It’s a simple truth: Where there’s a Dyson product, there’s a dupe, and that holds especially true for Dyson beauty products.
The brand entered the beauty sphere in 2016 when it released the now-legendary Supersonic, a hair dryer with an innovative design that maximized airflow and minimized hair damage. Eight years later, it remains the most highly-praised hair dryer on the market, making it clear that Dyson’s beauty tech bet was more than a success. While it’s an impressive product, it also retails for $429 — a price that you don’t need to pay for an exceptional at-home hair dry.
What makes the Dyson Supersonic special?
The Supersonic first made waves because, in typical Dyson fashion, it brought an upgraded, futuristic design to an everyday product.
Dyson is known for this aesthetic, but the sleek look also has a function. The ring-shaped head ditches the vented and coiled model of the traditional hair dryer and houses the tiny V9 motor in the handle. The combination of the V9 motor and the Air Multiplier technology makes for a dryer that clocks in at only 1.8 pounds, yet still delivers a powerful airflow that’s notably quieter than the roar of a traditional dryer. That extra strong airflow makes this dryer less reliant on heat than standard models. It also keeps hair damage to a minimum.
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To further minimize damage, the Supersonic also measures the air temp up to 20 times per second and uses a built-in ionizer to minimize static and give hair a sleek finish, which brings us to a quick ionizer science lesson.
Ionizers are pretty common in higher-end air dryers. Why? Most work by blowing negative ions at wet hair to reduce static electricity by sealing the hair cuticle and taking down the power of that positive ionic charge (aka what’s causing that annoying frizz). As negative ions make contact with hair, they’re also dispersing the positive ions of water, therefore cutting down on your drying time and reducing damage in the process.
Basically, it’s one of the reasons the Dyson Supersonic provides such quick and excellent results, and why hair dryers with ionizers will cost you more money — they do more than simply dry the hair.
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Magnetic attachments designed to easily snap onto the blow dryer round out the futuristic feel of the Supersonic, with five included — a styling concentrator, a flyaway attachment, a diffuser, a gentle air attachment, and a wide tooth comb. It’s a nice array of included nozzles even for high-end dryers, which might typically include three to four attachments at the most.
Why is the Dyson Supersonic so expensive?
At $429, the Supersonic is definitely an investment. However, you’re paying for a high-end motor that’s built to last, multiple heat settings to protect hair, an innovative design, and of course, the ionic tech. Other dryers from popular hot tool brands like T3, ghd, and Harry Josh boast some similar features and run you anywhere from $150 to $350, but none quite capture the complete offerings of the Supersonic.
When I tested the Supersonic myself, I found that it had a luxe feel that still makes it stand out from other hair dryers. Dyson also released an “affordable” version of the Supersonic, called the Supersonic Origin, in 2023 that retails for $399.99.
At only about $30 cheaper, the price-to-feature ratio is actually a much worse value than just going for the regular Supersonic, unless you can grab the Origin on sale. In early 2024, Dyson also released the Supersonic Nural, which retails for $70 more than the standard Supersonic but comes with even more premium features like a scalp protect mode, memory for preferred settings with your attachments, upgraded attachments, and pause detection.
As of October 2024, these are all the available Supersonic models:
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Dyson Supersonic ($429.99): The standard Dyson hair dryer most people think of when they think Supersonic — it comes with five attachments and was the originator of the dryer’s iconic design.
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Dyson Supersonic Origin ($399.99): The “budget-friendly” Supersonic that comes with just one attachment, the styling concentrator, but only costs $30 less, meaning it’s a much worse value at its full price.
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Dyson Supersonic Nural ($499.99): Dyson’s premium Supersonic is for folks who want those nice extras like automatic temperature changing for scalp health and pause detection, but are still at-home users that don’t need a professional grade dryer.
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Dyson Supersonic Professional hair dryer ($569.99): As the name suggests, this is the dryer for professional stylists, with a design that makes it easy to blow dry someone else’s hair and a longer cord for maneuvering — and it’s generally a machine that can withstand much more use than the standard Supersonic.
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At the same time, there are dupes that deliver similar features and elements of the performance at a much lower price.
What is the best dupe for the Dyson Supersonic?
There are a lot of options for luxury blow dryers and a lot of dupes that attempt to look like the Dyson but skimp on quality. A good rule of thumb is to try to avoid going for the $40 Amazon knockoff that copies Dyson’s signature fuchsia and nickel design from 2016, because I promise you, they won’t perform the same.
Instead, I tested a bunch of hair dryers, some that look similar to the Supersonic, and some that look nothing like it, to find the best hair dryers that replicate the Supersonic experience: That is to say, they give a hair dry that feels quick, easy, and at least a little luxurious.
Below, you’ll find a deep dive on each of my final picks for the five best Dyson Supersonic dupes and info on where to buy them.
How we tested
I started the Supersonic dupe search by wading through a sea of copycat listings with fake-sounding brand names and looking at hair dryers from established brands to select a pool of front runners. Then, I set out to test these Dyson Supersonic dupes.
The newest additions to this list of recommendations are the Dreame Gleam hair dryer, the Dreame Pocket, and the Shark SpeedStyle Pro Flex, which I added in October 2024. In the same month, I removed the Shark HyperAIR from my recommendations — though it’s still in stock at Amazon and Best Buy, it’s no longer a part of Shark’s beauty tool lineup. I also replaced the BaBylissPRO with the Dreame Gleam as the best pick under $100 — though the BaByliss is still a solid hair dryer, it felt more like a standard blow dryer than a Supersonic dupe. Plus, it’s less widely available these days.
In determining the best dupes, here’s what I considered:
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Design: Did the dupe look like the Supersonic, and if so, did that design make the dryer easily maneuverable and maximize airflow like the original? If the look seemed to be a copy merely for the sake of flattery (or rather, capitalizing on a dupe-hungry consumer base) or seemed to outright sacrifice functionality, I passed.
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Reviews: To see if a product lives up to the hype, it first has to have plenty of hype. So before testing a dryer for myself, I looked at customer reviews. I wanted to see which Supersonic alternatives were attracting shoppers, and how many legit reviews those products were earning.
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Damage minimizing: Dyson claims that the Supersonic gives you a better dry with less damage. It’s no secret that if you blast your hair with super high temperatures, it’s going to dry faster, but that heat is terrible for your hair’s health. That’s why I kept my eye out for claims of damage-minimizing techniques — like automatic temperature regulating, customizable temperature controls, and ionic technology — to make my selections. In testing, I paid attention to how my hair felt right after drying, and in the days that followed. I used the same heat protectant before each testing session.
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Other stand-out features: I looked for hair dryers with features such as automatic temperature regulation, extra-helpful styling attachments, built-in ionizers, and infrared light. I then evaluated those features in my review.
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Potential product life: There’s not really a point in spending less on a dupe if you’re going to have to replace it way more often. I chose the product pool based on the idea that you would spend less on an alternative to the Supersonic and actually save money in the long run.
As mentioned earlier, I owned the BaBylissPRO prior to the testing period, so I used it a few more times to refresh my memory and affirm my overall impressions of the dryer. As for the Laifen hair dryer, I used it regularly over the course of a month, allowing me to get a strong sense of what daily use felt like. I paid extra attention to how comfortable it was to use, if I personally wanted to reach for it day to day, if it seemed to make good on its claims, and how my hair health felt over the course of the month. When adding the Zuvi dryer, I made sure to hands-on test it over a period of two weeks. For the Dreame and Shark dryers, I made sure to use each attachment available over the course of a couple of weeks, and dried my hair from a slightly towel-dried state.
For a quick sense of what my hair is like: I have long, wavy hair that sits somewhere between a 2A and 2B pattern. I typically prefer to air dry as my hair is prone to dryness at the ends that can be exacerbated with regular heat styling. Though it’s wavy, it typically straightens easily and can hold a straight style for one to two days.