Sedu Icon Privé Blow Dryer Review

We all know that a reliable, well-made hair dryer is one of the most important things we can have in our lives. One way we judge a good hair dryer is by its price tag. While this isn’t always the best way to judge, it’s generally the more practical way to judge. So when the Sedu Icon Prive hairdryer came out at $700, that was enough to make people stop right in their tracks. If its $700, it better turn your hair to gold, right?

The Sedu Icon Prive hairdryer is no longer widely available (not even through the manufacturer’s website) and we wondered if it’s because the technology is now considered obsolete or maybe the features just didn’t hold up to the price. It could just be that something better came out and replaced it. We decided to see if the Sedu Icon Prive hair dryer is worth all the hype that it once generated. Keep reading to find out why we ended up giving this hair dryer 3.8 stars out of five.

We Liked:

• It’s very lightweight.
• Comes with a six year warranty.
• It’s made very well; hand made with superb craftsmanship.
• Extremely powerful at 2300 watts.
• Reduces electricity usage about 70% (compared to average hair dryers).
• Motor life is boasted to be 10,000 hours (about 8 years) of use.

We Didn’t Like:

• Between temperature, speed, and ions, you have about eighteen different combinations to choose from.
• It’s outrageously expensive.
• It’s hard to find them for sale nowadays.
• It blows air at 93 mph which is an extreme speed that could be highly uncomfortable.

Features of the Sedu Icon Prive Blow Dryer

Technologically Advanced Motor

This motor is one of the most amazing hair dryer motors on the market. It’s lightweight and the performance is out of this world. Even though it’s 1875 watts, it still uses significantly less energy than the typical hair dryer. The motor is also slated to be durable enough to last through 10,000 hours of drying with no problems. This is a hair dryer that was obviously meant for professionals, so it’s perfect for salon owners whose stylists are constantly using hair dryers all day.

Air Speed

The faster and stronger the airspeed of a hair dryer, the faster it can dry your hair. The Icon Prive has been known to cut half-hour dry jobs down to just five minutes. This happens because the air blows at an unbelievable 93 mph force. Speed is definitely one of the most impressive qualities of this hair dryer.

Ion On/Off Switch

With the ability to turn the ion generator on and off, this makes it much more versatile. You can leave it on for smooth, sleek styles or turn it off for voluminous styles. Pair this with the high number of speed/temperature combinations and you get a multitude of finishes for your hair.

Is The Sedu Icon Prive Any Good?

We rated the Icon Prive a 3.8 out of five stars. We came up with this rating based on an average from ratings of individual criteria. We’ve listed the criteria along with short explanations below.

Ease of Use – 3
Although it’s lightweight the buttons are very confusing. They are labelled with weird “icons” and it’s not quite clear how you get 18 choices of temperature/speed/ion settings like the company claims.

Durability – 5
This hair dryer is built rock solid. On top of that it has a six year warranty.

Heat Output – 5
Everything on this dryer works at top performance including heat output.

Price – 1
Sure it’s a great hair dryer, but we don’t see anything that warrants a mortgage payment.

Options (settings) – 4
The hair dryer has lots of options, but it could be difficult to figure out how to use them all.

Power – 5
If we could give ten stars in this area, we would. This hair dryer provides high power at low energy usage.

Our Thoughts On The Sedu Icon Prive

Now that we’ve told you about the bells and whistles of the hair dryer, we’ll give you our honest opinion. We believe that, while the Icon Prive is one of the best hair dryers on the market, it was completely overpriced when it first came out. Unless this hair dryer was robotic and could dry and style all by itself, there is nothing that warrants that high of a price for a hair dryer–even if it was meant for professional use.

Price Changes

The Icon Prive started out with a $700 price tag. The manufacturer boasted seven years of research before releasing it to the public, so it seems like you’d pay $100 for every year of research. Since then the price dropped dramatically to a point where it’s affordable. Unfortunately, it’s hard to find the hair dryer now. You can’t even find it on the manufacturer’s website.

Air Speed

Air speeds of up to 93 mph? This seems like it’s too fast to be blowing against a person’s head. However, it does reduce drying time significantly. This may be too much power for someone with thin/fine hair. You’d probably blow your style right out of place which means you’d be wasting your money for a hair dryer with this much speed.

Our overall advice—yes it’s great to dry hair at the speed of light and save money on your electric bill while you do it, but save yourself some money and get something else that works just as well but cost significantly less. We have a few suggestions below.

How Does The Sedu Icon Prive Compare?

Sedu Icon Prive vs. BabylissPRO Nano Titanium

The BabylissPro Nano Titanium hair dryer is one of the best and most powerful hair dryers out there right now. What’s more important is that it’s super affordable. It has less watts and dries hair in more time than the Icon Prive, but the watts and options it has are actually very good–not overkill like the Icon Prive. Here are some of the most prominent differences in the hair dryers.

	Sedu Icon Prive	Babyliss Pro Nano
Watts	2300	2000
Cord Length	9 ft.	8 ft.
Heat/Speed Settings	3 Heat 3 Speed	3 Heat 2 Speed
Cool Shot	Yes	Yes
Weight	1.1 lbs.	1.8 lbs.
Warranty	6 years	4 year
Attachments	2 Concentrators	Concentrator

Sedu Icon Prive vs. Elchim 3900 Healthy Ionic

Here is another powerful hair dryer that can keep up with the Icon Prive without breaking the bank. The Elchim 3900 Healthy Ionic hairdryer produces even more power than the Icon Prive and hydrates the hair with ionic technology. It also comes in a number of different colors so you can really tailor it to your tastes. However, there is one stand-out feature of this hair dryer that makes it much better than the Icon Prive–the lifetime warranty.

That’s right! The Elchim 3900 series (all of them) come with lifetime warranties so this is a much safer and better investment than the Sedu Icon Prive. Here is a chart of their differences.

	Sedu Icon Prive	The Elchim 3900 Healthy Ionic
Watts	2300	2400
Cord Length	9 ft.	9 ft.
Heat/Speed Settings	3 Heat 3 Speed	3 Heat 2 Speed
Cool Shot	Yes	Yes
Weight	1.1 lbs.	1.2 lbs.
Warranty	6 years	Lifetime
Attachments	2 Concentrators	Concentrator

Sedu Icon Prive vs. Dyson Supersonic

The Dyson Supersonic is another expensive hair dryer, but it’s nowhere near the starting price of the Icon Prive. The big difference between the Icon Prive and the Supersonic is that the Supersonic actually earns its price.

Dyson literally created their own hair dryer technology from scratch. They combined a digital motor, a thermistor, and a microchip to created a unique hair dryer that uses a patented Air Multiplier Technology to produce a powerful jet stream of air. The hair dryer monitors the jet stream 20 times per second to make sure that it’s an ideal temperature for drying your hair.

While the Supersonic only has 1600 watts compared to the Icon Prive’s 2300 watts, the Supersonic doesn’t need the extra watts to give you top quality results. These two hair dryers couldn’t be more different. We’ve highlighted some of the differences below.

	Sedu Icon Prive	Dyson Supersonic
Watts	2300	1600
Cord Length	9 ft.	9 ft.
Heat/Speed Settings	3 Heat 3 Speed	4 Heat 3 Speed
Cool Shot	Yes	Yes
Weight	1.1 lbs.	1.85 lbs.
Warranty	6 years	2 years
Attachments	2 Concentrators	Concentrator

Conclusion

When the Sedu Icon Prive came out, people were excited. That excitement quickly died out with the realization that they were paying way too much for the hair dryer. It’s a good hair dryer–we aren’t arguing the quality and speed of which it dries hair–but it just doesn’t live up to its initial price.

Unfortunately, with the drop of the price, the hair dryer almost disappeared from the market, including the manufacturer’s website. With this happening, we don’t recommend that you invest in this hair dryer. Sure it has a great warranty, but it’s been almost rendered obsolete and there are plenty of relevant hair dryers like the Supersonic that can give you great salon-quality results at home.