Glam slam
by Ian Knott | June 30, 2026 10:01 am
By Ian Knott
The days of owning a separate hair dryer, straightener, curling wand, diffuser and half a dozen brushes may finally be coming to an end. That’s certainly the pitch behind the Shark Glam Hot Tool Air Drying & Styling System, a machine that attempts to replace an entire drawer full of hair tools with one rather clever-looking device.
Whether it actually succeeds depends largely on what you expect from it.
The Glam isn’t simply another hot air styler trying to imitate what’s already on the market. Shark has gone a step further by combining high-speed airflow with ceramic styling tools, allowing it to dry, smooth, curl and straighten hair using the same base unit. It’s an ambitious idea, and judging by the growing number of independent reviews, it’s one that generally delivers.
Perhaps the biggest compliment paid to the Glam is that it genuinely works across a wide range of hair types. Reviews from users with straight, wavy, curly and coily hair are remarkably consistent. While everyone naturally gravitates towards different attachments, the overall feeling is that Shark has produced a genuinely versatile styling system rather than something that only shines in very specific situations.
The styling tools themselves deserve much of the credit.
The Glossi attachment produces the sort of smooth, glossy blow-dry you’d normally expect after spending considerably longer with a traditional hair dryer and round brush. Meanwhile, the Silki straightening attachment combines heated ceramic plates with a focused stream of air, allowing damp hair to be straightened without reaching the extreme temperatures associated with conventional straighteners. It’s an interesting approach that aims to reduce heat damage while also shortening the styling process.
The automatic curling barrels continue Shark’s use of the Coanda effect, where airflow wraps sections of hair around the barrel rather than requiring you to wind them manually. It’s technology we’ve seen elsewhere, but reviewers generally agree the system works well once you’ve spent a little time getting used to it. The learning curve appears relatively gentle, and most users report becoming comfortable with it after only a few styling sessions.
One of the Glam’s strongest selling points is that it works on both wet and dry hair. Rather than drying your hair first before reaching for another styling tool, the process becomes much more fluid. Dry, straighten, smooth or curl without constantly swapping appliances or waiting for one to cool down before picking up the next. That convenience is a recurring theme across almost every review.
Another area where Shark deserves credit is heat management. Sensors monitor temperatures many times each second, ensuring the tool never exceeds temperatures likely to cause heat damage during normal use. For anyone regularly styling their hair, that’s a reassuring feature rather than simply another marketing claim.
That doesn’t mean every reviewer was completely convinced.
The most common criticism centres on the ceramic styling attachments. While the combination of heated plates and airflow is innovative, several reviewers questioned why the two systems couldn’t be controlled independently. If you want to use the straightener, for example, you’re committed to having airflow as well. Likewise, the airflow can’t simply be switched off while using the ceramic plates. It isn’t necessarily a deal-breaker, but it does remove some flexibility that more experienced users may have appreciated.
The Glam is also a fairly substantial tool. That’s perhaps unavoidable when one machine is expected to replace several others, but it isn’t as lightweight or compact as a conventional hair dryer. Some reviewers also noted that while the controls become familiar with time, they’re not especially intuitive during the first few uses.
Still, those criticisms are outweighed by what the system gets right.
The general consensus is that styling times are noticeably reduced, frizz is well controlled, shine is improved and, perhaps most importantly, the results last. Several reviewers who already owned competing premium stylers admitted the Glam had started replacing them for day-to-day use, which is probably one of the strongest endorsements a new product can receive.
The Shark Glam won’t eliminate the need for every dedicated styling tool in every household. Professional stylists and those with very specific routines will almost certainly continue reaching for specialist equipment when the situation calls for it. For everyone else, however, this is an impressively capable all-rounder.
Rather than trying to be the absolute best hair dryer, the absolute best straightener or the absolute best curler, Shark has concentrated on producing one machine that’s very good at all of them. Judging by the growing pile of positive reviews, that’s a strategy that’s working remarkably well.
Source URL: https://metropol.co.nz/shark-glam/