Want Your Wavy or Curly Hair to Look Its Best? It Helps to Know Your Curl Type

WIRED

3 days ago

Not all curls are made—or behave—equally. Knowing your curl type will help you figure out the best products and tools to help style your hair. Courtesy of Getty Images; Sephora
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As WIRED's resident straightening iron specialist who has tested nearly 30 models for our guide to the Best Hair Straighteners, it probably goes without saying that I have naturally curly hair. Given my unwavering dedication to straightening it, it probably follows that I also have some associated trauma with my hair.
Today, in large part thanks to social media, people have unlimited access to chic, popular models and influencers with hair of all textures and styles. Even those with short hair have gotten into the curly spirit with the infamous Zoomer perms.
Back in the early '90s, though, it was a different story. The big, curly manes of the '80s had given way to sleek, straight locks showcased in Pantene commercials and on the cover of YM magazine via models like Cindy Crawford and Niki Taylor. Without the internet as we know it today, there was only one message, and that message was clear: There is one type of hair that's desirable, and it's not the curly kind. (This sentiment continued well into the aughts with cultural touchstones like The Princess Diaries , where the main character's curly hair is portrayed as a substantial physical flaw. Even though I was in my twenties at the time, I deeply internalized this message.)
The author with 3a-3b curls in high school Courtesy of Kat Merck
Thankfully, a variety of beauty types are now represented in the media. It's cool to love curls! But most people might not realize that not only do different curl patterns look different, they act different, too—and this means variances in everything from strength and structure to porosity, oil production, and even growth rate. Read on to find out what kind of hair you have and what that means in terms of how you should style it. Curl Construction
Coincidentally, while I was busy feeling ashamed of my curls in the mid-'90s, Oprah's personal hairstylist, Andre Walker, was inventing the Andre Walker Hair Typing System. Though originally created as a support for Walker's own line of hair products, the system is still in use on a general global scale today.
It's actually pretty simple: 1 means straight, 2 means wavy, 3 means curly, and 4 means coily, with the subcategories a-b denoting the degree of curl:
Many people have probably heard of these hair textures and are roughly familiar with how they look, but what they may not know is that they behave differently as well.
Ali Syed, a cosmetic chemist who founded four hair care companies (As I Am, Avlon, Uberliss, and KeraCare) and wrote a book on curly hair structure and properties, has spent his entire career researching curls and how to care for them. Classification of hair types - straight, wavy, curly, kinky. Scheme of different types of hair. Curly girl method. Vector illustration on white background. Elena Pimukova
Like, for instance, how to brush them. My mother has straight hair and didn't quite understand how to deal with my curls when I was a child, so she would deal with unruly hair the only way she knew how: by brushing it. As a result, I look like a poodle in nearly every one of my elementary school photos. According to Syed, brushing and combing curly hair is OK—but only when the hair is wet.
Unsurprisingly, pin-straight Type 1 hair is the easiest to comb or brush. However, Type 4 hair is not four times harder to comb, as one might expect, but 23 times more difficult, according to Syed. And that's only when it's wet. When it's dry? 'About 32 times more difficult to comb,' he says.
Curly hair and combs not mixing is not new information to curly-haired folks, but you might not know why this is so. The shaft of a strand of straight hair is uniformly tubular—'like a cylinder,' says Syed—which gives it a uniform structure and a lot of strength. 'Type 1 hair is almost two times stronger than the coily hair,' he says. The shaft of a strand of curly hair, however, is oval-shaped. The more oval-shaped the shaft, in fact, the curlier the hair ends up being.
Part of this strength—or lack of, in the case of curls—comes from the number of cuticle layers and where they're distributed. 'The straight hair has about six to 10 layers' throughout, Syed says, 'whereas the coily hair, where it is crimping, only has a couple of layers from the inside of the crimp and then outside six to 10. So it becomes very complicated in its physical structure.' Care and More
More fragile hair means it's more breakable. And breakage = frizz and flyaways.
'Type 3 curls (especially 3b and 3c) are highly sensitive to heat damage,' says Suzette Boozer, Dippity-Do curly hair expert and celebrity hairstylist who has worked with everyone from Gwen Stefani to Janelle Monae. 'It's essential to avoid hard pressing and always use a quality heat protectant. Without this care, the curls can become limp, frizzy, or even lose their pattern permanently.'
This is one of the reasons that using a heat protectant in your hair care routine is so critical—it provides a barrier between the tool and the hair shaft to keep it from weakening further or drying out. And speaking of drying out, if you have curly hair, you might want to consider trying a hydrating hair mask or a tool like Pattern's hair steamer, which can help high-porosity hair absorb humectants and other moisturizing ingredients more easily.
'Type 4 textures, particularly 4b and 4c hair, can be more difficult to work with if the hair isn't properly moisturized and detangled,' Boozer says. 'This curl type is prone to dryness, breakage, and shrinkage, and without the right prep, the hair can tangle or snap during styling. Moisture is key, along with gentle detangling methods and protective styling choices that preserve the integrity of the hair.'
Syed also notes the importance of using the right products—from leave-in conditioner and masks to mousse—for your type of hair. How well your hair absorbs product depends on its type as well. Type 1 has significantly less porosity than types of curly hair, but the porosity increases with the degree of curl, with Type 4 hair being the most porous.
Hair porosity 'has definite significance when it comes to weather-related styling issues, and also the product penetrations and how they make the hair behave in styling,' says Syed. 'Sometimes the hair can become very unruly if the hair is very porous, because then it's absorbing humidity.'
To minimize breakage and high-heat drying and to maximize defined curls, your best bet is using a diffuser or diffuser attachment on your existing hair dryer to dry your curls. Drying them gently while you scrunch will keep them intact and separated.
In addition to strength and low porosity, straight hair has another benefit: hair growth. According to Syed, Type 1 hair grows faster from the scalp—around 5.69 inches per year, versus 3.6 inches per year for Type 4.
'Similarly, the straight hair has less static electricity,' says Syed. 'Straight hair has significantly more shine and a lot more moisture. That's a huge issue for folks who have curly or wavy hair, especially with curly and coily hair. Similarly, scalp differences—the upper surface of the scalp is stronger in Type 1 consumers versus Type 4."
We get it, we get it—straight-haired people have it all. What if you want to pretend to be one of them for a while by ironing out your kinks? What kind of straightening iron you need will depend on your hair type as well.
If you have just lightly wavy hair and don't mind a little body, you probably don't even need a straightening iron and can make do with just a blow-dry brush or thermal brush, like our top pick above.
GHD tools have a max heat of 365 degrees Fahrenheit, so they don't work great on my Type 3a hair, but they work well for Type 2 hair without causing too much damage.
If you have Type 2b or 2c hair or even fine 3a curls, you'll likely do just fine with a lower-heat ceramic-plated straightening iron like the GHD Chronos, above. Ceramic irons heat up slowly and evenly with a lower temperature overall, which results in less damage, especially if you're trying a straightening iron for the first time. For Type 4 coils, you might want to consider a straightener with titanium plates, which heat up quickly and to a higher temperature, usually 450 degrees Fahrenheit or even more. This has more potential for damage, but it will also require fewer passes if you know what you're doing.
In all, hair—even hair in the same type category—is as individual as people themselves. Everyone will have their preferred way of trying to look their best regardless of the hair cards they've been dealt, so don't be afraid to experiment with different tools and products you might not otherwise have tried. As Boozer says, 'Learn it. Wear it. Love it.'
'Curly hair is truly the best of both worlds," she says. "Once you understand how to properly moisturize, avoid damage, and always use a heat protectant, your curls can remain healthy and versatile. It's a blessing many people wish for—and the beauty of it is, you don't need chemical treatments to enjoy both hairstyles. You just need to understand your hair and give it what it needs.'