Guam: Permanent Makeup & Nano Brows Licensing and Regulation

Verified against official sources, 2026-11-11.

How can you check Nano Brows providers in Guam?

No online lookup located: As of 2026-11-11, we did not locate a public online lookup. You may ask the provider for the credential's name and issuing agency.

A lookup result reflects only the information shown by the issuing agency. Directory inclusion does not certify a provider's credentials or legal compliance.

Who regulates it

Guam DPHSS, Division of Environmental Health — generic Tattoo Shop regime (26 GAR div. 1 ch. 4 art. 13, 1997 vintage, still the current listed rule): facility Sanitary Permit + individual Health Certificate. PMU SITS IN A GAP: not named anywhere in Guam law; the Board of Barbering and Cosmetology (GBBC) track affirmatively EXCLUDES invasive/dermis-penetrating work AND bans micro-thin blades from its establishments by statute — so the tattoo-shop regime is the only plausible home, but DPHSS's application of it to PMU in practice is UNCONFIRMED

Does it cover permanent makeup / nano brows?

Coverage: covered-as-tattoo

No Guam provision names PMU/microblading/cosmetic tattooing. Both generic tattoo definitions (26 GAR §41301(c); 9 GCA §70.410(f)) reach machine PMU on their face — but DPHSS enforcement practice toward PMU businesses is UNCONFIRMED (no guidance/FAQ/enforcement record either way). The cosmetology track is CLOSED to PMU (invasive-work exclusion + the §18128.6(c) micro-thin-blade ban pending never-confirmed Board rules) — industry-site claims that Guam PMU falls under the cosmetology board were checked against the statute and REJECTED. Physician boundary: Article 13 has NO medical exemption (Health Certificate mandate is unqualified); the Healing-Arts exemption (§18112(a)) exempts only from the Cosmetology Act — physician-PMU status under Article 13 UNRESOLVED. Anesthesia note: subcutaneous local anesthesia during tattoo/PMU work = licensed healthcare professionals only (9 GCA §70.410(c)). TITLE 26 CHECKED 2026-11-11 against the Compiler's published Chapter 4 (stamped COL 4/18/2022, so art. 9 there is the 1984 text and predates the 2023 reenactment by P.L. 37-38 — art. 13, which is the regime that actually governs PMU, was not touched by that law): "microblading", "micropigmentation", "permanent makeup" and "cosmetic tattoo" appear nowhere in Chapter 4, so the tattoo-shop rules do not name this work. They are not silent about it either: the chapter's definition of tattooing is tool-neutral and reaches marking the skin by pricking and introducing pigment, whatever the instrument. What remains unsettled is the separate cosmetology side — the long-pending DPHSS cosmetology rules are a different document from these. TITLE 25 CHECKED 2026-11-11: the Compiler annotates BOTH ch. 3 (Board of Cosmetology) and ch. 4 (Commission on Licensure to Practice the Healing Art in Guam) "(No rules filed)", so neither board has filed any rule. The Board's micro-thin-blade rules therefore do not exist, and the physician boundary is open because no rules exist on either side — not because none was found.

Artist requirements

License required	Yes
Training	NONE — the individual credential is DPHSS's HEALTH CERTIFICATE (26 GAR §41314), a communicable-disease screen, not a competency license: written application + physical exam (chest x-ray OR tuberculin skin test PLUS a syphilis blood test) + $10 fee ($1 duplicates); annual expiration; record kept at the shop. No exam, no training hours, no BBP certification, no apprenticeship anywhere in Article 13 — with HI's scheme as the only other medical-screening model in the DB, and far lighter
Exam	none
Bloodborne pathogen	no certification requirement; statutory single-use needle/ink + sterilization duties (9 GCA §70.410(b)) and Article 13 sanitation standards apply
Minimum age	no artist floor identified; CLIENTS: under 18 requires the parent/legal guardian's PHYSICAL PRESENCE (9 GCA §70.410(a), misdemeanor; good-faith ID-reliance defense (d)) — the older rule's written-consent-on-file standard (26 GAR §41311(b)(2)) is SUPERSEDED by the later, higher statute (both quoted; discrepancy flagged, statute controls)
Fee	$10/yr Health Certificate
Renewal	annual

Facility requirements

License required	Yes
Inspection regime	DPHSS Construction Permit (pre-build/alteration, §41303) + Sanitary Permit (§41304: application + inspection; non-transferable; posted; 12-month term renewed each June 30, renewal due ≥15 days early; denial/revocation for contagious-disease employees, invalid Health Certificates, inadequate water/plumbing; appeals per 10 GCA §21109) + separate DRT general business license (Form BL-01/guamtax.com, ~7-10 business days; Business License and Permit Center intake — bsp.guam.gov carried a cyber-incident restoration banner during research, partial-access caveat)
Fee	per DPHSS/DRT schedules
Renewal	annual (June 30 sanitary permit)

Local variation

County-level variation: No

Single territory-wide jurisdiction — 19 villages have mayors but no separate licensing layer found anywhere (all agencies territory-wide; well-supported inference, not an explicit statement).

Reciprocity

None for the tattoo track — full Article 13 read: no reciprocity/endorsement clause; every practitioner needs the Guam physical-exam Health Certificate regardless of credentials elsewhere (documented absence). (GBBC's cosmetology reciprocity, 10 GCA §18114 — 2 yrs licensed + mutuality + 2-yr Guam employment before establishment licensure — does not reach PMU.)

Pending / recent changes

Active changes: Yes

TWO open regulatory threads, both stalled: (1) RESOLVED 2026-11-11: the GBBC has filed NO rules at all. The Guam Compiler of Laws annotates 25 GAR ch. 3 (Board of Cosmetology) "(No rules filed)" — a convention it applies across the GAR, on thirteen chapters — so the §18128.6(c) micro-thin-blade rules (2017 mandate) were never promulgated, and the statutory default PROHIBITION on microblading-class tools in cosmetology premises now rests on a confirmed absence rather than an unconfirmed one; (2) RESOLVED 2026-11-11, and the 'Proposed since ~FY2018' reading was wrong. DPHSS states in press release PR26-101 (2026-06-01) that the "Rules and Regulations Governing Barber and Beauty Shops, Cosmetology Schools, and Nail Salons" were "adopted in August 11, 2023 via Public Law 37-38", which repealed and reenacted 26 GAR ch. 4 art. 9; the three-year grace period ended 2026-08-11 and "the regulation will be enforced after this date". They reach Barber Shops, Beauty Salons, Cosmetology Schools and Nail Salons — not body art, which is art. 13. Also new: anyone seeking a new or renewal Health Certificate must pass the Cosmetology Health Certificate Training Course under §4408(a)(2) of the Health Certificate Rules, tentatively from 2026-08-17; the Health Certificate stays $10/yr and the course costs $15. STILL OPEN, narrowly: whether the REENACTED art. 9 names microblading. The Compiler publishes one Chapter 4 file and it is stamped COL 4/18/2022, so it predates the 2023 reenactment and still carries the 1984 art. 9 (§§4901-4908); the adopted text is Exhibit A to P.L. 37-38, whose only live copy sits behind a consent interstitial, and the 2022 draft's DPHSS path is dead. No 38th Legislature (2025-26) PMU/tattoo bill found (incomplete search).

What this means before you book

Guam has no PMU-specific rules: tattoo shops need a health department sanitary permit and each artist an annual health certificate (a $10 medical screening — chest x-ray or TB test plus a syphilis test — with no training or exam requirement), and it's unresolved whether the health department applies this regime to PMU studios in practice. Salons and estheticians may NOT do PMU — Guam law bars invasive work and microblading-type blades from cosmetology premises. Minors require a parent physically present. There's no public register for tattoo or PMU credentials — ask the studio for its sanitary permit and the artist for their health certificate.

Statutes & sources cited

26 GAR ch. 4, Article 13 (Tattoo Shops) — read 2026-11-11 on the Guam Compiler of Laws, which carries the article in full: §§41301-41316, including a Construction Permit, a Sanitary Permit and a Health Certificate. §41301(a): "Tattoo Shop means any premises where a Tattoo artist does tattooing for a fee or for other consideration", and Chapter 4's own definition of tattooing is tool-neutral — "to mark or color the skin by pricking and introducing subcutaneously, non-toxic dyes, pigments, or by the production of scars to form indelible marks and figures". The standalone DPHSS handout this entry previously cited for these rules has gone (404 as of 2026-11-11); the Judiciary's compilation is the better source and is what is cited now
26 GAR div. 1 ch. 4 art. 13 (Tattoo Shops, §§41301-41316; DPHSS-hosted full text, internally dated 1997 — no substantive amendment evidence; authority asserted from 10 GCA §10102 + §§21101-21102): §41301(c) tattooing definition (pricking + subcutaneous non-toxic dyes/pigments/scars); §41303 construction permit; §41304 sanitary permit (annual, June 30 renewal); §41311(b)(2) minors (WRITTEN consent — superseded, see minors); §41314 Health Certificate
9 GCA §70.410 (crimes; current per Compiler text through 2026-06-10): (a) unlawful to tattoo under-18 'without the physical presence of that person's parent or legal guardian'; (b) single-use needles/ink, pre-sterilized/autoclaved; (c) subcutaneous local anesthesia = licensed healthcare professionals only; (e) misdemeanor; (f) broad tattoo definition incl. scarring
10 GCA ch. 18 (Barbering and Cosmetology Act): §18101(h)(4),(6) — esthetics EXCLUDES procedures penetrating past the epidermis and machines penetrating the dermis ('considered invasive and... prohibited'); §18128.6(c) (P.L. 34-047, 2017) verbatim: 'No establishment or school shall have on the premises any micro-thin blade or blades or instrument of the like, which is used to perform tattoo services or other similar procedures... until such time as the Board promulgates rules and regulations' — MICROBLADING-CLASS TOOLS BANNED FROM COSMETOLOGY PREMISES by default; whether GBBC ever wrote the rules is UNRESOLVED (a DEH barber/beauty rulemaking has sat 'Proposed' since ~FY2018)