Technically speaking, a tool is a device for accomplishing a task, but sometimes it can be so much more than a means to an end. Take, for example, the most indulgent-feeling blush brush to ever grace your cheeks. Or a hand-painted hair clip designed to look like a ribbon. Or a waver that makes achieving beachy styles quick and easy, and saves your biceps for that Hyrox class. In these instances, a tool becomes a part of our routine that we love using every bit as much as we relish its results—and that’s saying a lot.
The 27 makeup brushes, hot tools, and hair accessories that have won this year’s Allure Best of Beauty Awards in our Tools category are the kind of hard workers that simplify, streamline, and optimize your routine. There’s an eye shadow brush with bristles that blend powders so expertly, we almost feel superfluous, and a hot round brush that warms just enough to make hair look as polished as a professional blowout, with less risk of crispy ends. And have you ever met a diffuser shaped like an hourglass? Well, let us introduce you. Its curvy, compact design dries curls quickly and painlessly (it’s every bit as fast as more cumbersome blow-dryer attachments, if not speedier).
With these over-performing beauty tools, our foundation, blush, curls, and waves have never had it so good.
Scroll to discover our 27 Allure Best of Beauty Tools winners.
Shop your favorite category or keep scrolling for the year’s very best hot tools, makeup brushes, and hair accessories.
Why It Won: Soft but sturdy, exacting but diffuse, Laura Mercier Real Flawless Foundation Brush is a study in contradictions, and our foundation looks all the more airbrushed for it. The synthetic bristles feel silky and are densely packed, buffing easily without gobbling up base or streaking. But what really sets this brush apart—and makes it unusually versatile—is the domed teardrop shape, which lets you access contours of the face that can be difficult to get into with other foundation brushes. Say you’re smack-dab in the middle of pollen season or want to cover dark undereye circles (in any season): After you’re done angling this brush around the nose and under the lashline, you’d never know you had allergies or the sleep habits of a college kid during finals.
Why It Won: This small, fluffy brush can work all the angles! Danessa Myricks Beauty Yummy Face 3.0 All Over Concealer Brush is a miniature feat of engineering, with a curved side, a sloped side, and a pointed tip where the two meet. It lets you be meticulous about placement and gives you control over how you stipple and diffuse your concealer, hugging corners, reaching under the lash line, and blending across delicate undereye skin without tugging.
Why It Won: The fine print says this brush’s synthetic bristles are made of triangular fibers—we’re not totally sure what that means, but we do know this: When we sweep Saie The All-Over Powder Brush over a compact or loose powder, this tapered tool picks up just the right amount of makeup, and then lays it down with a light hand, setting and mattifying to perfection.
Why It Won: This dual-ended brush lets you lay down contour powder or cream exactly where you want it, and its fluffy synthetic bristles ensure you get soft, realistic shadows. M.Ph Underpainting Dual-Ended Sculpting Brush was created by makeup artist Mary Phillips, who has defined some of Hollywood’s most famous cheekbones, including Kim Kardashian, Kendall Jenner, Jennifer Lopez, and Hailey Bieber—and you don’t get to that level of makeup artistry without being detail-oriented. In fact, the small, flat end of this brush is the best we’ve found for precision work around the nose and lips.
Best Bronzer Makeup Brush: Rēphr LC 02 Synthetic Petit Complexion Brush
Why It Won: Smaller than the usual bronzer brush, Rēphr LC 02 Synthetic Petit Complexion Brush paints on liquids and creams as seamlessly as if they were watercolors—no splotches, no streaks, just beautifully blended, sheered-out color. It’s great for careful placement of bronzer across the high points of the face, where the sun would naturally hit, or as contour.
Why It Won: If you’ll excuse us for a second, this brush feels so amazing, we’re going to put on blush right now just so we can use it…. That it also makes soft rosy glows and youthful peachy flushes a cinch is almost secondary to how incredible it feels—almost. Rose and Ben Beauty C41 Blush Brush’s uniquely angled bristles, which are more densely packed in the center than around the perimeter, do most of the blending, diffusing color around the edges so you never get obvious lines that scream, “Blush!” In keeping with the natural theme, it sweeps on fine layers of powder that you can build up gradually—a whisper-light flush, a wash of berry color, bolder coral cheeks, it’s up to you.
Why It Won: Makeup artists are masters of blending eye shadow “up and out” for the most smoldering, most polished looks. Ilia Blending Brush puts that technique within reach for us amateurs, too, making it easy to place powders and, in a few quick swipes, turn a bit of eye shadow into gorgeous, well-blended gradience. The brush’s light touch is also great for sweeping color through the crease (no harsh brown lines here!), dusting highlighter onto the tops of cheeks, and turning smoky, glittery, or colorful looks into full-blown works of art.
Why It Won: For more than two decades, this latex-free, hot pink, egg-shaped wonder has been so unbeatable, its icon status basically makes it the Cher of the beauty world. Once you try this small, squishy sponge—no bigger than an actual egg—you’ll 100% get it. Dampen the Beautyblender Original Makeup Sponge with water, press your base—be it foundation, tinted moisturizer, blush, bronzer, or highlighter—into skin, and watch as the two seem to become one. Its precise tip expertly reaches every last inch, so your foundation can look as good around the corners of your nose and mouth as anywhere else on the face. It’s a little pricier than standard sponges, but the one-of-a-kind foam dabs on makeup without soaking up even one precious iota of your favorite formulas.
Why It Won: Why reinvent the wheel? The OG Tweezerman Slant Tweezer is still the best at grabbing every hair, no matter how fine or stubby, that you’d like to yank out. It gets the job done swiftly, while still enabling you to shape and clean brows with the care and precision of a true artisan. Even when you’re in a rush, you can pluck out errant hairs as fast as you can spot them, because this tweezer’s grip never falters.
Why It Won: This beloved silver wand has done more lifting and curling than Dwayne Johnson—and its career is just as prolific. The brand’s famous lash curler was launched by legendary makeup artist Shu Uemura, and we’d bet that it’s been put to work behind the scenes for 99.99% of red carpet and runway appearances ever since. If you are willing to hold a tool centimeters from your eyeball (it’s not for the faint of heart), there’s just no beating Shu Uemura Iconic Eyelash Curler: It fits most eye shapes, doesn’t pinch, and presses down on lashes ever-so-gently for a natural, long-lasting curl, and nary a broken lash in sight.
Why It Won: We like blow-drying our hair, and we like going on vacation. FHI Heat AeroMax Style Dryer gets it. This flamingo pink ionic dryer folds in half so you can conveniently stash it in your suitcase or under your sink—genius! And the cool design doesn’t sacrifice on speed. This dryer is one powerful smoothing machine, which is great because we also like getting out of our hotel room quickly on vacation.
Why It Won: It’s shaped like an hourglass, the top half of which is actually an extra-large diffuser bowl for drying curls quickly. Where the hourglass curves inward, that’s where you hold it, making the Bellissima Italia Diffon Supreme Ionic XL Curly Hair Dryer easier to maneuver than bulkier dryers’ diffuser attachments (which have a way of popping off). It’s also super-convenient, taking up less space in a bathroom cabinet or suitcase. The customizable heat and airflow settings include an ultra-gentle option (for dry, color-treated, permed, and delicate type 4 curls), and the diffuser’s 12 prongs (plus over a hundred teeny holes that release the uniform airflow) create volumized, bouncy curls in a fraction of the usual time.
Best Blow-Dry Brush: Revlon One-Step Multi-Styler
Why It Won: Doing your hair is as easy as 1, 2, 3! The Revlon One-Step Multi-Styler comes with three attachments for styling as you dry. There’s a large round brush for building glossy volume, a smaller one for shaping waves and curls, and a paddle brush for smoothing and taming frizz.
Why It Won: You don’t need a hairstylist’s skills or an extra set of hands to get bouncy, smooth blowouts. All you need is Mane It’s Giving Body Jumbo Hot Round Brush (60MM), which is the most efficient way we’ve found to add body and shine to hair once it’s dry, or you can get loose waves just by wrapping sections of hair around the barrel and its gentle bristles. Unlike a blow-dryer, it doesn’t blast hot air, so it’s more comfortable to run it through face-framing sections or roots. Best of all, you don’t need to juggle a brush and blow-dryer to get the look of a round-brush blowout: Just run this through dry hair, and it delivers bouncy, less frizzy volume, with polished, curled ends.
Why It Won: Slippery but in a good way, the Bio Ionic 10X Styling Iron’s plates were designed to glide across hair as smoothly as Alysa Liu lands a triple axel, helping minimize friction and eliminate creases from flatironing. The rounded edges let you start closer to the roots, the adjustable temperature feature comes with a guide (in the instruction manual) to help you choose the right amount of heat for your particular hair, and the lightweight tool smooths frizz in just one or two passes over each section. So you get sleek, shiny hair with less effort, not to mention less heat exposure.
Best Curling Iron: GHD Chronos Curve Grand Iron
Why It Won: Proving that we most certainly don’t have to sacrifice speed for accuracy (in this area of our lives, at least), the GHD Chronos Curve Grand Iron heats up in a mere 25 seconds, and shapes and sets loose waves and voluminous curls in three to five seconds per section—wow! And just to throw one more number at you, the large 1.25-inch barrel is ideally sized for cascading curls.
Why It Won: With its triple-barrel design, the GHD Wave makes creating a loose, beachy texture as easy as opening and closing a pair of kitchen tongs. The three barrels are extra-wide and extra-curvy for undulating waves without any creases, and all it takes is a few quick presses of the iron down the length of your hair. With strands this tousled, you will never have to wrestle with a curling iron again.
Best Multitasker: Shark Beauty Shark Glam 5-in-1 Air Styler & Dryer
Why It Won: Blow-dry your hair on Wednesday, touch it up with a flatiron or hot round brush on Thursday, add some waves for the weekend—you can do it all with this one frizz-smoothing, ceramic, air-powered tool. Shark Beauty Shark Glam 5-in-1 Air Styler & Dryer comes with five easy-to-swap attachments: heated round brush, air straightener, auto-wrap curlers, plus two others, depending on your tool version (Straight & Wavy or Curly/Coily). You can mix things up and choose how you want to wear your hair each day.
Why It Won: If you are on a mission to cut down on the number of plastic items you buy, we’ve got an aesthetically pleasing option to show you with the Emi Jay Bamboo Paddle Brush. It is one of the prettiest brushes around, with three core designs: pink pearl that’s swirly, shiny, and a bit like an oyster shell; marbly, iridescent baby blue; and tortoiseshell, featuring a chic blend of amber and black. The brush is made of bamboo—including the bristles—and the handle and back are coated in cellulose acetate, a semi-synthetic material derived from plant cellulose, making this an excellent alternative to plastic for detangling and brushing. In case you were wondering, those bamboo bristles do get the job done, and gently.
Why It Won: Everything about the British M Hot Curling Ceramic Brush is easy! The nylon bristles glide smoothly through hair, and because this is not a hot brush, you can also use it to smooth damp hair as you blow-dry. Plus, it’s got just enough grip to keep hair twirled around the brush without slipping, and the ceramic barrel heats evenly all the way around to help speed up drying.
Why It Won: If it weren’t for the Tangle Teezer, sweater and scarf season would be a nightmare, with some of us spending half the morning chasing kids around with a brush, and some of us tempted to just snip a knot out of our own hair. We shudder to think what detangling would look like (and, my goodness, how long it would take!) without this beloved tool, whose bendy plastic bristles glide through knots to loosen them without any elbow grease or wincing. The Tangle Teezer The Ultimate Detangler Extra Gentle has similarly forgiving bristles but fewer of them, spaced farther apart on the edges, so there’s less pulling when getting out knots, even in fragile hair.
Why It Won: Sure, we could dry our hair without a bath towel—we could also cook food over a firepit and cut it with stone. Crown Affair The Hair Towel’s waffle-knit microfiber design is as soft as a cloud, absorbing water quickly and gently. And once our hair is wrapped inside, it really stays put, leaving us free to do our makeup, get dressed, you name it. (Twist the towel around your hair, and you can tuck its loose end into a built-in elastic band to keep it up.)
Why It Won: Too many bonnets stretch out and pill over time, or we wake up to find them just sitting on the pillow, leaving our hair static-y or knotted. Yanibest 6A Mulberry Silk Bonnet with Tie Band is the rare high-quality silk version that hardly slips off, has an adjustable band, and a supercomfortable, customizable fit. For example, you can make the bonnet bigger or smaller depending on whether you’re wearing your curls up, down, or braided. And the stretchy tie band minimizes tugging, going extra gentle on hairlines that are prone to breakage.
Best Accessories Set: Arachne L’uovo The Everywhere Essentials Egg
Why It Won: Like an Easter egg for grownups, Arachne L’uovo The Everywhere Essentials Egg is a clear plastic oval stuffed with no-snag hair ties, smaller rubber-like bands, mini claw clips, and bobby pins. It keeps hair accessories together and organized, so you don’t have to fish around in the bottom of your bag when you want to put your hair up. Each egg comes in a color theme of your choice, with multiple shades of brown, blonde, black, red, or gray.
Why It Won: If you ever thought a ponytail is just a ponytail is just a ponytail, L. Erickson Grab & Go Pony Tube will give you new appreciation for the classic. These woven hair ties are a simple upgrade with a raffia vibe. The sturdy elastic core can keep fine to thick hair up all day, and each set of 8 or 15 ties comes in a gradient of colors, including neutrals and fun shades. Black Metallic, for example, is a set of textured black, white, and silver woven together for a herringbone effect. Toffee features rich browns and bronzes. Corsica’s blues have an oceanic élan, and Think Pink is a sweet mix of rose and cream. Each elastic has a snag-free design (instead of a visible seam, there’s a smooth bead), and the woven texture helps cut down on creasing, all while looking super cute.
Why It Won: These hand-painted butterfly claw clips come in an array of artful, whimsical designs. You can pull your hair back using one that looks like a piece of sushi, a bottle cap, or a monarch butterfly. There’s a massive catalog of Solar Eclipse Claw Hair Clips to choose from, ranging from the adorable (teddy bear, puppy, horse, kitten) to the delicious (pizza box, hot dog, cherries, soda can), quirky (octopus, Tokyo taxi, cowboy boot, evil eye), to downright beautiful and sculpted, like a red bow in the hair.
Best Claw Clip: The Hair Edit Gilded Ellipse Flat Lay Claw Clip
Why It Won: We can’t decide what we love more, the way The Hair Edit Gilded Ellipse Flat Lay Claw Clip looks in our hair or all the things we can do when it’s in place. The golden oval shape only looks more chic than practical; because of the way it lays flat while keeping our hair up and out of our face, it lets us comfortably rest our head for hours while driving, reading, or lounging.
Written by Elizabeth Siegel
Discover more 2026 Best of Beauty winners:
Best of Beauty 2026: Breakthrough Winners
Best of Beauty 2026: Hair Winners
Best of Beauty 2026: Skin Winners
