# Survey on Deep Face Restoration: From Non-blind to Blind and Beyond

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2309.15490 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.15490/

## Key facts

- Cited by 18 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 101 of its 222 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 27 Sep 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 101)

- [The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Deep Features as a Perceptual Metric](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.03924/) (2018)
- [Segment Anything](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.02643/) (2023)
- [A Style-Based Generator Architecture for Generative Adversarial Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.04948/) (2018)
- [Deep Learning Face Attributes in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1411.7766/) (2014)
- [Analyzing and Improving the Image Quality of StyleGAN](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1912.04958/) (2019)
- [Taming Transformers for High-Resolution Image Synthesis](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.09841/) (2020)
- [SwinIR: Image Restoration Using Swin Transformer](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.10257/) (2021)
- [Image Super-Resolution via Iterative Refinement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.07636/) (2021)
- [Image Super-Resolution Using Very Deep Residual Channel Attention Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1807.02758/) (2018)
- [VGGFace2: A dataset for recognising faces across pose and age](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1710.08092/) (2017)
- [MaskGAN: Towards Diverse and Interactive Facial Image Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1907.11922/) (2019)
- [Zero-Shot Image Restoration Using Denoising Diffusion Null-Space Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.00490/) (2022)
- [How far are we from solving the 2D & 3D Face Alignment problem? (and a dataset of 230,000 3D facial landmarks)](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.07332/) (2017)
- [Learning Face Representation from Scratch](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1411.7923/) (2014)
- [Deep Laplacian Pyramid Networks for Fast and Accurate Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1704.03915/) (2017)
- [SRDiff: Single Image Super-Resolution with Diffusion Probabilistic Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.14951/) (2021)
- [DeblurGAN-v2: Deblurring (Orders-of-Magnitude) Faster and Better](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1908.03826/) (2019)
- [PULSE: Self-Supervised Photo Upsampling via Latent Space Exploration of Generative Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.03808/) (2020)
- [Towards Real-World Blind Face Restoration with Generative Facial Prior](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2101.04061/) (2021)
- [WIDER FACE: A Face Detection Benchmark](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1511.06523/) (2015)
- [Towards Robust Blind Face Restoration with Codebook Lookup Transformer](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.11253/) (2022)
- [Implicit Diffusion Models for Continuous Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.16491/) (2023)
- [GAN Prior Embedded Network for Blind Face Restoration in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2105.06070/) (2021)
- [Joint 3D Face Reconstruction and Dense Alignment with Position Map Regression Network](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1803.07835/) (2018)
- [Image Processing Using Multi-Code GAN Prior](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1912.07116/) (2019)
- [FSRNet: End-to-End Learning Face Super-Resolution with Facial Priors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1711.10703/) (2017)
- [GLEAN: Generative Latent Bank for Large-Factor Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.00739/) (2020)
- [VQFR: Blind Face Restoration with Vector-Quantized Dictionary and Parallel Decoder](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.06803/) (2022)
- [Blind Face Restoration via Deep Multi-scale Component Dictionaries](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.00418/) (2020)
- [Progressive Semantic-Aware Style Transformation for Blind Face Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2009.08709/) (2020)

## Built on by (most cited first, 18 of 18)

- [Efficient Face Super-Resolution via Wavelet-based Feature Enhancement Network](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.19768/) (2024)
- [InstantRestore: Single-Step Personalized Face Restoration with Shared-Image Attention](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.06753/) (2024)
- [Dual-domain Modulation Network for Lightweight Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.10047/) (2025)
- [Self-Supervised Selective-Guided Diffusion Model for Old-Photo Face Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.12114/) (2025)
- [FLAIR: A Conditional Diffusion Framework with Applications to Face Video Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.15445/) (2023)
- [Seeing Through the Rain: Resolving High-Frequency Conflicts in Deraining and Super-Resolution via Diffusion Guidance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.12419/) (2025)
- [FourierSR: A Fourier Token-based Plugin for Efficient Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.10043/) (2025)
- [DynFaceRestore: Balancing Fidelity and Quality in Diffusion-Guided Blind Face Restoration with Dynamic Blur-Level Mapping and Guidance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.13797/) (2025)
- [FADPNet: Frequency-Aware Dual-Path Network for Face Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.14121/) (2025)
- [RefSTAR: Blind Facial Image Restoration with Reference Selection, Transfer, and Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.10470/) (2025)
- [Transformer-Progressive Mamba Network for Lightweight Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.03232/) (2025)
- [PASDiff: Physics-Aware Semantic Guidance for Joint Real-World Low-Light Face Enhancement and Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.24969/) (2026)
- [GS-STVSR: Ultra-Efficient Continuous Spatio-Temporal Video Super-Resolution via 2D Gaussian Splatting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.18047/) (2026)
- [Attention-Guided Multi-scale Interaction Network for Face Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.00591/) (2024)
- [Human Multi-View Synthesis from a Single-View Model:Transferred Body and Face Representations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.03011/) (2024)
- [DeRainMamba: A Frequency-Aware State Space Model with Detail Enhancement for Image Deraining](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.06746/) (2025)
- [DVFace: Spatio-Temporal Dual-Prior Diffusion for Video Face Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.14560/) (2026)
- [WaveFreqAnchor: Wave-Structural Anchoring and Frequency Correction Diffusion for Training-Free Face Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.06717/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Face restoration (FR) is a specialized field within image restoration that aims to recover low-quality (LQ) face images into high-quality (HQ) face images. Recent advances in deep learning technology have led to significant progress in FR methods. In this paper, we begin by examining the prevalent factors responsible for real-world LQ images and introduce degradation techniques used to synthesize LQ images. We also discuss notable benchmarks commonly utilized in the field. Next, we categorize FR methods based on different tasks and explain their evolution over time. Furthermore, we explore the various facial priors commonly utilized in the restoration process and discuss strategies to enhance their effectiveness. In the experimental section, we thoroughly evaluate the performance of state-of-the-art FR methods across various tasks using a unified benchmark. We analyze their performance from different perspectives. Finally, we discuss the challenges faced in the field of FR and propose potential directions for future advancements. The open-source repository corresponding to this work can be found at https:// github.com/ 24wenjie-li/ Awesome-Face-Restoration.