What Would Happen If You Just Stopped Cutting Your Nails?

​This is What Would Happen If, a close examination of mundane hypothetical situations. Each week, we look at something that you could do but probably never would, and take it to its logical endpoint. This week: What would happen if just didn't trim your nails?​

We all have ways of keeping our nails in check — either by anxiously gnawing them down, or diligently trimming them into perfection. But let's say you just decided to stop. What would happen if you decided you would let your nails grow freely?

The answer, as it is with most things in life, is that it really depends.

For just about everyone, not trimming your nails will, at first, lead to your nails getting longer. "If you don't cut your nails, they're just going to continue to grow," says Dr. James Christina, executive director and CEO of the American Podiatric Medical Association. "It's just like the hair on your head."

As anyone who's tried to grow their fingernails can attest, even if you stop cutting your fingernails, at a certain point it gets pretty dang hard to keep those nails long.

Just regular, daily use is enough to break a fingernail. But what about the toenails? They're nice and protected from either biting or regular blunt-force stress, so would they just grow forever?

Again, it really depends, Dr. Christina says. Nail growth, like hair growth, varies from person to person. It's hard to say definitively, but Dr. Christina estimates that it'd take about six months to a year of toenails neglect for your negligence to finally catch up with you.

Assuming your nails are relatively healthy, just the act of walking will probably be enough to break them on your own. "When you think about walking, the last bit of push-off comes from the end of your toe," says Dr. Christina. "If your nail starts to extend that far beyond the end of your toe, and you're going to toe-off of that nail, I would assume that kind of pressure would cause the nail to crack or break."

There mere act of existence seems to be enough to keep your nails in check if they're healthy. But if they have a deformation or fungal infection, well, then things start to get ugly. These sorts of issues will cause the nail to grow thicker the longer it gets, which, as you can guess, will make it more resistant to breaking.

What happens as they nails continue to grow depends on your footwear choice. If you're wearing open-toed shoes and you're not doing a lot of walking, Dr. Christina estimates they'd probably grow nice and straight for a good inch-and-half to two inches, after which they'd start to naturally curl. If you're wearing shoes and walking a lot the pressure exerted on the nail will probably cause it to curl sooner.

At this point the image of a long, thick yellow toenails would be the least of your concern. As anyone who's studies simple machines can guess, pushing down on one end of a lever will cause the other to rise. "The pressure from the shoe on the nail can cause the nail to loosen or the skin could break down under the nail," says Dr. Christina. Instead of just part of the nail breaking off, you now risk just tearing a toenail off wholesale, or damaging it to the point that it'll eventually just fall off.

So, if you sat down and never got up from your seat, then yes, your nails would probably grow into yellowing, gnarled claws. Otherwise, like anything else, they'll eventually succumb to life's stresses one way or another.

Further Reading

The Sweethome's Guide To The Best Nail Clippers

WikiHow's Animated Guide To Trimming Your Nails

A Texas Woman Who Refuses To Cut Both Her Finger And Toenails

Next Week

What would happen if you just never wiped?

Got a burning (hopefully not in an infected way) hypothetical question? Submit it to [email protected].