The best boar shaving brush offers a slightly different shaving experience to a badger brush – especially the higher grades of silvertip.
Best Boar Shaving Brush Top Picks
Omega 80266 Pure Boar Bristle Brush
This is less of a boar brush and more of an imitation badger brush for a great price. The 80266 model has been in production for 30 years and has the hairs tinted to look more like badger. The backbone is somewhere in the middle so it is neither too floppy nor as stiff as a lot of boar brushes. The classic design of the handle means this is a beautiful piece for experts and beginner wet shavers. All this from Omega, the renowned Italian brush maker.
Semogue 2000
Semogue are a Portugese classic and the Semogue 2000 represents an outstanding boar brush. It features Semogue’s trademark of a metal ring to further reinforce the tight grip on the bristles to minimize losses.
This is not one for the faint-hearted – but if you want a stiff boar brush then this is it. The 2000 offers a superior exfoliation as you shave and that same stiffness means you can work up a great lather quickly with even the hardest shaving soaps. Don’t worry if its a bit coarse out of the box as it’ll take some use to break in properly.
Boar vs Badger Brush
Boar brushes tend to be stiffer and offer more of a scrubbing action which is preferable to some some shavers. However, the big difference tends of be in price. Boar shaving brushes are still provided by some top manufacturers like Omega and Proraso but at a much lower price than badger counterparts.
Then there are the ethics. How is boar bristle harvested? We know that there are problems with the trapping and killing of badgers in China for shaving brushes. With boar there seems to be a lot less research.
There are some European hair brush manufacturers that claim to use cruelty-free boar bristle. There are also widespread claims that boars are cultivated for their hair and then sheered like sheep.
However, we’ve struggled to find verifiable claims that this is commonly the case. More than likely a lot of shaving brush makers will not know details of the origin of their boar bristle just as badger shaving brush knots are exported by themselves ready to be made into brushes.
