A breast self-exam takes about five minutes and involves two parts: looking at your breasts in a mirror for visible changes, then feeling the tissue with your fingers to check for lumps or thickening. The goal is to learn what’s normal for you so you can spot changes early. Here’s how to do both parts thoroughly.
When to Do Your Exam
Breast tissue changes throughout the menstrual cycle. Hormonal shifts before and during your period can make breasts swollen, tender, and lumpier than usual, which makes it harder to notice anything new. The best time is a few days after your period ends, when swelling and tenderness are at their lowest. If you no longer menstruate, pick a consistent day each month, like the first of the month, so it becomes routine.
Step 1: Visual Inspection in the Mirror
Stand in front of a well-lit mirror with your shirt and bra off. You’ll check your breasts in three different positions, looking for the same things each time: changes in size, shape, or symmetry, plus any dimpling, puckering, bulging, or skin texture changes. Also check whether either nipple has recently turned inward.
Start with your arms relaxed at your sides. Look at both breasts from the front, then turn slightly side to side. Next, raise both arms overhead with your palms pressed together. This stretches the skin and can reveal dimpling or pulling that isn’t visible otherwise. Finally, place your hands on your hips and flex your chest muscles by pressing firmly inward. This tenses the tissue underneath and can make subtle irregularities more obvious.
Lift each breast to check the underside, especially the crease where the breast meets the ribcage. Look for ridges, redness, or rash along the bottom, and note whether both sides look roughly symmetrical. Perfect symmetry isn’t the goal. Most breasts aren’t identical. You’re looking for recent changes from what’s been normal for you.
Step 2: Feeling the Breast Tissue
You can do this lying down or standing in the shower. Lying down spreads the breast tissue thinner across the chest wall, which can make lumps easier to feel. Standing in the shower works well too, since soapy, wet skin lets your fingers glide smoothly. Many people do both.
Use the pads of your three middle fingers, not the tips. Keep your fingers flat and together, and move them in small, overlapping circles about the size of a coin. At each spot, press at three different levels: light pressure to feel the tissue just beneath the skin, medium pressure to reach the middle layers, and firm pressure to feel the tissue closest to the chest wall and ribs. You should be able to feel your ribs at the deepest level.
Cover the entire breast in a systematic pattern so you don’t miss any areas. The most reliable approach is to move in vertical strips: start at the outer edge of the breast near the armpit, move your fingers up and down in a narrow column, then shift over slightly and repeat, working your way across the entire breast to the breastbone. Think of mowing a lawn in rows. Some people prefer working in concentric circles from the nipple outward, or in wedge-shaped sections like slices of pie. Any pattern works as long as you cover every part of the breast.
Make sure you cover the full territory. Breast tissue extends further than most people realize. Go all the way up to the collarbone, down to the bra line, over to the breastbone in the center, and into the armpit. The tissue that extends toward the armpit is an area where lumps can develop and are easy to miss if you don’t check deliberately. Gently feel the armpit itself with your arm slightly lowered, since raising your arm all the way tightens the tissue and makes it harder to examine.
When examining your right breast, use your left hand, and vice versa. Place the arm on the side you’re examining behind your head to spread the breast tissue more evenly across the chest.
Checking the Nipple
Gently squeeze each nipple between your thumb and forefinger. You’re checking for any discharge, which could be clear, milky, yellow, green, or bloody. Some discharge can be normal, especially if you squeeze firmly, but spontaneous discharge (without squeezing) or bloody discharge is worth getting checked.
What Normal Feels Like
Most breasts feel lumpy or uneven, and that’s completely normal. Breast tissue naturally has a bumpy, rope-like texture that varies from person to person. You may feel firm ridges along the lower curve of each breast, or denser tissue in the upper outer area near the armpit. The point of doing regular exams is to build a mental map of your own normal texture, so you can recognize when something genuinely changes.
Common normal findings include tissue that feels grainy or pebbly, mild tenderness that fluctuates with your cycle, and slight size differences between the left and right breast. These don’t need medical attention on their own.
What to Watch For
The changes that warrant a call to your healthcare provider are specific:
- A new lump or hard knot in the breast or underarm, especially one that feels different from the surrounding tissue or doesn’t go away after your next period
- Skin changes like dimpling, puckering, or a texture resembling an orange peel
- Nipple changes like a nipple that has recently turned inward, or discharge (especially bloody) that happens without squeezing
- Swelling, redness, or warmth in part of the breast, even without a distinct lump
- Thickening or fullness in one area that feels noticeably different from the rest of the breast
- Persistent itching, scaling, or a rash on the nipple or surrounding skin
Finding any of these doesn’t mean you have cancer. Most breast lumps turn out to be non-cancerous, such as cysts or areas of fibrous tissue. But the only way to know is to have it evaluated.
What Happens if You Find Something
If you notice a lump or other change, your provider will typically start with imaging. A diagnostic mammogram uses X-rays to create detailed pictures of the breast tissue. An ultrasound, which uses sound waves, is often done alongside or instead of a mammogram, especially in younger people with denser breast tissue. In some cases, an MRI may be ordered for a more detailed look, even if the mammogram and ultrasound appear normal.
If imaging can’t clearly identify what a lump is, the next step is a biopsy, where a small sample of tissue is removed and examined under a microscope. The most common type uses a needle guided by ultrasound to extract a small core of tissue. The procedure is done with local numbing and typically takes about 15 to 30 minutes. A tiny marker clip, too small to see or feel, is sometimes placed at the biopsy site so providers can locate the spot again in the future.
If imaging and biopsy confirm the lump isn’t cancerous, you may still have a follow-up appointment scheduled so your provider can monitor whether the lump changes over time.
Breast Exams for Men
Men can develop breast cancer too, though it’s far less common. The self-exam process is the same: check visually for skin changes, dimpling, or nipple changes, then feel the tissue around and behind each nipple using the same finger pad technique with light, medium, and firm pressure. Pay attention to any hard lump near or behind the nipple, nipple discharge, or skin puckering. Because men have less breast tissue overall, changes are often easier to feel but also easier to dismiss.