Acne, though not life-threatening, is frequently developed on exposed body parts such as face. Acne imparts significant effects such as the feeling of intimidation on patients’ mental status, interpersonal relationships and daily life. For this reason, the current study aimed to investigate the relationship of female college students’ acne recognition with their quality of living (QOL) and self-esteem. In this study, 500 female students from 5 colleges in the Gyeonggi and Chungcheong regions of South Korea participated. A total of 468 sets were utilized for final analysis. The collected data were statistically processed using SPSS v. 21.0 statistical package program. For the validity test of the measurement tool, the exploratory factor analysis was run. For reliability validation, Cronbach's α was calculated. To investigate correlation between each variable, correlation analysis was employed. Multiple regression analysis was performed to test the hypotheses. As a result of analyzing correlation between variables, acne care recognition in terms of subfactor of acne recognition, was found to show significant negative (-) correlations with the QOL subfactors of Sx (symptom), Fx (function) and, Ex (emotion) (p<0.001). Acne aggravation recognition showed a significant negative (-) correlation with Fx (function) (p<0.05). Moreover, in terms of acne recognition subfactors, acne care recognition displayed significant positive (+) correlations with the self-esteem subfactors of self-respect, relationship with others, leadership and popularity, and self-assertion (p<0.05), Acne aggravation recognition showed significant positive (+) correlation with the self-esteem subfactors of relationship with others, leadership and popularity, and self-assertion (p<0.001). With respect to QOL subfactors, Fx (function) demonstrated significant negative (-) correlations with the self-esteem subfactors of self-respect, relationship with others, leadership and popularity, and self-assertion (p<0.001). Sx (symptom), and Ex (emotion) showed statistically significant negative (-) correlations with the self-esteem subfactors of self-respect, relationship with others, and self-assertion (p<0.001). Consequentially, it was found that the more accurately the female college students recognized and responded to their acne, lower were the indexes of their emotional or symptomatic function related subfactors. Self-esteem, on the contrary, showed relatedness as it increased together with the increase in self-respect, relationship with others, self-assertion, and leadership and popularity.