Male Hair Removal Methods

In spite of the rising sales of products to help prevent hair loss, there’s also a rising popularity of businesses offering hairfree services, more specifically hair removal for male customers. The hair most of these male customers are looking to eliminate isn’t on their heads though.

There are a few areas and several reasons why male hair removal has become more popular over the last years. Men occasionally spot hairs growing in places they would rather not.

Common examples include the outer part of the ears or between the eyes. Sign of the times: a uni-brow appearance is definitely considered a no-no.

A lot of man also dislike too much hair on their chest or back. That too is considered unattractive and for some, it’s simply in the way if they want to get a tattoo.

How popular are hair free services and hair removal in general?

You’ll be surprised. Recent studies show that up to 80 percent of all women undergo some type of treatment for hair removal. That’s 8 out of every 10 women.

Men? They’re catching up rapidly.

That same study showed that about 5 out of every 10 men had unwanted hair removed from their bodies.

The biggest difference between men and women however, is not in the numbers. It’s in how many admit to having it done and how.

Athletes, such as bodybuilders, cyclists and swimmers have no problem whatsoever with admitting to the fact that they have body hair removed. A lot of men however, still consider male hair removal to be a sign of being less masculine.

Basically there are 2 types of hair removal. One is temporary, the other permanent.

Temporary Hair Removal Options For Men

The following are the most common quick fixes for getting rid of body hair.

Shaving

This may come as a surprise: in spite of all innovations and new techniques, good old shaving is still one of the most common methods of hair removal for men. It is easy, comfortable and cheap if you know what you are doing.

All you need is a razor, shaving gel, water and a moisturizer, for after shaving to prevent razor burn. And the best part? You can do it yourself. Just make sure to follow the correct steps.

So, if you are looking for temporary male hair removal, shaving is of course the most common technique.

We all know the downside though. In fact, we face that downside every morning and that’s probably exactly what brought you to this website. The most common disadvantage of shaving, is that it is practically a daily routine. Some men find it relaxing, others think it is annoying.

Tweezing

Another cheap, but slightly more permanent method of getting rid of unwanted hair is with tweezers. Pretty effective to pull unwanted hair from your chest of back. Obviously if you’re very hairy than tweezing is not really an option as the time required would be unfeasible.

Also, it’s not very comfortable. In fact it is pretty painful. And although lots of men seem to think it is permanent, it is not. Eventually the hair will grow back.

Waxing

Waxing is a lot faster than pulling hair by hair using tweezers (and consequently more painful) but not a long term solution either.

Waxing is a proven, inexpensive, popular but painful method of getting rid of unwanted hairs around the armpits, back, shoulders, legs, and any other part of the male body. There are many hair removal wax products in the market today that are inexpensive and easy to use. Including hair removal wax for men.

Waxing can be done at home. You apply strips of heated wax on your skin and rip it off, pulling out the unwanted hair. Sounds painful? It is. Just look at these poor fellows.

You can do it yourself in the privacy of your home or go to a spa and have it done. If you don’t like pain, even a little bit, then probably best avoid the DIY option and go to a professional salon.

There are several spas and salons that perform waxing for men. There the treatment is usually performed by specially trained and certified professionals. The prices for the service of hair removal through waxing usually varies.

It definitely pays to do your homework. The internet is a good place to start. Go to Google and do a search on “male hair removal wax YOUR HOMETOWN” – don’t forget the quotes for the most accurate results.

Using a hair removal wax to get rid of unwanted hairs is not just a clever choice because it’s cost-effective. It is also fast. So if you don’t feel comfortable hanging around in spas or salons, waxing is something to consider.

I guess we all know how it works. After the hair removal wax is applied to the area of the skin, a strip of cloth is applied on and quickly pulled off. Yip, that hurts.

To prove your suffering was worth it, you can see all the unwanted hairs that were pulled off left clinging to the cloth. Your skin doesn’t just feel free of hairs, it also feels smoother and even softer. Plus, another benefit that you could get from using hair removal wax is that the re-growth of the unwanted hairs appears to be lighter in color and finer.

However, there is a considerable drawback. It hurts. In fact, it hurts like hell. It’s ‘fast pain’ though.The amount of pain pretty much depends on who’s performing the treatment. If that person isn’t perfectly trained to do the job, accidents may happen.

What kind of accidents? What about ripping your skin? It does happen. Other known and even common side effects are redness, inflammation, and some bumps. That won’t last though.

Waxing pulls the hair out of the roots and these empty roots or open pores could be a breeding ground for bacteria. A cool and effective trick is icing the area after a few minutes of treatment.

People with diabetes are more susceptible to infections as compared to other people. That’s why this method of male hair removal maybe isn’t the best choice for people with diabetes. Also, people who have acne and use tretinoin and isotretinoin should avoid waxing.

Waxing is effective and cost-efficient, however it hurts and is only a temporary result (lasting 3 to 8 weeks). In the long run, you might see permanent results in some areas, if the hair is ripped out often enough so the follicles stop growing more hair.

You can choose traditional wax for superb results or a sugar wax for good results. Sugar wax is easier to clean up. It simply dissolves when water is applied.

Sugar Hair Removal

Apparently hairless bodies are not a recent fad. People have been stripping hair from their bodies for thousands of years. The Persians came up with a way of removing unwanted hair with a method we now know as the sugar hair removal.

Another name for this method is “Persian waxing.” It’s a lot like waxing your hair. The basic difference is that sugaring uses natural ingredients instead of chemicals.

Sugar hair removal is also considered less painful compared to traditional waxing. This is due to the fact that the sugar sticks to the hair and not the skin. When you yank the sugared strip, it just pulls the hair not pieces of your skin.

The Persian name for the sugar mixture was “moum.” The ingredients are sugar, lemon, and water. You have to be careful with the amount of water used because you want to have the right consistency, It should be thick, about the consistency of a wax hair removal product.

Not only does sugar hair removal hurt less, it is about the cheapest method of removing unwanted body hair. The only cost is the sugar and lemon. You will need a spatula to spread it on your skin and cotton strips to pull off the hair.

As noted above, sugar hair removal is less painful and cheaper. The only downside is that it can be messy. However, sugar is water soluble so it is easy to clean up after. You can shower it off your body and use a damp cloth to tidy up your work area and tools.

You can buy the sugaring compound already made or make your own. If you are interested in making your own, here’s the recipe:

Mix together in a saucepan two cups of white sugar, one quarter cup of water, and one quarter cup of lemon juice.
Put the pan on a stove and heat it to two hundred forty degrees Fahrenheit. It will boil so keep the heat to medium.
When it reaches the right temperature, take it off the stove. Pour the mixture into a glass jar.
Microwave it for about ten to twenty seconds when you go to use it.

To use it, powder the skin before you apply it. It should be warm from the microwave. Spread it on but not too thick. Press a strip of cotton cloth over the sugared area and let the sugar cool a bit. Then pull in the opposition direction from the hair growth.

Threading

Sick of shaving or tweezing to get rid of unwanted hairs around your face?

In that case, the threading hair removal method is a solution you might want to give a try. This technique is a popular choice in India and lots of Arabic countries where it is know as “khite” or “fatlah”.

For us men, its use is limited, but I know of some men who’ve used this technique to get control over their eyebrows and to straighten untidy hairlines. I haven’t heard any success stories from men using it to get rid of hair on other body parts. Yet.

Threading hair removal is getting more and more popular in western countries. It’s an ancient method of removing unwanted facial hairs with the use of a thin, twisted, pure cotton thread.

The thread is rolled over the face area (like your forehead) for untidy hairlines, mustache, eyebrows, and upper lips where it plucks the unwanted hairs.

Due to the growing popularity of threading hair removal nowadays, it was just a matter of time before we saw spas and salons offer this new and therefore exciting service.

It works like this. The one who is doing the threading hair removal holds one end of the thread in his teeth and the other end in the left hand. The middle part of the cotton thread is looped through the middle and index fingers of the right hand.

Yes, it’s quite complicated to describe clearly in words, so here’s a video showing step by step what I’m trying to explain.

Now, the loop serves as a trap for the unwanted hairs and pulls them right out of your skin. Most people prefer threading because of the natural straight lines it produce after the pulling as compared to tweezing.

Benefits? Well, first of all, threading hair removal is way faster than tweezing. Besides, lots of people consider this technique less painful than tweezing, which, of course is a good thing.

Threading hair removal is considered less intimidating but it is much more time consuming when compared to the old and proven but not so costumer friendly rip-off wax strip.

Threading hair removal is also considered to be a pretty inexpensive way to shape your eyebrows. Another benefit that you can get from threading is that, it has the advantage of plucking which could make the results last for more than two weeks and sometimes up to eight weeks.

Downsides? Not many. Probably the fact that it’s harder to locate an experienced aesthetician who knows her threads and can perform the method.

There are some other minor side effects like itching, a bacterial infection affecting the hair follicles, or puffiness. Sometimes this technique causes a slight change in the color of skin pigment. But these side effects seem to be rare.

Hair Removal Creams

Finally, there is the easiest and painless option which is that of using hair removal creams like Revitol.

This is a very temporary solution and you must be really carefull not to apply it on certain parts of the body. I would suggest that you try the cream on a small patch of your boday first to see if it agrees with your skin type and that it does not cause irritation. Also, make sure to read the directions carefully before applying it. I once left it on for too long and it caused all sorts of skin irritation and burns.

So, the above options were all temporary solutions and in each case , the hairs will grow back after either a few hours or a few weeks, depending on the method you choose. Now let’s look at the more long-term options, but before we do that it’s best to understand how you can get permanent hair removal.

How can you get Hair Removed For Good

In order for a permanent male hair removal treatment to be effective, the follicle has to be in a growth stage. That’s why whatever the method of permanent hair removal, it will almost certainly require more than one treatment.

At any given time, about 10 percent of the hair follicles are resting and not growing hair and about another 5 percent are shedding their hair. To get rid of that part, additional treatments are needed when the other follicles return to a growth stage.

Removing only the hair leaves the follicle in place and it will quickly replace the hair with a new one. Removing the follicle can be painful and there is no promise that another hair follicle will not assume the duties and produce another hair.

The more permanent hair removal methods involve a higher tech approach. You cannot apply these techniques at home. It takes sophisticated machines and trained pros. That’s why you need to find yourself a clinic.

When researching clinics, make sure that their staff is qualified and have had the proper training. It is pretty confusing, but rules and regulations surrounding these procedures are different in every state. So do your homework. These guys are messing with your body!

Two such high-tech solution are laser hair removal and Electrolysis. These forms of male hair removal usually requires more money and more time. The result will be almost permanent hair loss though at the end of several treatments. Let’s see what these involve.

Permanent Hair Removal Options For Men

Laser Hair Removal

Laser hair removal for men is getting more and more popular and for a good reason. However, if you consider having body hair removed with the help of laser treatment, you probably want to know what results to expect, before you finally make up your mind.

And so you should. In addition, you probably want to know if it hurts (it does, I’ll get back to that later), what it is going to cost you and – most important of all – if it’s a safe technique.

To find the proper answer to these questions, a solid start would be understanding how hair can be removed with lasers.

Well, what it boils down to, is that laser hair removal burns the hair follicles right down to the roots. Sounds terrible, doesn’t it? Actually, it is. That’s why it’s so effective. It does more than just remove hair.

Laser hair removal starts with focusing lasers on the skin. It gets attracted to the pigment of the hair’s follicle. Because all energy from the laser gets focused your poor little follicles get heated, and thus burn right to the roots.

Pigment plays an important role in this technique. The color of your hair more or less decides the success of the treatment. If your hair is of a darker color, the results will be correspondingly better, while darker color skin makes the laser attracted to the skin instead of being focused on the hair and thus causes it to blister.

Improvements in laser technology are slowly taking care of this drawback, but still, the bigger the difference between the color of the skin and that of the hair, the better the results will be.

So what is the greatest advantage to using laser hair removal? That is probably that you are able to remove hair permanently from every part of your body, except for areas around your eyes.

Looking for more advantages? Well, most import is probably that there are no real side effects to contend with. Sure, you can expect some redness as well as some swelling. That won’t last though. Most men look fine in just a couple of days.

You will need more than one treatment for lasting result, in fact, depending on the area you will probably need between three and 8 sessions to get rid of most of it once and for all. If you’re wondering why; remember that hair grows in cycles, and therefore one session will effect the growing hair but not the dormant follicles..

Let’s face it. The results of laser hair removal are impressive to say the least.

However, make sure to consult an expert before you turn over your credit card. Ask the expert to explain to you the different laser hair removal treatments and make sure you know how many treatments it will take before you’ll see the results you are looking for.

Permanent laser hair removal sounds like a dream come true. Well, perhaps the laser part sounds a little scary. But think about the permanent aspect. No more shaving, tweezing, cream hair removal, waxing, or any of those pesky hair removals methods.

Laser Hair removal is sometimes also termed ‘epilation’, ‘phototricholysis’ and ‘photoepilation’. These are some terms you can use while googling your options.

Laser hair removal actually has spread out to mean any kind of mechanical permanent hair removal. Some are not laser-based. One example is the light-based epilator, Xenon Flash Lamp. This lamp produces an intense pulse light. It’s one of the more popular methods and is usually referred to as laser hair removal.

Electrolysis

There is also electrolysis which is a hair removal system that uses radio frequency to kill the individual hairs as well as damage the follicle to prevent re-growth.

The makers of these hair removal systems claim no pain and a 60 percent success rate after the first in-home treatment.

Sound waves are sent through the hair by a tweezers-like device for individual hairs and for larger patches of unwanted hair, a patch is used to kill the hair without pulling it out by the roots.

Electrolysis hair removal for men is an almost perfect system. It’s a permanent procedure that will take the unwanted hair away forever. Electrolysis has been used for many years, and there are very few risks involved when this is done by a qualified person.

Electrolysis hair removal usually requires a skilled and trained professional who has experience performing the procedure. There are some home kits available for electrolysis hair removal, but most people visit a trained person for this service.

Electrolysis requires that each hair is removed individually. It will require several treatments depending on the amount of hair you want to get rid of. The number of treatments will usually be determined as the results are noted. Each treatment will last from ten minutes to an hour depending on the area.

Electrolysis hair removal might appear painful because of the instrument involved, but in fact electrolysis hair removal is comfortable. The equipment is designed so the customers might feel a slight tingling sensation, but they will not feel any pain.

Electrolysis is extremely safe, so much so, that it is used on even the most sensitive parts of the body including the eyebrows and the upper lip. There are no harmful substances used with electrolysis.

Electrolysis is usually performed by skilled professionals. You should look for an expert. Someone with lots of experience.

Do some homework. Investigate the services of each establishment before committing any money for services. Use the internet but get off your butt and visit the experts you pre-selected. The place should be very (very!) clean, and the equipment should be the latest available.

Conclusion

Many hair removal products for men can be used at home. Most cannot completely eliminate hair growth immediately. They need to be used repeatedly as hair growth is continuous.

The good news? They are easy to obtain. Both online and offline.

If you want to stay in control of your budget, do some research online. You will find plenty of cheap products that will do the job.

News reports are quick to point out problems with particular hair removal systems, typically highlighting one person or one application that didn’t go as well as planned, while ignoring numerous other persons or procedures that worked as it was designed.

Armed with those reports, the manufacturers of hair removal systems tend to use them against their competition and to promote their own treatment options.

So, you will need to research all the various systems on the market to determine which one is right for you depending on your budget, pain threshold, and time availability.

In the meantime enjoy all our Male Hair Removal related articles where we guide you through the process to shave, trim, pluck any hairs on your body.

We also review and recommend some of the best hair removal products you can buy on the market.