The Very Best Hairbrushes for Every Hair Texture

Boar bristles, nylon pins | Heat resistant | £££

An unsurprising yet undeniable choice. According to three of the experts we spoke to, the cult brand’s boar-bristle-and-nylon brush still deserves the hype. “The Mason Pearson has hundreds of tiny boar-bristles, which are softer and more gentle for brushing through your hair,” says Sara Jane Booth, the salon owner of Bassia Bassia in New York. Those bristles help move the hair’s natural oils from the scalp down the hair shaft, while the nylon bristles create less static.

MacDougall is also a fan of the Mason Pearson and, like Booth, praised the brush’s ability to “stimulate and exfoliate the scalp.” Clyde Elezi, the creative director and founder of the Drawing Room New York, recommends the brush as well. He cites it as an example of a natural-bristle paddle brush, useful for those with long hair thanks to a larger head size that reaches more strands than a smaller brush might. “The Mason Pearson brush helps to smooth the cuticle while distributing hair’s natural oils evenly,” Elezi says. The brush has also appeared in many a “What I Can’t Live Without,” including Charlotte Tilbury’s and Jane Seymour’s — who, we should note, both have great hair.

Nylon pins | Heat resistant | ££

Booth also recommends this all-rounder if you haven’t got a Mason Pearson to hand. Unlike a boar-bristle brush, wet brushes have bristles with smooth plastic tips, which are less likely to break wet hair, when the strands are at their weakest. “It’s a combination of a wet brush with slightly stiffer and longer bristles and an everyday detangling or ponytail brush” at a good price point. It works well on wet, coarse hair without being flimsily flung across the room at the first sign of a tangle. And it’s ideal if you’re slicking back a ponytail, especially if you’re using product to lay it (washing it out of the brush is easy).

Plastic bristles | Heat resistant | £

Wet brushes are a bit like Kleenex or Tippex: a specific brand name we tend to use interchangeably with the name of a whole category of product. Here, the term “wet brush” refers both to this style of plastic-bristle brush as well as the original name-brand Wet Brush. Masami Hosono, the founder and creative director of Vacancy Project, says they use wet brushes at her salon to detangle wet hair before starting a haircut. MacDougall seconded Hosono’s recommendation of the wet brush for detangling, and Strategist contributor Alice Gregory is a fan, too. In her ode to the wet brush, she writes, “I even bring the one I keep at home with me when I go to get my haircut, lest they’re not equipped for the job — anything else seems masochistic.”

Synthetic bristles | To use wet | £

For another post-shower detangling option, try the Tangle Teezer, which comes recommended by Booth. While Booth says the brush works for “any hair type,” she told us that if you have hair on the finer side that’s prone to tangling when wet, this is the brush for you. “Your hair is the most fragile when wet, and all my fine-haired clients seemed to rip through their tangles with paddle brushes when their hair was wet, likely causing a lot of unnecessary breakage,” Booth says. “The Tangle Teezer’s teeth are so small and flexible, which helps to brush out tangles slower without ripping through your hair.” Unlike the Wet Brush, the bristles on the Tangle Teezer are varied in height so that the longer “teeth” detangle hair while the shorter ones smooth hair at the base. It comes both as a palm-size handheld brush — the original Tangle Teezer — or in an updated version that has a handle. “I suggest getting the style with the handle instead of the one without because the original is really slippery and uncomfortable to hold in your hand,” says Booth.

Nylon pins | Heat resistant | £

The base of this seven-row Denman brush curves slightly, which stylist Koni Bennett likes across the Denman range because it “gives your hair a little bit of bounce.” Celebrity stylist Ro Morgan enjoys how the brush is designed with “flexible bristles that are widely spaced apart enough to prevent damage to hair from breaking.” For Booth, that spacing out of the styling brush’s plastic bristles are “great for combing out wet curly hair, leaving your curls more individually defined and less frizzy.” You’ll get a more defined look in curls than with the hundreds of bristles on a brush like a Mason Pearson — they’d blend the curls together for a soft, puffier look. The brush also features an anti-static rubber pad and should be used on wet hair (keep a spray bottle to hand to top up, if you need to).

Synthetic bristles | Heat resistant | ££

“A paddle brush is great for thick hair and long hair as it glides through the hair more easily” and covers a larger area, says MacDougall. According to Elezi, this Label.M brush combines “detangle, vent, and paddle” brush properties “that help in blow-drying long hair flawlessly smooth while adding natural movement and body.” Heat should flow easily when applied, and water shouldn’t get trapped in the brush, which wouldn’t necessarily happen with a cushioned head. The brush is also ceramic coated, which Elezi says makes it “fast heating,” adds shine, and cuts down blow-drying time — leaving less time for the heat to damage your hair.

Nylon bristles | Heat resistant | ££

If you want to create waves in your hair, Elezi suggests using a round ceramic brush, for the reasons above. “This type of brush can be used to achieve either slick straight look or bouncy waves and add extra volume as well,” he says. Elezi says his salon’s “absolute favourite” is the round ceramic brush from Tigi. According to the salon’s site, the brush works particularly well for those with medium to long hair and for those with thick hair. The Tigi Pro brush isn’t available in the UK, but this Morracannoil brush is a good alternative.

Synthetic rubber | Heat resistant | ££

You can nestle the knob of this handleless brush between your fingers, effectively turning it into an extension of your hand. That should make detangling process as easy as running your fingers through your hair. The flexible bristles help, too — they move 360 degrees to fully contour to the shape of your head. Celebrity stylist Myss Monique likes this brush because the design lends itself to easy detangling and scalp massaging. “We tend to forget how scalp health is just as essential when taking care of natural hair,” she says. “The delicate bristles on the Manta brush allow you to exfoliate the scalp while washing your hair and evenly distribute conditioners.”