Croc - Baby Croc Mini Flat Iron

Bought this mini at Trade Secrets for $25. Amazing! Hottest travel size I've found. Goes up to 430F. Comes with heat mat that wraps around it so you can travel right after you've done your hair. Dual voltage, perfect for down south. I have normal-fine hair that is about 18" long. It straightens my hair fairly quickly. I would say it takes about an extra 5 min to do my hair, compared to my full size flat iron, that I use daily. I would definitely recommend this iron for anyone looking for a travel iron.

I have a bob that hits about 1" below my ears, with bangs that hit just above my eyebrows, and my hair is on the thick side with a natural unruly wave. Ironing my hair with a 1" flat iron was just too difficult to grab all the short hair underneath, and especially difficult for my bangs (I burned my hand trying... ugh). I decided the 1/2" plate Baby Croc would be perfect -- it has really good reviews and it was only $26 from folica.com (I actually paid less than that because of a coupon code). It also came with a heat protectant mat with elastic on the inside to store your iron, and a plastic zipper case to keep it all together.

The Baby Croc has an on/off switch on the inside part, with no temperature controls -- according to the specs, it heats up to 430F. It doesn't let you know when it's done heating up, so I usually give it about two minutes, and that seems to be enough. I'd say it works so-so on my hair. It doesn't get my hair super straight/smooth/shiny, so I only use it on my bangs and the short layers underneath that are too hard to grab with wider plates. I do the top layers of my bob with my regular 1" so it's nice and shiny.

One major complaint though, is that the outside of the iron gets SO HOT really quickly. I only spend about 5 minutes or so ironing my hair, and by that time, the iron is almost too hot to even hold, if you hold it behind the plates (which is how I like to hold a flat iron so I can put some decent pressure on it) and not at the bottom. I don't know if mine is defective or what, but that is one detail I really hate about it. Luckily the iron is so small that you can hold it at the bottom and not lose tons of pressure, but I can't get over how quickly it gets super hot.

Between the lack of smoothness and shine it gives my hair, and the super hotness, I only rated the iron a 3. I put that "yes" I would buy it again because I really need 1/2" plates with this length of hair, but really it's more of a "maybe."