Review: T3 Aire IQ

I’ve always had fluffy hair. It’s varied in texture throughout my life as I put it through the wringer of bleaching it, dyeing it neon colors, heat-styling it, re-nourishing it, and repeating the process all over again. It’s usually a combination of curl types 2A to 3A, and I very rarely heat-style it. But this year I started using diffusers on a regular basis, and I was excited to try the T3 Aire IQ blow dryer—and its diffuser attachment.

And I weirdly ended up liking the diffuser attachment the least.

The T3 Aire IQ looks fantastic on a bathroom counter. The little hair dryer comes in White or Satin Blush, and it includes a heavy magnetic stand where it can rest. It’s got a soft brushed casing that looks stylish without being too showy, and the stand has built-in storage for two of the three attachments—the Quick Dry and Style attachments. The diffuser doesn’t have a dedicated storage spot. You can store the diffuser on the stand, but then you’ll need to find a place to store the other two. This annoyed me a little. I do like the look of the overall package, though—displaying hair tools can be cumbersome and they sometimes become a bit of an eyesore. The T3 Aire IQ manages to take up a small amount of space in a stylish way (unlike some much bulkier dryers I’ve tested, which get chucked into a bathroom cabinet when not in use).

Nice to Heat You

When you first turn on the dryer, the little display lights up and says “Hello.” Choose your language (English or French). Choose your hair texture (fine, medium, or coarse), and then connect an attachment. The tool will automatically start on a predetermined heat and speed setting. And it’ll remember your hair type, so those adjustments will automatically change as you connect different attachments. (Note that the dryer does not work without an attachment connected.) You can also select the settings manually. You can set the dryer down or press the center button to pause airflow (the set-down feature lowers the airflow but doesn’t turn it off completely, and you can turn on or off the set-down pausing in the settings). You can choose among three speed settings and five heat settings, and turn the ions on or off. There’s a cold shot switch that you can flip on or off—no button-holding necessary. The dryer will even remind you when it’s time to clean the filter (by removing it from the dryer and wiping away dust).

The dryer weighs 2 pounds (about the weight of a hammer), and it didn’t feel too heavy while I was using it compared to other dryers I’ve tried. Thankfully, even if you’re not gifted in the biceps department, the technology means you won’t be holding it for too long, since your hair will dry so quickly. It’s also pretty quiet—I was able to use it in my en-suite bathroom while my partner slept, a feat I haven’t managed with other dryers.

The T3 Aire IQ capitalizes on a previous innovation. The brand is known for its SoftAire technology, which makes airflow more gentle and less likely to strip your hair’s natural moisture during the drying process. This new dryer has SoftAire as well as Heat ID built in, which automatically chooses a setting that protects your hair while also ensuring that it‘s dried efficiently. If you have coarse hair, you’ll need higher heat and airflow settings compared to someone with fine hair. The Heat ID technology essentially saves you time and eliminates guesswork by intelligently adjusting these settings for you based on the attachment you’re using. You attach whatever tool you want, and the dryer does the rest of the adjustments for you.

After straightening my hair (or at least my bangs) almost every day during my scene kid phase, adult me hasn’t heat-styled her hair much. It takes forever, and my hair doesn’t like to hold a style—it’s either naturally curly or it’s straight. Even professional hair stylists haven’t been able to iron-curl my hair—I’m used to salon styles falling out within an hour or so. Another problem is that my hair usually takes at least a few hours to air dry due to its low porosity. The T3 Aire IQ seems made for blowouts, so I tried one. I was actually mind-blown. It usually takes at least 45 minutes to blow-dry my hair, and the T3 Aire IQ got it done in less than 20. Not only was it dry, but it was dried straight. I would pass a flat iron over the fluffier bottom sections if I was wearing the style out somewhere, but that means my straightening routine would take half an hour—not more than an hour as it otherwise would. I have tried tons of hair gadgets in my life. None of them have been as efficient at drying my hair as the T3 Aire IQ. I marveled at how soft my hair was, and so did my partner. That might be in part due to the heat protectant I used, but either way, my hair wasn’t frizzy or flat. It was just voluminous and 90 percent of the way straightened.

And when I diffused my hair, the resulting texture was a dream. The diffuser is wide and well ventilated, and even on lower airflow settings, my hair dried efficiently without my scalp feeling too hot during the styling process. My hair wasn’t super frizzy or flat. It was gorgeous and voluminous, with set curls that didn’t fall down over the course of the day. It was shiny. It was soft. It was arguably everything I’d want after diffusing my natural curls.

Which makes my main annoyance so annoying.

Missed Connections

The sleek, modern magnets that hold the attachments to the main body just aren’t strong enough. Repeatedly while diffusing my hair, the weight of the diffuser (or my styling process) caused it to come off or become loose, prompting the hair dryer display to tell me to add an attachment. This happened while lifting sections of my hair toward my roots, as well as when I got a little rougher with the diffuser to break up the gel cast on my curls. It also made it difficult to direct air toward my roots the way I usually do. And the attachments get hot during use, so I’d have to pause the dryer and let things cool off before I could readjust. The styling attachments can’t lock in place, so while I was drying my hair straight, the angle of the Style attachment kept changing and I’d have to rotate it back to where I wanted it. I want to note that I’m no stranger to diffusing my hair, and every other diffuser attachment I’ve used has worked without needing adjustments during the process. I know what I’m doing! I promise!

Even when the dryer was resting on its stand, any time I’d accidentally bump the cord, the dryer would fall off. A hair dryer that costs $400 shouldn’t have this problem. The cheapest hair dryer I own doesn’t have this problem. And while the diffuser and styling attachments worked well, they also only worked for a few minutes at a time before I needed to pause and readjust them. I do have a lot of hair, and it’s long, but that shouldn’t make a difference when it comes to the product’s efficacy. And I’m not quite sure how to articulate this, but as someone with mixed-race hair, I’m all too used to curls feeling like an afterthought. Something about a diffuser attachment that can’t hold up to its intended users’ routines rubs me the wrong way—because if I had straight hair, or was styling mine straight, these flaws become less obvious. I can change my styling angle to make the concentrator nozzles work, even if it’s annoying. But I can’t diffuse my curls if the diffuser won’t stay on the dryer.

One other minor issue I noticed is that if you have auto-pause enabled for setting the dryer down, sometimes it automatically pauses when styling your hair. I couldn’t figure out what was triggering the dryer to think it was supposed to pause. I turned off the setting. But again! A “smart” feature that isn’t smart enough just becomes an inconvenience.

I would so very much love to reach for this hair dryer every day, because it’s so darn efficient at drying my hair. Maybe I could even learn how to give myself a big, bouncy blowout. But needing to constantly readjust the attachments whittles away at the time I save, which makes this recommendation one that comes with some reservations. If you’re the kind of person who blow-dries your hair every time you wash it, I do think this product offers excellent results. You just might have to adjust your routine and be prepared for a learning curve in order to style it while drying.