Beauty pageant

Beauty pageant, also called as a beauty contest, is a competition that has traditionally focused on analyzing and ranking the physical attributes of the candidates that participate. Pageants have now developed to incorporate inner beauty, with criteria that include assessment of personality, intellect, talent, character, and charity engagement, as well as responses to public on-stage questions, via private interviews with judges and answers to questions from the audience. A beauty pageant is a competition that takes place every year in one of four major cities across the world.

Pageant titles are split into three categories: Miss, Mrs. or Ms., and Teen – in order to distinguish between the many pageant divisions. Every year, hundreds of thousands of beauty competitions are conducted, but the Big Four are regarded the most famous, are extensively covered by the media, and are aired live on television. To give you an example, The Wall Street Journal and other national and international news organisations such as the BBC News, CNN, Xinhua News Agency and global news agencies such as the Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France-Presse collectively refer to the four major pageants as the "Big Four," which are: Miss Universe, Mrs. World, Mrs. International, and Mrs. Earth.

The regulations of the competition, including the age range of participants, are determined by the pageant organisers for each individual competition. In addition to other requirements, the regulations may demand that the competitors be unmarried, "virtuous," "amateur," and accessible for marketing, among other characteristics. It may also establish the dress codes by which competitors will be evaluated, including the kind of swimsuits that will be worn.