Whether technological advances have the potential to transform skin cancer diagnosis has gained considerable interest, particularly in countries such as the UK and USA, where the incidence of skin cancers is rising. Although skin cancers are common, especially the keratinocyte cancers (such as basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma), these cancers can be challenging for patients and doctors to differentiate from benign lesions. Therefore, patients might present late, primary health-care professionals might refer or excise lesions too readily, and there might not be enough dermatologists available to triage the numbers of patients with suspicious lesions to provide diagnosis and treatment or reassurance. This burden on patients and health-care systems could be lessened by new digital approaches aimed at encouraging people at high risk of melanoma and other skin cancers to consult primary care clinicians earlier to more accurately distinguish benign lesions from possible skin cancers. This approach is a health-care priority because evidence suggests that a timely diagnosis for melanoma, and the more common keratinocyte cancers, results in excellent survival rates.