from below is bigger. The profile reads sharper. That is contrast, and contrast is the only version of this that is real. Fat under the chin is a kitchen problem, and anyone who says a gadget fixes it is selling a gadget.

The author in his kitchen after a morning session, towel over one shoulder, head turned so the line of his jaw from ear to chin is clearly visible

What 135 Owners Say

4.75 out of 5 from 135 reviews on the product page. I read them from the bottom up, because the low ones are worth more than the high ones.

"You need to be consistent to see results but it definitely works. I've been using it 4x per week for 3 months. Neck measurement went from 15 to 15.75 inches."

Daniel H., four stars

That is the closest review to my own twelve weeks: three months, three quarters of an inch of neck. Two others put their tape at just under half an inch in six weeks and 0.7 inches in two months. Nobody reports an inch a month.

"Best part about it is that you can buy generic weight plates anywhere. Only downside I have is that the chin strap just barely fits around my chin when fully extended."

Timothy B., verified buyer

"It would be a good product but just need some pads on the sides above the ears, unfortunately it moves."

Cristopher, verified buyer, three stars

The wobble is the real complaint. Of the six reviews at three stars or under, three say it shifts side to side and two say a pad came loose. I get it on side bends with a loose strap and not otherwise. Cinch the chin strap until the frame does not turn when you shake your head, and keep side bends slow. The pads on mine have stayed put. One owner with the pad problem fixed his with hockey tape.

A man lying on his side on a bench doing a slow side bend with the loaded neck helmet on, a blue plate at each ear

Is loading a neck safe? Start lighter than feels sensible, move slowly, add weight only when ten clean reps are easy. Same plan as any other muscle, same plan the study used. No plates at all on day one is fine too: the frame clips to a resistance band.

The price. Two hundred dollars for a nylon frame with two sleeves is not nothing. It is less than my year of jaw trainers cost, and $150 less than the cheapest Iron Neck.

Get the EZ-HELM

15% off with code SMGJAWVIP at checkout.

15% reader discount, applied automatically at checkout.

15% off with code SMGJAWOCT at checkout, through October 14.

$30 off with code SMGJAW30 at checkout.

A man holding a plank on a gym floor with the loaded neck helmet on, head lifted against a green and a yellow plate at each ear

	Kensui EZ-HELM V2	Iron Neck 3.0	DMoose chain head strap	Titan four-way machine
Price	$199	$349, Pro $599	$35	$539.97, rack-mount $149.97
Where the load sits	Olympic plates at each ear	Band or cable pulling on a halo	Plates on a chain under the chin	Plates on a lever arm, head on a pad
Directions	Front, back, both sides	Rotation and holds, front and back	Back, front if you flip over	Front, back, both sides
Weight and space	Two pounds, fits in a bag	Halo plus an anchor point	Fits in a drawer	A bench-sized footprint
Wins on	Load and growth per dollar	Rotation and rehab work	Price	Stability
	Learn More

Before You Buy

Do I need plates? Any 2 inch Olympic plate fits. A pair of 2.5s and a pair of 5s covers the first month. For 1 inch plates, Kensui sells a $27 adapter.

Will it fix my jaw? No. It builds the muscle under and behind it, which is the only part of a jawline you can change. The bone stays.

The cheaper Kensui one? The EZ-NECK is a handheld plate loader, $49 for the PRO and $129 for the MAX. You hold it against your head instead of wearing it. It works for curls and extensions. I wanted my hands free and the weight on my head, so the helmet.

How long? Twelve weeks, three sessions a week. Take the profile photo on day one or you will not believe it later.

100 days is longer than the study. Kensui gives you a 100-day risk-free trial with free returns. Train the full twelve weeks, take the same photo on the last day, and if the tape and the mirror both say nothing happened, send it back.

The black neck helmet frame on a white background with a gold Olympic plate loaded on each ear sleeve

The Jawline Was Never In The Jaw

A year of jaw trainers changed nothing because they work the wrong muscle on a bone that does not move. Twelve weeks of plates on my head changed the muscle under the line, because that is what a muscle does when you load it. One frame, any plates, ten minutes at the kitchen table.