Dyson Airwrap Styler Complete Curling Iron review

Alright, beauty junkies: this one’s for you. The Dyson Airwrap is the kind of luxury product that only a true style aficionado would lust after, but also the exact kind of product that’s perfect for a hairstyling newbie. It’s a wonderful example of the Dyson brand, and features a new technology that’s truly innovative.

What’s in the box of the Dyson Airwrap Complete Collection?

The Dyson Airwrap doesn’t speak specifically to this set. Rather, the Airwrap is a collection of combination hairstyling and drying products, and the Complete Collection is the sum of its parts. While some Airwrap kits feature only Dyson’s smoothing attachments and others feature only the brand’s curling and volume attachments, this particular set has it all.

In the box—which you should note is large, luxurious, and heavy; covered in rich, tan leather and lined in a stiff faux-velvet—you’ll find every single Airwrap product on the market. We’re talking things to dry, curl, volumize, and smooth.

More specifically, the Airwrap Complete Collection comes with a base wand and attachments for using it. It’s pretty simple: sleek and evenly weighted, it contains the actual motor and intake of the styler. Think of it as a dryer base, with four sets of controls. One turns the device on, off, and sets it to cool; another releases the attachments for easy removal. The two at the top of the device (nearest the fuchsia) provide the user with three settings each for speed and heat.

This set also includes a non-slip, heat-resistant mat and a filter cleaning brush. Note that the case itself is part of this kit—it’s well-built, and makes it easy to keep everything organized inside.

What are the different Dyson Airwrap attachments?

The Complete Collection includes every Dyson Airpwrap attachment. For drying, we start on the left with a basic Dyson dryer head. This one is the most similar to the Dyson Supersonic dryer, but with the shape of a miniature Dyson Airblade fan. I greatly prefer this over any other dryer I’ve ever used; the controlled and elongated shape make drying my hair significantly easier and faster. The Airwrap is designed to style damp hair, so the dryer is actually intended for use as a pre-styler. Just spritz in your heat protectant, get your hair about 80% dry with the pre-styler, and then select styling attachments to finish.

For curling, you’ll see two 30mm and two 40mm barrels, allowing you to curl the hair both clockwise and counter-clockwise. Next, there are two brushes: one for firm and one for soft smoothing. I prefer the one for soft smoothing, with the little bristle caps and soft-tilt panels. It’s so handy in the kit that I’ve been using it to de-tangle and partition my hair before styling!

Finally, the kit contains a volumizing round brush for soft blowouts and root volume. This is the one that is most likely to tangle your hair, as it doesn’t have directional air movement, but it’s key in a great blowout.

How Dyson’s drying technology stands out

Alright: this is what makes the Dyson Airwrap really cool, and what I think justifies its price tag. Dyson’s high price tags are in part due to their high production standards (you can definitely feel the difference between Dyson products and their more affordable competitors), but they’re also due to the brand’s large R&D budget. Products like the Dyson vacuum ball and bladeless fan are completely new innovations. They’ve never been seen on the market before, and they can often make us go, “how has no one thought of this before now?!”

The Dyson Airwrap is another one of those products. While the original Dyson hair dryer was cool, the Airwrap’s bladeless technology is brand spankin’ new to the beauty world. It uses the Coanda effect to wrap your hair around its curling barrels—without any clamps or winding mechanisms. It’s the only product that you can curl your hair with that you literally cannot, no matter how hard you try, get your hair stuck in. (Bolded for emphasis!)

The Airwrap barrels combine the ease of an automatic curler with the soft effect of a blow dryer … And the risk-free nature of doing absolutely nothing at all. It’s an incredible new invention, and by far the single coolest new product that I’ve seen in all 12 of my years as a beauty writer. I filmed my first-ever time using the Airwrap for this video, and it’s pretty easy to see the child-like wonder that this product makes me feel up close!

Because this styler is primarily a dryer, it’s important to note that you’re meant to style from damp. The Airwrap curling barrels will still curl your hair from dry, but without a lot of product, your curls are unlikely to stay defined for more than a few hours. If you’re styling later in the day, spritzing some water through your hair will work!

What the Dyson Airwrap Styler excels at 

If price wasn’t an issue, I would absolutely say that every household should have a Dyson Airwrap Styler. (Well, maybe not if you’re fully-bald Air Nomads straight out of Avatar: The Last Airbender, but that’s pretty much the only exception.) In real life, however, Dyson products are always a luxury—and this one is better suited for some.

If you’re looking for a full hair collection, then this is a great place to start. It’s the only product I can think of that has different attachments for drying, styling, smoothing, and volumizing. It’s also great if you love getting blowouts, but struggle to do them yourself; this is the closest I’ve ever come to actually achieving salon-quality hair at home.

Dyson’s directional air actually does perform differently than other drying products, and my hair is noticeably smoother when I use this than when I style it manually with a traditional dryer and brush. (It feels smoother to the touch, but my split ends are less noticeable visually, too. Heat styling, especially using hot tools like flat irons and curling irons, can kind of “pop” your split ends like popcorn. This doesn’t!)

Who is the Dyson Airwrap Complete Curling Iron best for?

There are two instances where I think the Airwrap doesn’t make sense. For starters, if you have very short hair, you won’t get a lot out of this product. At that point, a round brush blow dryer would have the same effect. But it also struggles somewhat with holding a tight curl throughout the day—in humid locations, you’ll need a lot of hairspray to keep these curls in shape.

The Airwrap Complete Curling Iron is best for those who want to be able to achieve salon-quality blowouts at home—which is a lot of us! I’m really happy with it, and have been using it after every single shower since I opened the box. (I’m typically the kind of person who only bothers to style their hair once or twice a month, so that should tell you how easy it is to use).

However, I do want to note that my friends who love their Dysons all have thick, unmanageable hair. The Supersonic and the Airwrap dry your hair faster than other companies’ dryers will, so if that describes your hair, you’ll probably love this product even more than I do. And I love it a lot!

Get the Dyson Airwrap at Best Buy online.