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If you would love to get a tattoo but can't stand the thought of needles, a UK-based startup has just invented the perfect solution.

CipherX has developed the world's first completely painless tattoo that delivers permanent ink with zero discomfort.

Instead of using a traditional tattoo gun to inject pigment under the skin, this unusual technology is applied with a clever disposable plaster.

Each patch is covered with hundreds of tiny spikes made of normal carbon-based tattoo ink combined with a specialised biopolymer.

Once the patch is aligned, these 'microneedles' are pushed into the skin and start to break down, depositing a tiny pixel of ink in exactly the right spot.

After 15 minutes, the needle-filled sticker can be peeled away to reveal a permanent 'microdot' tattoo that will slowly darken over the following 48 hours.

Unlike a normal tattoo, CipherX says there is no pain, blood, and very little damage to the surrounding tissue.

And, in great news for tattoo fans, each design currently costs just £50.

UK-based company CipherX has developed the world's first completely painless tattoo that delivers permanent ink with zero discomfort

Instead of using a tattoo gun, the company has developed a patch coated with hundreds of 'microneedles' made of tattoo ink and a biopolymer

Tattooing has been around for thousands of years, with some of the earliest examples dating back 5,000 years to the marks on Otzi the Iceman, a mummy found in the Alps.

However, besides the invention of the electric tattoo gun in 1891, techniques for putting ink under the skin have remained relatively unchanged.

Currently CipherX is only offering its revolutionary tattoos in a limited number of designs, such as hearts, stars and smiley faces, that fit inside a 15-millimetre frame.

You can purchase a voucher for a design online, but the actual tattoo can only be applied at a CipherX event where staff check customers are over 18, consenting, and sober.

The company also refuses to apply its painless tattoos anywhere on the hands, feet, groin, neck, or face.

However, in the future, the company says that it would like to make its patches available to order online and apply at home.

While this could lead to some poor impulse decisions and regrettable tattoos, the team say that their sterile, accurately-dosed patches make home tattooing safer and easier to reverse.

Tattoo guns or 'stick and poke' needles can already be purchased online, and ink that is placed too deep in the skin can be much harder to fade with laser removal.

Once aligned, an applicator pushes the needles into the skin, where they break down to leave behind a single pixel of ink

CipherX says that the process takes just 15 minutes and doesn't cause any pain or bleeding

In contrast, CipherX's technique doesn't create the web of scar tissue sometimes left by heavy-handed tattooing, which could make their ink easier to remove.

CipherX says that the inspiration for their tattoo applicator came from co-creator Ferdinand Kohle's fear of needles and blood.

Mr Kohle says he first encountered microneedle technology while studying Innovation Design Engineering at Imperial College London, and wondered whether it could be used for a 'minimally invasive, more accessible approach to tattooing'.

However, although the tattoos are certainly eye-catching, giving people an easy way to get inked isn't CipherX's real goal.

Instead, they want to use their microneedle applicators to deliver vaccines and other medicine through the skin without the need for traditional injections.

The company has already received funding from Innovate UK, the government's technology innovation agency, to help researchers at the University of Oxford develop a contraceptive hormonal patch.

Similarly, the team are looking at how their patch can deliver 'lipid nanoparticles', the same tiny packets of medicine that were used in the mRNA Covid-19 vaccine.

Tattooing might seem like an unusual first step toward this goal, but it is far less regulated than medical products, allowing CipherX to trial their tech in the real world before going to clinical trial.

The tattoos are permanent and darken over 48 hours after application. A small design that fits within a 1.5-centimetre frame currently costs £50 and can only be applied at a CipherX event

This comes after scientists from Michigan State University revealed how people make judgments based on someone's tattoos.

According to their analysis, people with cheerful, colourful tattoos are seen as more agreeable.

In contrast, people who opt for tattoos featuring death imagery are more likely to be rated as unpleasant.

Meanwhile, people with large, traditional-looking tattoos are more likely to be rated as extroverted.

CipherX has been contacted for comment.