The Best Mousse for Curly Hair

Hair mousse may be most well-known for its volumizing benefits, but it's also a star curl styler. Mousses for curly hair increase fullness by creating space between strands with their aerated foam formulas, enhance the shape of spirals with plumping ingredients like polymers, and can provide conditioning benefits via boosters like silicones and botanical oils. And experts agree that mousse is one of the best products for naturally curly hair, to enhance the bounce and shape of fine or thin curls, or to help hold curls in straight hair.

If you have fine or thin curls, live in an environment where your curls tend to go limp, or like the combination of a volume boost, shaping, and softening properties, curl mousses may be for you. Meanwhile, curl gels typically offer stronger definition and hold with less volume and conditioning and curl creams usually provide more hydration with less hold and fullness.

So how do you get perfect curls with a hair mousse? For best results, apply your curl mousse by spreading a dollop between your palms, then raking the product through your damp hair from roots to tips with your fingers, suggests Andrita Renee, a hairstylist in New York City. Lush, bouncy curls are right this way with the best mousses for curly hair of 2020 according to Good Housekeeping Institute Beauty Lab experts and shoppers, including curly girl-approved drugstore picks, non-crunchy formulas, curling mousses for fine hair, and more: