No one should need or want a $699 hair dryer. The number one hair dryer on Amazon costs $50, the one under my sink cost $90 in 2003, and the one my hair dresser uses daily on clients costs between $120 and $200. A $U699 hair dryer is more than twice the price of anything else, but that doesn’t matter, because Dyson, a company best known for its fancy vacuums, has made a hair dryer, and the damn thing might be the last you’ll ever need.
All images: Alex Cranz/Gizmodo
Dyson has this irritating habit of making wildly expensive products that are actually kind of worth the money. Its vacuums suck up pet hair better than the other guys and are easier to service. Its fans are super quiet, and don’t require a screw driver and patience to clean. The Supersonic hair dryer is even more overpriced than other Dyson products, but it is also an outstandingly good product. It solves most of the major problems of every other hair dryer on the market, while also drying hair faster and better.
To test it out I used it on my own very wavy and straight hair and my roommate tried it out on her super straight hair. Not exactly the most diverse of tests and other hair types may have very different results, but the roommate’s hair is incredibly fine and brittle, while mine is so thick that it takes, on average, over thirty minutes to dry from a wet head. The Supersonic dried it in a fraction of the time. Most mornings I could hop out of the shower and have my hair dry and presentable in seven minutes or less.
“It’s so smooth now,” my roommate crooned over her own hair after use. That sentiment was shared by my coworkers after I got a blowout with the hair dryer on camera.
“Can I touch it,” a coworker asked.
Drying hair requires a combination of heat and air movement. Hair dressers usually use expensive hair dryers that get incredibly hot incredibly quickly. These dry hair fast, but they end up creating frizz if the hair dresser isn’t careful — which is why they usually switch to a no heat mode at some point (that’s also why it takes longer to dry it at the salon than at home).
The Supersonic has a sensor inside that measures the heat of the air to keep it from ever getting too hot. I can’t say I noticed that particular feature, but that’s because for the first time ever I didn’t have to crank the heat all the way up to get my hair dried fast. The Supersonic churns out a lot of air at an incredible rate — which helped instead.
Air intake is at the base of the handle, so you have to hold it a little higher than you might be used to.
Usually that kind of air flow requires an insanely loud hair dryer that makes anything but falling trees inaudible. Cleverly, Dyson moved the dryer’s motor into the handle and uses the rest of the handle as a kind of silencer. The effect is a dryer you can use while still having a conversation.
Dropping the motor into the handle also better balances the dryer so it’s not a top heavy irritation that leaves your shoulder sore. Because the motor is in the handle the air intake is moved down there as well. So that fear you have of your hair being sucked up through the back of your dryer and catching on fire? A thing of the past.
There are currently only three extensions available for the dryer, two concentrate airflow while the third is a big diffuser. The big missing extension is the hot comb one — super useful for people with extremely curly and natural hair. Attachments don’t screw in or squeeze on, but instead attach via magnet.
The only time the attachments fell off was when I dropped the hair dryer onto concrete from five feet up. The attachment snapped back into place with ease, and the ding on the dryer rubbed away with a swipe of my thumb.
It seems like Dyson really has made the perfect hair dryer. So that insane $699 price tag almost feels reasonable. Dryers were flawed! This one is not! But the price itself is a major flaw. If you dry your hair once a month do not buy this dryer. If you dry it once a week then maybe, do not buy this dryer. If you’re drying it every time you wash you’re hair, or if you dry hair for a living, than yeah, start counting your dollars and considering that insane price tag, because this stupidly expensive hair dryer is worth it.
README
- It’s 700 damn dollars
- But it does the job so damn well
- Comes with three attachments, including a very good diffuser
- But no comb extension
- Super light
- Super quiet
- Dries hair faster than any other dryer
- But seriously. It is $699.