Physical attractiveness is the degree to which a person's physical features are considered aesthetically pleasing or beautiful. The term often implies sexual attractiveness or desirability, but can also be distinct from the two. There are many factors which influence one person's attraction to another, with physical aspects being one of them. Physical attraction itself includes universal perceptions common to all human cultures, as well as aspects that are culturally and socially dependent, along with individual subjective preferences.

In many cases, humans attribute positive characteristics, such as intelligence and honesty, to physically attractive people without consciously realizing it. From research done in the United States and United Kingdom, it was found that the association between intelligence and physical attractiveness is stronger among men than among women.Evolutionary psychologists have tried to answer why individuals who are more physically attractive should also, on average, be more intelligent, and have put forward the notion that both general intelligence and physical attractiveness may be indicators of underlying genetic fitness. A person's physical characteristics can signal cues to fertility and health. Attending to these factors increases reproductive success, furthering the representation of one's genes in the population.