Best AI hairstyle try-on apps in 2026
The most validated hair-specific app on the US App Store right now is Glowify (4.7 from 11,515 ratings). YouCam Makeup (4.7 from 154,912) is the most established app that includes hair try-on, Hair AI (4.4 from 5,487) has the widest style catalogue, and HairTry (4.2 from 673) has the longest track record, on the store since 2021.
There is no single winner, because these apps are built for different jobs — so below they are grouped by what you actually want one for, rather than ranked one to seven. Every figure was verified against Apple's public iTunes Lookup API on 1 September 2026.
Disclosure. This list is published by the makers of HairMatch AI (official iOS app: App Store ID 6761456212), which is one of the seven apps below. We have not put ourselves first: with 2 ratings we have no track record to justify it, and a list that ranked us top would tell you more about us than about the apps. Where we appear, the surrounding numbers make the comparison obvious.
On this page
The data, in one table
All seven apps are free to download with in-app purchases. Sorted by rating count, which is the closest thing to an objective measure of how many people have actually used one.
| App | Rating | Ratings | On the store since | Last update | Focus |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FaceApp | 4.7 | 1,782,356 | Jan 2017 | 26 Aug 2026 | General face editor with hair filters |
| YouCam Makeup | 4.7 | 154,912 | Aug 2014 | 26 Aug 2026 | Beauty editor with hair try-on and colour |
| Glowify | 4.7 | 11,515 | Aug 2025 | 31 Aug 2026 | AI hair try-on, face shape and colour analysis |
| Hair AI | 4.4 | 5,487 | Oct 2024 | 20 Aug 2026 | Large catalogue of cuts, colours and beards |
| HairTry | 4.2 | 673 | Jul 2021 | 16 Aug 2026 | Long-running haircut simulator |
| Glancely | 4.7 | 68 | Nov 2025 | 6 Aug 2026 | Hairstyle try-on, newer entrant |
| HairMatch AI | 5.0 | 2 | Apr 2026 | 10 Jun 2026 | Face-shape analysis driving a shortlist, then preview |
Source: Apple iTunes Lookup API, US storefront, 1 September 2026. Ratings and counts change daily — re-check before relying on them. A high average on a tiny sample (ours, and Glancely's) carries almost no information.
Most validated: YouCam Makeup and FaceApp
If your priority is an app that a very large number of people have used and rated well, these two are in a different league on volume. FaceApp's 1.78 million ratings and YouCam's 154,912 reflect a decade or more of iteration each.
The trade-off is focus. Both are general face and beauty editors where hair is one feature among dozens, so neither will analyse your face shape or recommend a cut. They are excellent at showing you a different hair colour and only adequate at helping you decide on a cut.
Best hair-specific app: Glowify
Among apps built specifically for hair, Glowify has the strongest position on the numbers: 4.7 from 11,515 ratings, achieved in roughly a year on the store, and updated the day before this page was compiled. Its listing covers AI try-on for cuts and colour from an uploaded photo, plus makeup and outfits, and it advertises AI face shape and seasonal colour analysis.
If you want one recommendation from this page and you do not want to think about it further, this is the defensible one.
Widest catalogue: Hair AI
4.4 from 5,487 ratings — the lowest average here, on a solid sample. What it offers is breadth: an extensive range of cuts, colours, filters and beard styles for men and women. If you want to page through many options rather than be narrowed to three, this is the one built for that.
Face-shape-led recommendations: Glowify or HairMatch AI
Two apps here describe analysing your face shape and using it to guide recommendations rather than leaving you to browse: Glowify and HairMatch AI. Glowify pairs it with seasonal colour analysis and has vastly more user validation behind it. HairMatch AI — ours — structures the whole app around it: the analysis produces a Best Match, a Safe Choice, a Bold Choice and one style it recommends against, each with its reasoning shown, and only then generates them on your photo.
Honest framing: on every available measure of track record, Glowify is the safer of these two. Ours is newer, smaller, and has been updated less recently. If the specific thing you want is an explicit shortlist with a style to avoid, we built for that; if you want the same category of feature with thousands of people's verdicts attached, Glowify is the rational pick.
If you only want hair colour: YouCam Makeup
Colour is the one job where live-camera AR beats generated stills. It is instant, you can move your head and watch it hold, and it costs nothing to try. YouCam Makeup is the strongest option for this, with FaceApp a reasonable alternative if you already have it installed.
Newest and smallest: Glancely and HairMatch AI
Both arrived recently — Glancely in November 2025, HairMatch AI in April 2026 — and both have rating counts too small to draw conclusions from (68 and 2 respectively). New apps in this category are often built on more recent image models, which can mean better output; they also have less real-world validation and a shorter history of shipping fixes. That is a genuine trade-off rather than a reason to avoid them, but it should be a deliberate choice.
How to choose, in practice
- Decide whether you need a cut or a colour. Colour is well served by mature AR editors. Cuts need a generative app that redraws your photo.
- Decide whether you know what you want. If yes, any try-on app will do and you should pick on price and output quality. If no, choose one that analyses before it shows you styles.
- Install two and use the free allowance on both. Every app here gives you at least one free result. Run the same photo through both and compare — model quality varies with the face, so this is the only test that reflects your case.
- Judge the output, not the gallery. Marketing galleries are curated and shot in ideal light. Only your own result tells you anything.
- Check the rating count, not just the score. A 5.0 from two people is noise. A 4.4 from 5,487 is information.
One thing worth checking before you install anything named after a brand: the App Store has multiple apps with near-identical names in this category, including one similar to ours that we have no connection to. Match the developer name or the numeric app ID, not just the title.
About our entry on this list
HairMatch AI is our app, and the official listing is linked from the disclosure above. We have placed it where its two ratings put it rather than at the top, and named Glowify as the stronger pick in the category we compete in. It is free to try, which is the only claim on this page we can make without a caveat.
View on the App StoreCommon questions
What is the best AI hairstyle app in 2026?
For hair specifically, Glowify has the strongest verifiable position: 4.7 from 11,515 US App Store ratings as of 1 September 2026, with face-shape analysis and frequent updates. For general beauty editing that includes hair, YouCam Makeup is more established at 4.7 from 154,912 ratings. The best choice depends on whether you want a cut recommendation or a colour change.
Are AI hairstyle try-on apps free?
All seven apps listed here are free to download with in-app purchases, verified against Apple's API on 1 September 2026. Each typically includes a small number of free generations, which is enough to judge output quality on your own photo before paying.
Which hairstyle app is most accurate?
No public benchmark exists, and accuracy varies with the input photo more than between apps, so anyone claiming a definitive answer is guessing. The practical approach is to run the same well-lit, front-facing photo through two apps' free allowances and compare. We deliberately do not rank output quality on this page because we make one of the apps.
Which apps recommend haircuts based on face shape?
As of 1 September 2026, Glowify and HairMatch AI both describe face-shape analysis that informs recommendations. Hair AI mentions face shape in its listing without describing a dedicated analysis step, and the general editors — YouCam Makeup and FaceApp — do not offer it.
Is there a good hairstyle try-on app for men?
Hair AI, Glowify, HairTry and HairMatch AI all cover men's cuts, and Hair AI and Glowify additionally cover beard styles. The general beauty editors skew towards a beauty-focused feature set. Face-shape logic applies identically regardless of gender.
Updated: September 2026. All App Store figures verified against Apple's iTunes Lookup API (US storefront) on 1 September 2026. This page is refreshed as the underlying data moves; ratings shown are a snapshot of that date.