Image credit: Josh Kirschner/Techlicious
I have two main memories of curling my hair. The first is going to the salon and Jennifer giving me Shirley Temple curls so bouncy, they'd make the titular star jealous. The second is of a teenage me rocking a huge bang in an attempt to hide the massive burn from mishandling my first curling iron.
Sadly, my locs prevent me from using curling irons. But I'd like to think if I had something like the Laifen Autocurl back in the day, I could have avoided the burn and the unfortunate bang.
The Laifen Autocurl Curling Iron is an automatic hair curler that can hopefully take some of the anxiety and haphazardness of curling your hair. The Autocurl retails for $99.99 and is currently on sale for $84.99. That's about 7x cheaper than the new Dyson Airwrap co-anda 2 ($749.99).
So how exactly does the Autocurl work its magic? Billing itself as the “world’s first truly autonomous curling iron”, you simply place the section of hair you want curled near the Autocurl's barrel, and its Direct Time-of-Flight (D-ToF) sensor jumps into action, detecting, wrapping, and curling the hair before releasing it. Laifei claims the Autocurl detects the hair in 0.5 seconds. Once the hair is in the process of wrapping, an adaptive servo is constantly monitoring the curling mechanism while the PID controller(Proportional-Integral-Derivative) allows the motor to adjust its speed when it encounters resistance in an effort to prevent tangles. In addition, the curling iron has direction selection capabilities so you don’t have to worry about your dominant hand's side having better curls than your weaker hand. In short, it's a great tool for beginners and pros.
And while the Autocurl isn't the world's first automatic curling iron, it is one of the few that has a closed enclosure with an open barrel. That open design could potentially make it easier to place the hair.
The Autocurl features two modes: Auto and Manual. When Manual mode is engaged, you feed a section of hair to the curling iron, press a button, and the section is gently pulled into the enclosure and curled. Laifen says the Autocurl is designed to create loose curls and waves. The company also claims the device can handle most hair types with length ranging between 9.8 and 23.6 inches. Personally, I'd like to see the hair texture claim put to the test, as most of the models in the company’s ads seemed to have straighter locks.
So let's talk specs. The Autocurl weighs 13.8 ounces and has a 1.25-inch barrel with ceramic PTC (Positive Temperature Coefficient). If you're unfamiliar, it's a self-regulating heating technology that uses advanced ceramic materials to generate safe, energy-efficient heat. There are three temperature settings: 320, 356, and 392ºF, and it takes about 50 seconds to heat up. Laifei claims 200 million negative ions, which the company says work to reduce static and frizz. The curling iron has a 60-second sleep mode with a 30-minute automatic shutoff.
While I'm always excited about a cool new beauty product, it's always with a grain of salt. Particularly because I haven't seen how the Autocurl works with African hair textures, particularly 4C type hair, which has the tightest curls and is prone to dryness, which could potentially lead to heat damage. But here's the rub: because of the texture, sometimes higher temps are required. It's a balancing act of product, hair health, and tools. So while I'm intrigued, I need to see several demonstrations on different hair textures before I recommend it as an inclusive product.
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