Having facial hair, whether you’re a man or a woman, is a perfectly natural part of being human. Since earliest times, however, society has regarded smooth hair-free skin as a major factor in female beauty. Luckily, there are many options available to women to help them to remove unwanted facial hair. Right now, two of the most popular ways of dealing with this issue are waxing or the use of an epilator. But when it comes down to epilator vs waxing, which is the best solution? To answer that question we need to look at what each involves and what their individual pros and cons are.
Removing unwanted facial hair by waxing
As the name suggests, this method of getting rid of unwanted facial hair involves the use of wax. In fact, there are two different treatments; you can use either hot wax or of cold wax. Hot wax hair removal treatments involve heating up either solid or softened wax until it can be easily spread on the area of your face that needs the hair removing. Depending upon the version you use, wax might be heated either in a microwave oven or by using a dedicated ‘wax heater’.
Care is needed when using hot wax for removing hair
Clearly, whichever way the wax is heated you must be really careful to ensure that the wax is not so hot that it burns your skin when applied to your face. Once the heated wax has melted down enough it can be spread over the area to be treated, usually with a small spatula. The thin layer of wax is then left to cool down and go firm on your face. Once this has happened, an edge of the cool wax can be peeled from the face and then the rest ripped away in one quick movement. Pulling away the wax also pulls out all of the unwanted facial hair by the root, leaving the skin smooth and hair-free.
Using wax strips to get rid of facial hair
Cold wax facial hair removal treatments
The pros and cons of waxing
So what are the pros and cons of waxing when comparing epilator vs waxing? On the plus side, both hot and cold waxing give very good hair removal results, with each treatment lasting for up to four weeks before another application is needed. Cold waxing has the slight advantage since it doesn’t need any preparation and is quick and non-messy. Repeated waxing weakens the hair follicles, which means that over time regrown hair is finer and less dense.
The biggest downside to waxing is the pain factor. Remember, you’re pulling out a clump of hair by its roots in one go every time you wax; this can be eye-watering!
There are also repeat costs associated with waxing whether you use hot or cold treatments, although these are a good deal less than you’d be likely to pay for the same treatment in a beauty salon. Lastly, besides the possibility of burning your face if the wax is too hot, waxing may leave you with patches of red and tender skin on your face as well as increasing the chances of ingrowing hairs or skin infections.
Using an epilator to get rid of unwanted facial hair
An epilator is a hand-held device that, when moved over an area of unwanted hair, gets rid of it by plucking out each hair by its root. The action of an epilator is similar to that of using a pair of tweezers. The difference is that tweezers can only usually remove two or three hairs at a time, while an epilator can quickly and effectively deal with a much bigger patch of unwanted hair. Some models of epilator rely on electricity or batteries to power them. While these are good at hair removal, the need for a power supply means that they’re not as convenient or as portable as they could be. The good news is that you can also buy practical manual epilators such as the innovative and highly popular Epiwand, which is just as effective at removing unwanted facial hair as an electrical epilator.
The pros and cons of a manual epilator
So how does a product such as the Epiwand shape up in the battle of epilator vs waxing? In this case, the epilator seems to have far more advantages than disadvantages. For sheer convenience, the Epiwand wins hands down. Self-contained and needing no power supply, this epilator is so compact that you can easily carry it in a bag or pocket and use it quickly and discreetly whenever needed. Unlike waxing, once you’ve bought a manual epilator such as the Epiwand there is nothing else to pay, yet you can still get great results from it over and over again. Epiwand users also say that using a manual epilator is ‘uncomfortable’ rather than painful, but this is something that you notice less as you use it more.
The key question then, when comparing epilator vs waxing must be “how effective is an epilator at removing unwanted facial hair?” Well, because something like the Epiwand also removes hair by the root it is just as effective as waxing, meaning that skin will appear hair-free for four weeks or more before needing treatment again. Again, just like using wax, hair that has been removed using a manual epilator will regrow finer and sparser over time.
Epilator vs waxing for unwanted facial hair removal – the winner revealed
In our opinion, an epilator such as the Epiwand beats waxing for unwanted facial hair removal in terms of cost, convenience, portability and ease of use, yet is just as effective for eliminating hair. For these reasons there’s no question that the epilator wins any epilator vs waxing contest.
