Learning how to diffuse curly hair is a part of any curly girl’s beauty journey. After all, making sure you’re properly drying your waves and coils while minimizing heat damage is key to healthy, happy hair, and using a diffuser alongside your favorite curly-hair products seriously helps. If you aren’t familiar with hair diffusers yet, let us be the first to introduce you to the tool that will revolutionize your curly-hair drying routine.
A hair diffuser is a round, bowl-like tool that you attach to the end of your hair dryer to disperse the heat all over your hair. Many diffusers also have spikes to help keep your curls separated while drying. Most are round and plastic, but you can also buy sock diffusers (aptly named; they look like socks for the end of your dryer), which are small, soft, and super convenient for travel. After attaching your diffuser to your dryer, you’re ready to get drying. Ahead, we chatted with a professional hairstylist to get the lowdown on everything you need to know about how to diffuse curly hair, from the best techniques to how to prep your hair beforehand. Read on for all our best tips.
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What is diffusing?
Diffusing your hair is, at its simplest, “drying the hair with heat in an indirect way,” says hairstylist Koni Bennett. “When the blow-dryer has a directional heat setting, it comes out forcefully, but diffusing will allow the blow-dryer to blow air out in a controlled way.”
Essentially, this means that the air “is not forceful enough to damage your curl. However, it’s just enough concentration to dry a section of hair without manipulating it,” Bennett says.
What is the proper way to diffuse curly hair?
To maximize results and enhance your curl pattern, “always diffuse in sections,” says Bennett. “Some style their entire head and then diffuse after. I personally believe that when you do that, you don’t give all of the hair a chance to dry along with the diffuser.”
Instead, this causes your hair to dry “in the natural elements of the environment, which is not a controlled way to dry your hair, because the environment can have excess moisture,” she says. “If you go section by section, you’re ensuring that every bit of hair gets the same exact method, so that your result looks more uniform in the end.” Bennett says even slight variations can change your hair’s finish.
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Should you diffuse curly hair with hot or cold air?
It’s up to you. “It is okay to use warm and hot air,” says Bennett. “But for curly girls, to be safe, I personally suggest using warm to cool air, because heat sometimes can manipulate the hair or stretch the curl.”
What should you put in your hair before diffusing it?
Prior to applying any products, make sure your hair is wet or damp. You can mist your strands with water using a spray bottle if needed. Then, to add definition, “depending on your hair type and texture, you could use a mousse or setting foam, which are similar products for different densities of hair, or you could use a gel or a cream,” says Bennett.
And although your diffuser will provide less intense heat on your strands, you still want to use a heat protectant to make sure your hair stays healthy and free of damage from any hot tools.
If you want to reduce frizz, the key is water, says Bennett. “Usually, when your hair is frizzy, it’s searching for water in the environment, because for some reason or another, the moisture has not penetrated the shaft of the hair,” she says. “Because the cortex of the hair is looking for moisture, it’s sending a signal to the outer shaft of the hair to go out into the environment and find moisture.” And when the hair does that, it causes the frizzy look. The solution is simple: “You need more water or water-retention products,” says Bennett. Think leave-in conditioners, hydrating curl creams, and more. Pro tip: “A quick way to blast frizz is to add water to your styling product and diffuse right away,” says Bennett.
She also recommends extra-hold gel to define kinky curly hair and cream- and gel-based products, as “you can pretty much use them from start to finish, either to dry your curls or to style your curls wet or dry,” she says.
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How to diffuse curly hair, according to a hairstylist
Good news: Diffusing hair at home is super straightforward. First, section your hair in six to eight pieces with clips, says Bennett.
“You start primarily in the back of the hair, and you use your product and water to achieve your desired wet curly style,” she says. “And once you have your style set and your curls to your liking, you then go in with your diffuser and blast that section of hair with diffused air until it fully dries before moving on to the next.” Simply repeat that process with each section of hair until your whole head is dry.
You can hold the diffuser on the top of your head, going from the roots to the tips (the same positioning as if you were using a concentrator), or you can come at your hair from the tips, bringing the diffuser under the hair and collecting it in the bowl until it’s dry. Or, try a mixture of both!
To increase volume while you’re diffusing your curls, “flipping the hair upside down is the best trick,” says Bennett.
Though curly hair tends to be fairly voluminous on its own, “some curly hair has a bit more density, especially as the water travels down toward the end of the hair to drip off,” says Bennett. “You may experience a flatter top and more density on the very bottom.” If this sounds like you, “flipping that hair over to go against gravity and diffusing there for a couple of seconds at your front and top pieces will add volume to the root of the hair,” says Bennett.
Catharine Malzahn is the contributing associate beauty editor at Glamour.
