Top 6 Best Curling tongs of 2022

The Dyson Airwrap is actually much more than just a curling tong – it’s a hair styler. This means it's a heated tool that lets you do much more than create attractive curls.

But there’s no point ignoring the elephant in the room – we’d better talk about the price of the Airwrap straight away. It’s really expensive. This isn’t something you buy on the spur of the moment, but rather a tool you’re going to have to save up for.

The Dyson Airwrap uses hot air to attract the hair to the barrel of the tong. This is an unusual technique, and many influencers have made videos to show how to use it. But you should probably avoid these YouTube videos because a surprising number show the wrong technique. You should instead look at Dyson’s own instruction videos. Once you've learned how to use it, this is an incredibly simply tool.

Your curls come out nice and bouncy and it’s not an exaggeration to say you can get professional results in just over five minutes. The styler is available with a range of different accessories. If you buy the fully equipped version, you get a hair dryer, curling tong, hot air brush and a smoothing brush. The only thing it’s actually lacking is a straightener, but using the brush you can actually get as smooth a hairdo as you could possibly want.

In terms of design, it’s really good. There’s minimal risk of burning yourself. It’s easy to change between the different heat settings and to the cold shot that sets the curls. It’s also very easy to change between the different accessories. The fact that the hair doesn’t have to be completely dry before styling feels like a great time saver too.

If you're willing to spend a huge amount on a styling tool, the Dyson Airwrap is a fantastic product. It’s fast, the noise level isn’t bad and the cold shot feature helps you efficiently set your hairstyle (but you’ll still need to use a fixing product for it to last throughout the day). In fact, it’s a pure pleasure to use the Airwrap. Styling your hair feels like an enjoyable process rather than a tedious chore.

If the Dyson Airwrap hadn’t been so hideously expensive, this fantastic styling tool would have got full marks in terms of score.

This may not be a waver that would be your first choice for a gala look. But if you're going for something more playful, or wavy party hair, a waver is an easy-to-use tool that gives instant gratification.

The BaByliss Deep Waves is a tool that’s reminiscent of a 1980s crimping iron. The difference is that instead of lots of small grooves to crimp the hair, this tool has three large waves. You don’t need to read a complicated manual to use this tong – you simply plug it in, allow it to warm up and make a start.

Just like with a crimping iron, you clamp small sections of the hair at a time between the heated tourmaline-ceramic plates. It doesn’t take many seconds before the hair is wavy. The result is a bit like if you’d slept with your hair in plaits – relaxed curls that brighten up your everyday hairdo.

The cable is 2.5 m long and has a rotating attachment. A heated tool absolutely needs to have a rotating attachment if it’s going to be easy to use.

And just as with other heated tools, the durability of the curls depends on how you set them. It’s important to allow your curls to cool completely before you run your fingers or brush through your hair. You can also use the cold air setting on your hair dryer, but you should avoid the most powerful setting. A touch of fixing product will also help to keep your hair looking great.

For attractively playful hair, the BaByliss Deep Waves is a simple and easy-to-use tool. But you need to be careful not to burn yourself on the edges, which can come into contact with both the scalp and neck despite the heat protector.

The BaByliss Pro 180 Sublime touch is a classic curling tong that produces fantastic party curls. The clamp that holds the ends does a good job and the material on the heated surface offers the right amount of friction. This makes it easy to curl even really slippery hair. The top gives your fingers a good grip to wind up the hair.

The maximum temperature is 180 degrees, and we’d have preferred to see a digital display instead of a knob. The curling tong is available in four different diameters: 19-25-32-38 mm, so you can easily find a tong that will suit you. The cable is short, but overall this is a very good styling tong for a good price.

BaByliss Curl Styler Luxe combines the technique of curling with a straightener with cool air technology. The result is a styler that’s fun and easy to use.

We’re often told how easy it is to curl our hair with a straightener, but this technique requires practice and patience. With BaByliss Curl Styler Luxe, you get a little help. While a straightener usually requires you to press to bring the plates together, with this styler you press to open the plates. This may not sound like a huge difference, but when it comes to keeping the strands of hair in place between the quartz-ceramic plates, it’s actually extremely helpful. It’s simply easier to move this curling tong in the way you need to achieve perfectly soft, loose curls.

Inbuilt air flow sets your style

BaByliss Curl Styler Luxe has inbuilt cool air technology. Cool air always helps to set hair during styling. Normally you need to use a hairdryer for this, but with BaByliss Curl Styler Luxe it happens automatically when styling. This also means that this curling tong makes a whirring sound similar to what you hear in a plane (although lower, of course).

This is a fun curling tong that styles your hair into really lovely curls. Depending on how skilled you are at curling your hair, it may take a few tries to master this technique. But practice makes perfect, and this is a styler that you enjoy using as it gives you beautiful curls so quickly.

The curling tong offers three heat settings: 160°C, 180°C and 200°C. But the cool air stream is always in play to instantly cool down the curls. So how much longer does the cool air make your curls last? A little longer, but we’d still recommend using hairspray to make them last even longer.

The Cloud 9 Wand is an exclusive curling tong that comes in a luxurious box. The curls it produces are bouncy, beautiful and last. It’s easy to vary the size thanks to the conical shape.

Each product has an RFID marking allowing it to be identified as an authentic Cloud 9 item. The temperature can be controlled in three steps, from 126 to 187 degrees. When you’ve finished using it, you pop it down onto a protective kickstand, which is a clever safety detail only Cloud 9 seem to have thought of.

The tong is quite heavy so it becomes a bit of a strain to use it for a longer period. It includes a good glove so you don’t burn yourself. This is a good curling tong but the price is much too high.