Which dryer nozzle to use, and when

Four attachments ship in the box and most people use one of them. That is a shame, because each solves a different problem, and using the wrong one is the single most common reason a good dryer produces a mediocre result.

The smoothing nozzle

The narrow slot. This is the one you reach for nine mornings out of ten. It takes the airflow and flattens it into a directed sheet, which lets you point the air along the strand from root to end rather than across it. Air travelling along the cuticle lays it flat. Air travelling across it lifts it, which is what frizz is.

Hold it about two centimetres off the brush, follow the brush down the section, and keep both moving. Parking the nozzle in one place is how you get a hot spot.

The precision nozzle

Narrower again, and easy to misuse. It concentrates the same volume of air through a smaller opening, so velocity goes up and the working area shrinks to roughly the width of a section. Use it for a fringe, for the pieces around the face, and for setting a part line. Do not use it for the bulk of a head, because you will be there all morning.

The wide nozzle

The opposite trade. It spreads air over a much larger area at lower velocity, which makes it the right choice for rough-drying long or dense hair before any shaping starts. It is also the gentlest attachment on fine hair, because nothing is being concentrated anywhere.

The diffuser

The deep bowl with prongs. Its job is to slow the air down and spread it out so that curl clumps are not blown apart. Almost every complaint about diffusers comes down to two habits: running too fast a speed, and moving the diffuser around.

• Drop to medium speed and a lower heat setting before the diffuser goes on.
• Cup a section into the bowl, bring it up to the scalp, and hold it there.
• Hold rather than sweep. Thirty seconds per section, then move to the next one.
• Finish on cool-shot with the diffuser still on, which is what sets the clump.

If the diffuser is moving, it is doing the job of a nozzle badly rather than the job of a diffuser well.

One habit that applies to all four

Rough-dry to roughly eighty percent before any attachment goes on. Attachments are shaping tools, not drying tools, and using one from wet doubles the time under heat for no gain in the finish.

Attachments on this range mount magnetically and rotate while attached, so you can change the angle of the slot mid-pass without taking the nozzle off. That is worth knowing on day one rather than month six.

Written in-house. No sponsored placements appear on this site.