Voldemort looks the way he does because years of dark magic — especially splitting his soul into Horcruxes and other twisted experiments — slowly dehumanized his body and made him more snake‑like as a visual symbol of how inhuman he’d become.

What Voldemort Is Supposed To Look Like

  • After regaining a body in Goblet of Fire , he’s described as tall, skeletally thin, with chalk‑white skin, a skull‑like face, slit-like nostrils, and red eyes with slit pupils.
  • The overall look is meant to resemble a humanoid snake: unnaturally smooth, hairless, and cold, with long white fingers and a masklike, emotionless face.

How He Got That Way In-Universe

  • Tom Riddle started out handsome; by the time he returns to Hogwarts asking for the Defence Against the Dark Arts job, Dumbledore notes his features are already waxy, distorted, and less human.
  • This change is tied to advanced Dark Arts and the repeated tearing of his soul to create multiple Horcruxes, which gradually made him paler, more snake-like, and “less than human” in both body and mind.

Symbolism Behind The Design

  • His altered face is not just “damage”; it’s a physical manifestation of his choices — each act of murder and soul‑mangling magic pushing him further from normal human appearance.
  • The snake features echo his obsession with Slytherin and his ability to speak Parseltongue, turning him into a living emblem of the dark, corrupted side of that legacy.

Why Movies And Books Differ Slightly

  • In the books, his eyes are explicitly scarlet with slit pupils; the films toned this down so Ralph Fiennes’s performance and expressions could read more clearly on screen.
  • Some concept art and fan discussions show even more monstrous designs, but the final movie look lands in a middle ground: recognizably human, but disturbingly wrong and predatory.

TL;DR: Voldemort looks “like that” because the story wants his body to show what his soul has become: a once-human dark wizard who tore his soul apart so many times that he turned himself into something cold, snake-like, and unnaturally inhuman.