From Kepler to Einstein, Dirac and Weinberg (to name a few), most physicists believed that the ultimate explanation of the Universe must possess beauty. For some of them, the beauty of the physical laws was as important as the truth. Over the last few years, however, we hear more dissenting voices fuelled by the no new physics results at the LHC, which claim that we have been led astray by aesthetics. These claims range from constructive criticism to more or less open scepticism. This situation calls for an assessment. I will argue that beauty in physics, besides being an important epistemic tool, offers a wonderful message that has an outreach potential. The topic was inspired by the discussions within the IPPOG collaboration.