Should You Shave With Hot Or Cold Water?

Should you shave with hot or cold water? If you wonder which water temperature brings a comfortable shave, congratulations on finding the right place!   

Needless to say, shaving is an unavoidable routine for having an appealing appearance regardless of how much you hate it. Aside from enhancing your charm, it also enables scrubbing out dead skin that brings you a fresh and energized feeling. 

When it comes to shaving without any extreme skin irritation, you have various selections of shaving products, including using water. However, the difference in aqua temperature can cause a cascade of skin issues in the saving experience. 

If you have no idea whether to shave with hot or cold water, I bet you don’t want to miss any single piece of information in this article. Continue reading this article for more specific details about this topic!          

Should You Shave With Hot Or Cold Water?

In general, there is no specific answer that comes right for all men’s hair types as most of their shaving routine decisions rely on personal preference and experience. 

To be more specific, we hardly realize the slight difference between these two different sides of aqua temperature. The following information will explicit the advantages and disadvantages of each side for more effective hair removal techniques. Read on!   

What Are The Benefits Of Shaving With Hot Water?

The hot water enables softening of hair follicles by opening and closing the cuticle. Due to that reason, you can bend your hair shaft for smoother razor glides.

Hot water also helps the hairs become erect, easier to shave. This will help you avoid the risks of irritating rash while shaving as well. 

Whenever you suffer inflammation, a hot-water shave will offer you a way to exaggerate the healing process. Furthermore, you can avoid the risks of ingrown facial hair by having the pores cleaned. 

What Situations When Shaving That Hot Water Should Not Be In Use?

If you have acne-prone sensitive skin, it would be best if you think twice before shaving with hot aqua. Despite cleaning the pores, hot aqua can cause dry skin due to removing natural oils and sebum. The lack of moisturization will trigger the sebaceous glands to produce more sebum. As a result, you might face up to the risk of a new acne breakout.

Shaving with hot water can cause the puffiness of your skin, which causes an irritating feeling. 

Is It Good To Shave With Cold Water?

So, how to shave without hot water?

If you have sensitive skin, cold water shaving will be your best option. When entering cold aqua, you will have the pores tightened and closed. Due to this reason, you can avoid suffering unwanted problems such as skin irritation, razor burns, and fewer ingrown hairs. 

While hot aqua maneuvers the blood to the surface skin, we can spot a reverse to that process in cold aqua. When the blood vessels constrict, the vital organs will be warmer due to the movement of blood circulation. 

Shaving with cold aqua enables a closer and better shave. Specifically, the cold aqua will stiffen your entire beard hair for an easy transverse cut across the surface.

Besides, you can avoid skin dehydration when it comes to cooler water. Compared to the blade razor’s lifespan when using hot aqua (5 times use), it will last longer with cold aqua (8 times use). 

What Are the Disadvantages Of Cold-Water Shaving?

In case you got a fever, you should not take cold-aqua shaving. For a better description, the constriction of blood vessels when entering cold water will slow the body temperature reducing process. 

Despite the easy transverse cut, the shaving experience might be less comfortable. Due to the stiffness of hair, it might cause a tugging sensation that unwittingly vulnerable your skin.

We believe that you might also not prefer to take cold-water shaving under freezing weather.    

How To Shave Safely With Hot And Cold Water?

To ensure the shaving’s safety, keep in mind that you need to prepare a suitable kind of razor blade.

If you want a closer shave, you can think of the double-bladed razor. In addition, the electric razor blade will come to your mind through its adaptability to both watered and dry skin. 

There should be no hair left on the blade for a cleaner shave. Technically, you can rinse it under a continuous faucet flow or wipe it lightly with a cloth. 

After that, you need to check the blade’s sharp quality through simple methods. The most popular approach is using your thumb for enough pressure around the blade’s edge to feel its sharpness. 

Due to the opening pores when using hot aqua, it would be best if you clean the surroundings to prevent bacteria infection. Moreover, it is recommended to exfoliate dead skin for unblocking the pores. 

Coming to the shaving technique, you should try as meticulously as possible to put enough pressure against your skin. A 45-degree angle between the razor and skin might be acceptable.  

About the use of aqua, you have to cover the shaved area with warm water to remove the hair from the follicle. After shaving, we suggest you apply cold aqua to remove losing hair and ensure no allowance for bacteria. 

Following that, let’s dab the extra aqua with a paper towel or a soft cloth. To keep your shaved areas healthy, you need to add more moisturization through lotion and aftershave. 

Frequently Asked Questions About Shaving With Warm Or Cool Water

Should You Shave Your Legs With Hot Or Cold Water?

Indeed, it is a hot aqua for shaving your legs perfectly. For more explanation, hot aqua softens the hair by opening the cuticle to bring comfortable trimming.

Meanwhile, cold aqua causes the stiffness of the hair shaft. You will then experience a difficult time shaving the entire leg without any hurt.

Coming to the detail process, you should immerse your legs before shaving because the steam evaporation will enable softening your hair for an easier razor cut. In addition, to avoid razor burn, we recommend you exfoliate the shaved areas with a body scrub. Do not forget to opt for a sharp blade to get a clean and smooth shave.

After having all preparations done, now is the time for the shaving part. Be mindful that you should shave against the hair growth direction, start from the ankle and continue slowly upward.

This hair removing technique enables you to have a closer shave without putting too much pressure. If you unintentionally go wrong for a second, you might leave your legs with nicks and cuts as a result.

During the shaving, you need to stop a few times to rinse the blade before completing the task. It is recommendable to use a warm water source to remove all the trimming cream and stubble on the razor.

Once removing all the hair, you need to check whether any lingering stumble is left or not. If you find any unshaven areas, patiently repeat the whole process from soaking, and shaving to rinsing. 

Is It Good To Shave With Hard Water?

When the water sample has a high proportion of calcium and magnesium, it is indeed hard water. Taking this as a pro tip, you should not use this kind of water for shaving. 

To be more specific, the reaction between hard water’s minerals and trimming soap leads to the lack of lather in the combination. This issue will result in an unexpected painful experience for you while causing a pulling sensation. 

Once the hard water‘s minerals creep into the shaving brush and blade, they will trigger a gradual erosion. If you have no trimming choice apart from hard aqua, you can choose to pour water softeners into the aqua tank and reservoir. 

By adding sodium chloride or potassium chloride, you can help remove certain minerals. On the other hand, another good idea is to use distilled water for safer shaving.    

Should You Clean Razor Blade With Hot Or Cold Water?

In fact, rinsing with hot water will cause thermal expansion of the blade. Due to this reason, the razor might be dull quickly after every five times of usage.

On the other hand, rinsing with cold aqua shows better effectiveness while enhancing the razor lifespan. This means that you should give a thumbs up to rinse the razor blade with cold water.  

If you have trouble with clogged hair debris on your blade, you should take a hot water rinse to remove these kinds of stuff. Specifically, you need to soak the razor blade in warm water to soften the blockage. Next, keep gently shaking the cartridge to remove all the hair left.  

Last but not least, you should never use an object when cleaning the blade. If you do it multiple times, the blade’s edge will suffer damage. In addition, when tapping the razor’s head, you might cause significant damage to the blades or cartridge which is apparently out of your expectation.

Therefore, you should not tap it to avoid any potential risk and damage to the safety of the shaving experience.

What Things Should You Avoid Before And After Shaving?

Some irritating skin problems might be the result of before-after improper shaving habits. By getting rid of these following bad habits, you can improve the quality of your shaving significantly.

Note down these things that you should avoid before and after shaving:

• Skip the shower: Before trimming, it would be better to immerse yourself in the bathtub to soften the hair. You can have a cleaner and closer shave as a result.
• Exfoliate again: You should only take one exfoliation before shaving. If exfoliating more than once, you can cause significant damage to the skin barrier. In addition, as trimming plays the role of an exfoliating technique, there is no need to provide more sloughing to the skin.   
• Use products that contain alcohol: After shaving, you should not apply lotions or any products that contain alcohol. Within an amount of alcohol, your skin will be on the verge of long-time burning. Moreover, it will cost you a long time to heal the wound.      
• Stay up all night: The best shaving time is right before going to bed. When coming to sleep, your skin will have time for healing better. 
• Forget to moisturize:  To avoid irritation, you need to provide enough moisturization for your skin with the aid of lotion. A small tip for you is that you should find a non-water moisturizer for a smoother and last-longer shave. 
• Forget to lube up: To have a closer shave, you might want to apply some sort of lubrication to the skin. Otherwise, you can use a hair conditioner or a shaving gain to smooth the razor glide.  

Conclusion

Overall, should you shave your face with hot or cold water? – The answer to this question depends on your choices. 

By weighing up carefully the pros and cons of each water source’s temperature, you might come up with the best option. 

Moreover, you should consider your health condition to avoid unwanted diseases when shaving. From the view of my personal preference, it might be okay to use hot water before shaving and cold water after shaving.   

If you are still in the ambiguous mind of shaving with warmer or cooler water, don’t hesitate to contact us for support.