Written by
Jessica Kasparian, who has spent four years testing makeup, hair, and skin care products.
Sara Miranda, beauty product tester and trend spotter with over three years of experience.
Updated September 16, 2024
If you’re like us, you may notice something odd every time you pay a stylist to wash and blow-dry your hair: It looks amazing. Sleek, shiny, and voluminous with seemingly no heat damage—all achievable at the hands of someone else. But with the right hair styling tools, an easy, breezy style should be attainable at home.
We at Reviewed tested a variety of hair dryers to find one that quickly blow-dries hair and leaves it soft and sleek, not frizzy or fried-looking, whether you have hair that's fine, thick, straight, curly, or anything in between.
In the end, we named the BaBylissPro Nano Titanium Dryer (available at Amazon) our Best Overall winner because of its intuitive design and powerful heat and speed settings to get the job done fast. And the drugstore-sold Panasonic Nanoe Salon Hair Dryer (available on Amazon) is a steal for what it offers—it's lightweight, inexpensive, and dries hair in a snap—making it our Best Value pick.
Best Overall
BaBylissPro Nano Titanium Dryer
Jessica's hair is medium in texture, naturally wavy-curly, and falls about 10 inches below her shoulders. So when she says the BaBylissPro took her hair from wet and untidy to dry and styled in 20 minutes, know that it outdid itself. Before testing the dryer, she sopped up excess water from her shower with her microfiber towel for about 10 minutes until her strands were damp. She began drying on the medium heat and high power settings, circling her head and paying attention to her roots.
After about three minutes, her roots felt dry to the touch and the length of her hair was semi-damp—optimal for styling. She used a round brush to pull her hair taut and slipped the concentrator nozzle (something all dryers included) onto the barrel to dry and straighten her hair from roots to ends. Twenty minutes later, she had voluminous, straight strands that exceeded her expectations. (Read: Most dryers on this list couldn’t deliver the same results.)
In addition, she appreciated the tool’s lighter weight (0.9 pounds) and button placement, both of which contributed to its comfortability. The weight felt evenly distributed in the barrel and handle, making the blow dryer easy to maneuver with no undue stress on the wrist.
The controls consisted of a cool shot button and two switches, each with three settings to toggle between—off, medium, and high for airflow as well as low, medium, and high for heat. Without looking, she could flip between settings while styling but also never accidentally pushed the switches without meaning to.
If you want a tool that dries your hair fast, this one has the power to do it. And if you’re like Jessica and also use a hair dryer to straighten your locks, you’ll be impressed with BaBylissPro.
Pros
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Sleek blowout
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Comfortable to hold
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Variety of speed and heat settings
Cons
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None that we could find
Buy now at Amazon
$89.99 from Target
$94.99 from Walmart
Panasonic Nanoe EH-NA67-W
Panasonic created its Nanoe Hair Dryer with an attachment that oscillates to give your arms some relief. While testing this dryer, Jessica evaluated this feature in addition to its regular drying abilities.
The oscillating attachment presented some challenges. First, it took her several attempts to figure out how to activate the attachment, despite reading the instructions (it turned out I was over-complicating it). Then, the attachment caused her hair to tangle while in motion, though you may not notice this as much if you have silkier hair unlike Jessica's textured hair that binds together easily.
It took her a total of 15 minutes to dry her hair on the low setting—high felt too hot, and heat and airflow can’t be controlled independently here. She chose not to style her hair with this dryer, as she wanted to test its claim of cutting down on drying time using the oscillating nozzle, but she noted that her hair looked "crazy" after the 15 minutes and would require a pass through with a straightener if she wanted to wear it down.
Still, she would expect that result with any of these dryers if she didn’t specifically pull her hair taut and try to straighten it, so she doesn’t fault the dryer. However, it didn’t really help to cut her drying time down.
Aside from the snags, she liked this dryer fine. It didn’t wow her, but she appreciated the innovative idea that indeed kept her arm from feeling as tired throughout the drying process. All of the controls are also very intuitive, albeit less customizable, with a single switch that toggles among off, low, and high.
Pros
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Intuitive controls
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Includes innovative oscillating nozzle
Cons
-
Speed and heat settings can't be controlled independently
$114.99 from Amazon
$114.99 from Best Buy
$159.80 from Walmart
Shark HyperAIR Hair Dryer with IQ 2-in-1 Concentrator and Styling Brush
The Shark Hyperair looks like a dupe for the double-the-price Dyson Supersonic. It forgoes a long barrel and instead opts for a short, wide one that, like the Dyson, acts as the control center with three buttons for air and three for heat. Both sets of buttons even light up white and red, respectively, like the Dyson.
This landed higher than the Dyson on our list because it felt more comfortable to hold, thanks to its better weight distribution, but she has similar criticisms for both tools. The medium heat and air settings dried her hair in 20 minutes, with the finished ‘do looking semi-straight but poofy. But the higher airflow, even on medium heat, was intense and whipped her hair around at times.
Would Jessica use this again? Sure. But she could get her hair to look sleeker with other, more affordable options on this list.
Pros
-
Variety of speed and heat settings
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Comfortable to hold
Cons
-
Powerful air stream whips hair around
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Puffy results
$159.99 from Amazon
$159.99 from Best Buy
$159.99 from Walmart
Harry Josh Pro Tools Pro Dryer 2000
The Harry Josh comes with two concentrator nozzles and has a "negative ion" setting switch that claims smoother styling. Without a nozzle accessory, Jessica struggled to control the dryer’s airflow, which caused her hair to poof up more than any other blow dryer. The nozzle attachment corrects this problem, but that accessory gets burning-hot to the touch, so there’s no taking it off mid-drying session without waiting for it to cool.
Another big deterrent for her was the high-pitched squeal of this dryer—after she finished, her ears were ringing for 20 minutes, which coincidentally was about the same amount of time it took to dry her hair.
Pros
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Compact design
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Intuitive speed and heat settings
Cons
-
Heavy
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High-pitched hum
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Puffy results
Buy now at Amazon
$229.99 from Walmart
Dyson Supersonic Hair Dryer
No hair dryer list would be complete without the super-pricey Dyson Supersonic Hair Dryer. Its diminutive but powerful motor lives inside the Supersonic's handle instead of the head, differentiating it from the other models we've tested.
The design lends itself to being more balanced and, in theory, more ergonomically pleasant to use. However, placing the motor inside of the handle means an ultra-light barrel that leads to an awkward weight imbalance, most noticeable when Jessica was maneuvering it around her head to dry her roots before moving onto styling.
She liked that the Supersonic's control buttons are located on the head of the dryer as opposed to in its handle, and that they light up to show which of the three heat or air settings she's using. Their placement keeps them from accidentally engaging while the hair dryer is in use—an issue that some hair dryers suffer from.
Its "cool mode" button locks into place so that you don’t have to keep squeezing it to keep it on—a nice touch if you like to use the function to "set" your hair after styling with hot air. The Supersonic comes with two smoothing nozzles and a diffuser, all of which attach to the hair dryer magnetically in a snap.
She saw poofy but fully dry results after 30 minutes of using the Dyson and a round brush—a little longer than some. While the Supersonic works well enough, there are far less expensive hair dryers that you can invest in that will yield similar, if not better, results.
Pros
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Powerful air stream
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Variety of speed and heat settings
Cons
-
Awkward weight distribution makes it feel heavy
$329.00 from Amazon
$429.00 from Abt
$429.99 from Best Buy
Shark SpeedStyle HD331
Unlike many of the other hair dryers on this list, the Shark SpeedStyle has six attachments. But the brand says you can build your own SpeedStyle by choosing two attachments to accompany your dryer. As far as customization goes, that's not the only option. Shark also has bundles designed for each hair type. Even though Sara had all six attachments for testing, she took a particular liking to two: the RapidGloss Finisher and the QuickSmooth Brush styler. The RapidGlosser Finisher left a noticeable sheen on Sara's strands and gave a pin-straight finish, but she can't confirm if the tool significantly reduced the frizz in her hair.
On the other hand, when it came to the QuickSmooth Brush styler, it was no walk in the park upon first use. After three attempts with the QuickSmooth Brush, she mastered the art of creating a voluminous blowout that accentuated all her layers.
This dryer also stood out because its on and off switch is located on the outside of the handle. It felt different to turn it on and off from the outside, but it wasn't a major nuisance. While it did an excellent job at drying and giving a bouncy blowout, other hair dryers towards the top of this list ring in at a fraction of the price of the SpeedStyle and provide similar, voluminous results.
$199.00 from Amazon
$199.99 from Target
$199.99 from Best Buy
$199.99 from Walmart
Conair InfinitiPRO by Conair Quick Styling Salon Hair Dryer
This low-priced Conair embodies the differences between a high-end dryer and a budget one. It was noticeably heavier, seemed louder, and had a weaker air stream than its competition.
Like most of the blow dryers, it has two speed and three heat settings, but the low speed setting isn’t powerful enough while the high one feels uncontrollable, which led to Jessica's hair getting tossed around and looking poofy instead of smooth and straightened. Sure, it’ll dry your hair at a fraction of the price of others, but so will our Best Value pick, which works way better.
Pros
-
Variety of heat and speed settings
Cons
-
Loud
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Heavy
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Weak air stream
Buy now at Amazon
$34.99 from Target
$49.99 from Home Depot
$36.99 from Best Buy
Kristin Ess Iconic Style Professional
I wanted this beautiful dryer to be a star performer like the celebrity hair stylist who branded it, as it’s easily accessible at Target and comes in sleek white-and-gold packaging. Unfortunately, looks are about the best thing it has going for it.
The Kristin Ess dryer fell flat in the lab testing and in Jessica's own experience with it. Most notably, the dryer sounded loud, despite measuring at about the same volume as the rest, because of its higher-pitched tone, and that made the whole experience off-putting. It performed fine in terms of its power, but the thing that made it stand out from the pack was its pitchy tone—in a bad way.
Pros
-
Sleek design
-
Powerful air stream
Cons
-
High-pitched hum
$100.00 from Target
$69.99 from Walmart
T3 Fit
The first thing that stood out about this blow dryer was its lightweight build—it’s a perfect travel hair dryer. It’s similar in size and shape to the Shark Hyperair, but feels even lighter and looks sleeker with its white and gold exterior. That positive aside, its airflow isn’t powerful enough to stack up with the others on this list.
It gently tossed Jessica's hair around even at the highest speed, and it took her about 28 minutes to get her hair to look semi-straight, but it was still damp in some spots and puffier than she’d prefer. She tried it on medium and high heat settings and found the former sufficed but the latter felt too hot. She’d use this again in a pinch, but its lightweight, attractive design is the most appealing thing about it.
Pros
-
Sleek design
-
Compact design
Cons
-
Weak air stream
-
Semi-damp and puffy results
$149.99 from Amazon
$149.99 from Best Buy
$149.99 from Walmart
Remington D3190
The budget-minded Remington was another dryer that hurts the ears with its high-pitched hum—something you can look past if the performance was superior to others on this list. But it wasn’t: This dried the hair in about 25 minutes with the results straight but not sleek enough, even after switching both the heat and speed settings from medium to high.
Its humdrum performance was not for a lack of heat, either—a big difference could be felt between the heat settings, with the medium being about right and the hot one feeling too intense.
The primary positive to this dryer is that it was comfortable to wield. It didn’t feel too heavy and the weight was evenly distributed in the head and the handle. Aside from that one aspect, this dryer was only passable.
Pros
-
Comfortable to hold
Cons
-
High-pitched hum
$18.98 from Amazon
$19.19 from Target
$19.16 from Walmart
Hot Tools Pro Signature Ionic Ceramic Salon Hair Dryer
This dryer from Hot Tools isn’t bad—it’s just not great, either. It dried her hair in 25 minutes with semi-straight results. Like a few of the ones above it, you can use it in a pinch, but nothing about its performance, build, or buttons stood out from the pack.
Pros
-
Sleek design
Cons
-
Results in only semi-straight hair
$39.99 from Amazon
$39.99 from Walmart
How We Tested Hair Dryers
The Testers
I’m Jessica Kasparian, the former beauty editor at Reviewed, and I've tested everything from makeup to skincare to hair care. I have medium-textured, wavy-curly hair and, at the time of testing, my hair was damaged on the ends (thanks, bleach) and measured about 10 inches past my shoulders.
When I use a hair dryer, I’m hoping to get it completely dry and somewhat straight, in preparation for going over it with a hair straightener. If I want to wear my hair naturally curly, I don’t use any hot tools to style it.
I'm Sara Miranda, the staff beauty writer at Reviewed, and I've also tested dozens of beauty products under the sun. Similar to Jessica, my hair fares more curly-wavy, but I have very thick hair. When testing hair dryers, the ends of my dark brown hair had minimal damage due to daily heat-styling, and it fell about three inches past my shoulders.
My expectations when using a hair dryer are pretty minimal. My hair should come out on the other side of a blow dry looking relatively straight, and, of course, completely dry. After blowdrying, I typically put my hair in curlers for about an hour in order to accentuate my layers—but that's not an everyday occurrence. Whether I'm styling my hair with or without curlers, I blow dry my hair every single day, given that it takes hours for my mane to dry on its own.
The Tests
To help demystify the daunting task of finding the top hair dryer out there, we considered best-of lists, top sellers at major retailers, and cult favorites of bloggers and reviewers, then narrowed our test field to the best of the best.
After we settled on over a dozen hair dryers at a wide range of costs, we pitted them against each other in a hair-drying battle royale, from everyday usability to the technical stuff few people think of when drying their hair. Our goal? To see if a pricier dryer is really better, or if those hefty price tags are just from brand notoriety.
Before blow drying the hair with each product, we handed them over to our scientists for lab testing. Our technicians put each appliance through a gamut of tests to measure airflow speed, temperature settings, weight, and sound.
For example, to measure air streams, we balanced a pingpong ball on the ends of the nozzles. We then turned each dryer on its highest speed and heat setting, and recorded how high it projected the pingpong ball, using the lab’s brick wall as the measuring stick. The BaBylissPro and Conair dryers aced this test, keeping pingpong balls hovering far above the rest.
From there, we tested each one at home to see how quickly we could achieve a smooth blowout. We wrote down our impressions on the resulting style and experience using and maneuvering the dryer. We also took notes on the weight and balance of each dryer in hand, and any annoying details, like if it was extremely loud or high-pitched.
The final attribute we considered while using the hair dryers was the location and usability of the controls. If the buttons or switches controlling the airflow or heat were placed in a way that wasn’t easily accessible while we were drying our hair, or if they were in the way and caused us to accidentally switch modes, we noted this.
Finally, we compared the scientific and subjective results to find out if any of these aspects actually has an impact on what makes a hair dryer perform well.
What to Consider Before Buying a Hair Dryer
Temperature Settings
Just because a hair dryer can get hotter, doesn’t mean it’s better—higher temperatures don’t necessarily yield straighter or smoother results. In fact, having adjustable heat settings is better than just one hot temperature because you may find a setting causes your scalp to burn or your hair to feel scorched.
Adjustable temperatures are also great to fit with various hair types, so anyone with fine hair can reduce damage to their strands by using a lower heat setting. Meanwhile, those who are prone to frizz can use a lower speed setting to hopefully reduce fly-aways with more intentional blow drying.
Weight
A good hair dryer is only a great one if it’s not exhausting to hold and maneuver above your head for upwards of 20 minutes at a time. For this reason, and because many hair dryers claim to be lighter-weight than the competition, we weighed each dryer. In reality, they all came in between 0.8 and 1.8 pounds. One dryer even claims to be "featherweight," and it was one of the heaviest that we tested—that speaks to the mistruths in beauty marketing.
It turns out that a hair dryer is comfortable (or not) to use because of how its weight is distributed. One example: The lighter-weight Dyson feels heavier because its weight is in its large handle and long cord, which drag down your wrist.
Noise
Look at any blow dryer at the store and its box will say it's "quieter than the competition." To test that claim, we brought the dryers into our soundproof headphone lab and measured the volume of each hair dryer on its loudest setting. All of the dryers hovered between 7.5 and 8.4 dbA—about as loud as a vacuum cleaner.
However, the hair dryers all sound quite different from each other due to the pitch and speed of the motor. Even so, none of the dryers were quiet enough to have a conversation over: Don't believe the hype when you hear that a new hair dryer is near silent.
Hair Prep
Before styling your mane with a hair dryer, you want to make sure that your strands are about 85% damp, says Howard McLaren, co-founder and Creative Director of haircare brand R+Co. McLaren suggests using a towel to sop up excess moisture pre-hair dry, and for an extra layer of protection, spray your strands with a heat-protectant spray like R+Co’s Chainmail Thermal Protection Styling Spray. It promises to safeguard hair from heat that reaches up to 450ºF while leaving hair with a glossy sheen and copious amounts of volume. This heat protectant calls on water lily and celery seed extracts along with sunflower and jojoba oils to volumize and hydrate the hair.
"Starting with hair that’s partially air-dried helps reduce the amount of heat exposure and ensures a smoother, shinier finish," Aaron Grenia, co-founder of IGK Haircare, explains. Grenia adds that semi-dried hair will also help cut down on styling time. He recommends using his brand’s Good Behavior Spirulina Protein Smoothing Spray, a self-proclaimed "heat-activated blowout spray" that uses spirulina protein to make strands stronger in addition to innovative bonding polymers to give hair a smooth finish.
Your Hair Type
Curly HairIf you’re going for a traditional blow out look, it may be harder to accomplish on naturally wavy or curly hair. It’s not impossible, but you’ll certainly need a high-quality dryer (preferably one with ionic technology or hair smoothing abilities) to help cut down on frizz, or you may want to opt for a hair dryer brush.
However, if you typically like to embrace your natural curls, a diffuser attachment can be a great way to add some bounce and volume to your hair. In this case it may be worth purchasing a hair dryer that already comes with a diffuser included, like the DevaCurl Dryer & Diffuser Combo (available at Amazon) .
Fine HairThinner hair strands are often the easiest to blow dry as they typically don’t require very high heat settings to get a frizz free result. With that being said, it’s probably best to avoid ionic hair dryers if you have fine hair.
The technology in these dryers can make your smooth strands look a little too sleek, taking away the volume that you were trying to create by blowing out your hair in the first place.
Thick HairFor thick hair, you’ll want a well-rounded blow dryer that can reach higher temperatures (and speeds) to get the job done. One that delivers adequate drying power so you aren’t left with exhausted arms half way through your blow out, like the BaBylissPRO Nano Titanium Dryer (available at Amazon) , is great for fast drying when it comes to long, thick hair.
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The Best Dry Shampoo
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Prices were accurate at the time this article was published but may change over time. The product experts at Reviewed have all your shopping needs covered. Follow Reviewed on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, or Flipboard for the latest deals, product reviews, and more.
Meet the testers
Jessica writes and edits beauty content as a member of Reviewed's commerce team and manages a beauty TikTok called Beautorial. She's spent four years testing makeup, skincare, hair care, and body care products, and she acts as Reviewed's beauty expert.
Jessica represented Reviewed's beauty section at CES in-person and virtually for four years, and she was nominated for and graduated from the Gannett Emerging Leaders 2021-2022 program.
Jessica holds a Bachelor's degree in journalism from Emerson College, and she's written for Scary Mommy, 7News, Boston.com, Citizine, and Boston Common Magazine.
See all of Jessica Kasparian's reviews
Sara Miranda
Staff Beauty Writer
Sara Miranda is the Staff Beauty Writer at Reviewed. Her bylines appear in Allure, Bustle, Coveteur, HelloGiggles, and more. She graduated from New York University with a degree in Art History and credits her studies for teaching her how to craft colorful descriptions of the latest and greatest beauty products. Besides writing about all things beauty, she loves going to art galleries, photographing her travels, looking for the best bubble tea, and taking long walks down the aisles of Sephora.
See all of Sara Miranda's reviews
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