Best Hair Dryers
The top-rated hair dryers CR tested proved to be powerful, lightweight, and less noisy
Hair dryers first arrived on the home consumer market in the 1920s, and they’ve been hot ever since. Today, 60 percent of U.S. women and 20 percent of U.S. men regularly use a hair dryer over air drying, according to a 2018 report by Dyson. And while the technology has improved with time, hair dryers still serve the same basic function: to blow hot air until your hair dries.
So when it comes to choosing a new hair dryer, it’s the performance and ease of use that matters. You want a machine with enough speed and heat that it can dry your hair fast, but not so much heat that your hair will fry. You’ll be aiming this device around your ears, so it needs to be quiet to avoid damaging your hearing. And ideally, it’s light enough to wield with ease.