How do Swedes, who are not exposed to administrativeroutines of reporting race and ethnicity, perceive, andcategorize faces with different phenotypical features? Thisstudy examines identity contestation that can occur andaddress how race affects the way you are perceived asSwedish. A sample of Swedish participants were asked toassign racial categories to images of faces with differentphenotypes, identify the skin color of the faces and ratehow ‘Swedish’ the faces are perceived. We also use eye‐tracking to explore whether participants look differentlyat the faces of different racial groups. The results showgreater identity contestation among Latino and Black faces.Moreover, while Swedish respondents identify the skincolor of faces self‐identified as Black as darker compared toother racial backgrounds, the differences in skin color re-ported between Asian, White and Latinos were very small.Despite these small differences in the perception of skincolor among Asian, White, and Latino faces, faces self‐reported as White were rated as significantly more Swed-ish by the respondents compared Asian and Latino faces.All these results contribute to the understanding of notonly how race matters in Sweden but also to the under-standing of constructivist nature of race.