Tattoos are forever. By prickling your skin with needles, and putting ink underneath it, tattoos will be edged into your body, and will not fade away. The pains only add to the commitment.
This is why so many get them to commemorate important events or people in their life. The tattoo selections are plentiful; they could be a meaningful phrase, a badass design, or even the initials of your significant other.
For something so permanent, people would think twice when getting them. But they don’t. Lots of tattoos people have come to regret to include cartoon characters misspelled foreign phrases, initials of people's names, to even the infamous “tramp stamps.”
Since celebrities are people too, some of them have also gotten tattoos they have come to regret deeply. And while they have tried to have them removed, the Internet remembers. Here are 25 celebrities who truly, madly, and deeply regret their tattoos.
#1 Justin Bieber
Source: Kevin Winter, Getty Images
The "Peaches" singer notoriously got a tattoo of his then-girlfriend
Selena Gomez on his wrist. "This is my ex-girlfriend, so I attempted to shade her face, but people still know," he told GQ in 2016.
#2 Hailey Bieber
Source: David Becker, Getty Images
Hailey Bieber, née Baldwin, famously had a firearm tattooed on her left middle finger. In 2021, the model told Elle about her tattoos: "I guess at 18, I was like, 'Yeah! That looks nice.'" But now, as a 24-year-old, I would never do something like that. "I believe that firearms are violent."
#3 Nicki Minaj
Source: Neilson Barnard, Getty Images
When the "Super Bass" rapper was 16, she received a tattoo on her bicep with Chinese letters that meant "God is with me always." "Much too young. At the age of 16, you have no clue what you want to put on your body "Nicki Minaj subsequently commented on the ink. "You must wait until you are at least 21 years old before making a decision."
#4 Angelina Jolie
Source: Vince Bucci, Getty Images
Angelina Jolie and Billy Bob Thornton married in Las Vegas on May 5, 2000. She received a tattoo of the actor's name over a dragon on her forearm shortly after the wedding. Jolie began receiving laser treatments to erase the ink after the marriage separated in 2003, which she then covered up with another tattoo, this time of the coordinates for where her children were born.
#5 Jessica Alba
Source: Gareth Cattermole, Getty Images
Jessica Alba regrets her tattoos. "I regret one... maybe two," she said to Refinery 29 of her tattoo regrets, confessing that one of the tattoos, a bow in the middle of her lower back, is "sort of a tramp mark." The second tattoo she regrets is a bouquet on the back of her neck: "I got that when I was like 17, and I'm annoyed that I got it." I've had it lasered several times and it's still not coming out."
#6 Mark Wahlberg
Source: Attitude magazine
Mark Wahlberg has six or seven tattoos when he was younger. He previously told Today that the varied inks have personal and professional significance for him. However, he had them removed for both professional and personal reasons. "I don't want my children to have tattoos." "I wanted them [removed] by the time I filmed The Fighter because putting makeup on and covering them up has always been a pain in the buttocks," he stated. He allegedly removed them in seven months, despite doctors advising him to do it gradually over time.
#7 Pete Davidson
Source: Raymond Hall, Getty Images
Pete Davidson and Ariana Grande called off their engagement in October 2018, and the SNL star hid the tattoo he received in her image when they were together. He previously had an outline of the pop star's distinctive Dangerous Woman bunny ears on his neck behind his ear, which he changed with a black heart.
#8 Demi Lovato
Source: Alexander Tamargo, Getty Images
Demi Lovato described herself as a "drunken adolescent girl" when she got a set of lips tattooed on her wrist in 2015, which she subsequently covered with a black and grey rose.
#9 Kaley Cuoco
Source: Frazer Harrison, Getty Images
The former Big Bang Theory star had the date of her marriage to now-ex-husband Ryan Sweeting tattooed in roman numerals on her back (Dec. 31, 2013). "Thank you @nero set @studiocitytattoo for assisting me in making amends... "Note to self: do not tattoo any future wedding dates on your body," she captioned an Instagram image of her tattoo removal in 2015, right before she and Sweeting divorced.
#10 50 Cent
Source: Jamie McCarthy, Getty Images
In 2015,
50 Cent chose to get some tattoos erased to save time in the makeup chair while filming a movie. "I erased several tattoos when I started working on Twelve," he told AZ Central. "The call time they gave me for concealing tattoos was four hours earlier than everyone else's call time." So, if everyone else arrives at 6 a.m., I arrive at 2 a.m. 'Oh man, hold up,' I thought.
#11 Zoe Kravitz
Source: Michael Loccisano, Getty Images
Zoe Kravitz never publicly said why she covered up her shoulder tattoo. Fans have pointed out, however, that the Arabic calligraphy was intended to spell "let love rule," and her ink was grammatically wrong.
#12 Marc Anthony
Source: Evan Agostini, Getty Images
Marc Anthony has a tattoo of his ex-name wife's on his right wrist while they were married. In 2012, the singer covered J.Lo's name with a Statue of Liberty tattoo as a homage to his then-girlfriend, model Shannon De Lima.
#13 Nicole Richie
Source: Frazer Harrison, Getty Images
Nicole Richie revealed to Into The Gloss in 2015 that she had a handful of tattoos erased. "I was a 19-year-old moron when I got this tattoo on the back of my neck," the ex-reality star stated, alluding to a red ribbon and her last name inked on her back.
#14 Johnny Depp
Source: Thomas Lohnes, Getty Images
When Johnny Depp was married to his now-ex-wife Amber Heard, he had her nickname "Slim" tattooed on his knuckles. Following their nasty divorce, the actor covered off the tattoo, which now says "scum." His bicep tattoo of a pinup beauty resembling his ex has also been removed.
#15 Khloe Kardashian
Source: Angela Weiss, Getty Images
Khloe Kardashian posted a video in 2015 of herself having tattoos of a crucifix, angel wings, and the word "daddy" removed from her lower back. "End of an era," she captioned the video. "I got this bad boy when I was sixteen... Not as cute as before... I should've paid attention to Kim when she said, 'You don't put a bumper sticker on a Bentley.' "Goodbye, bumper sticker!"
#16 Nick Lachey
Source: 98 Degrees via YouTube
If you're a 98 Degrees fan, you might remember Nick Lachey getting a tattoo of the band's name amid a sun on his upper arm. He has subsequently covered up the nod to his boy band days with a black circle in the center of the sunburst.
#17 Iggy Azalea
Source: Rachel Murray, Getty Images
In honor of her now-ex-boyfriend, A$AP Rocky, the "Fancy" rapper once got "Live Love A$AP" tattooed on the inside of her fingers. She split up with the rapper in 2012 and had the tattoo erased in 2015 at a Beverly Hills cosmetics shop.
#18 Kelly Osbourne
Source: Robert Mora, Getty Images
Kelly Osbourne had her tattoos temporarily covered up using makeup while filming the 2012 film Should've Been Romeo. "I can't say I missed them," she said after seeing her ink-covered. "Some still have a significant meaning, like the matching ones my brother Jack and I have of each other's names, but now I feel like some were a mistake," she says of her early tattoos. Osbourne previously told This Morning that the tattoos were her "means of self-harming because I genuinely knew it would anger my mom and dad [Sharon and Ozzy]."
#19 Amy Schumer
Source: Simon & Schuster
Amy Schumer isn't thrilled with her prior tattoo selections. "#Yesiknowmytattoosucks," the comedian captioned a 2016 Instagram shot of herself with a generic black "tribal" pattern on her lower back. Her 2016 collection of essays was even named The Girl With the Lower Back Tattoo.
#20 Rihanna
Source: Raymond Hall, Getty Images
Although she has not talked publicly about it,
Rihanna recently covered up a camouflage shark tattoo she received with her ex-boyfriend Drake when they were together in 2016. The "Umbrella" singer now has a black crown tattoo on her left ankle.
#21 Megan Fox
Source: Teresa Barbieri, Getty Images
Megan Fox received a Marilyn Monroe tattoo on the side of her right arm when she was 18 years old. She started the removal procedure in 2011. "It's a bad character because she had personality issues and was bipolar," Fox said at the time. "I don't want to invite negative energy into my life."
#22 Hayden Panettiere
Source: David Becker, Getty Images
Hayden Panettiere had a tattoo of an Italian quotation removed off the side of her chest. She recently told Glamour about her tattoo blunder: "So my tattoo means 'Live without regrets.'" Not that you don't have regrets in life, but you attempt to learn from them. It's also misspelled, so I'm forced to follow that advice."
#23 Adam Levine
Source: Al Bello, Getty Images
Adam Levine revealed to Anderson Cooper his biggest regret: a dubious tattoo on his shoulder. The Maroon 5 vocalist was so taken by actual Russian prison tattoos that he hired a tattoo artist to design one for him. "I have a very foolish one," he said. And, despite his claim that he would never cover up a tattoo, he has attempted to conceal it with other objects. The musician now thinks the ink resembles a "cauliflower with a sun in the center of it."
#24 Jhené Aiko
Source: Joseph Okpako, Getty Images
Jhené Aiko had a full-color photo of her ex-boyfriend Big Sean tattooed on her left tricep earlier. Following their separation, tattoo artist Miryam Lumpini filled over the singer's mark with a galaxy of stars in 2018.
#25 Sarah Hyland
Source: Dimitrios Kambouris, Getty Images
In 2019, the Modern Family actor shared a video of herself receiving laser therapy to allegedly erase a dinosaur tattoo on her lower back.