Women crave diversity and variety in their hairstyles. Women with naturally curly, kinky, or frizzy hair need heat to achieve straighter hairstyles. A flat iron is instrumental in straightening curly hair.

To understand which flat irons work best, you must know how flat irons work. Think back to 8th grade and remember what your science teacher told you about positive and negative ions. You probably did the experiment with magnets and metal shavings. Holding the magnet over the metal shavings caused the shavings to cling to the magnet but pointing two north ends of 2 separate magnets repelled each other. The lesson learned was that opposite magnetic fields attract each other but like ions repel. Curly, frizzy, dry and damaged hair has a positive ionic charge. To make hair look its best, the positive ions must be neutralized.
The ceramic plates on a flat iron produce a negative charge that neutralizes the ions on the hair leaving it silky and smooth.

Other flat irons made of metal and plastic do not produce a negative ionic charge and only contribute to the hair’s positive ionic charge. This leaves hair follicles open, drying out hair and leaving it brittle. In nature, these ionic atoms strive for neutrality; thus neutrality provides stability, health, and wholeness.
Metal and plastic flat irons penetrate the hair from the outside and heats hair unevenly. This causes hair to lose moisture and creates damage to hair. Whereas ceramic flat irons heat hair from the inside out and dries hair evenly. Therefore, ceramic irons are excellent on damp hair but metal and plastic irons tend to singe damp hair leaving it stiff, dry, and dull.

Ceramic flat irons cause less damage to hair than metal or plastic flat irons. Ceramic plates also don’t tug or catch on the hair so the hair is less likely to burn. Ceramic plates make hair shiny by smoothing hair cuticle.

Ceramic flat irons use infrared heat to straighten hair. The infrared heat is generated by transforming direct light into heat. One benefit of infrared heat is that it can heat and object from within without heating the area around it. Infrared heat is able to penetrate the hair cells with enough heat to straighten it from the inside without burning the hair. Some East Asian communities believe that infrared heat actually has restorative properties.

While plastic and metal flat iron can usually be purchased cheaply, the benefits of ceramic flat iron outweigh flat irons made of other materials. At any price point, a flat iron with ceramic plates is healthier for your hair.