The Top Facial Hair Styles for Men: Beards, Goatees, & Moustaches

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Professional barbers weigh in on unique, interesting options

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IN THIS ARTICLE

1 Goatee

2 Moustache

3 Stubble

4 The Van Dyke

5 Balbo Beard

6 Anchor Beard

7 Circle Beard

8 Mutton Chops

9 Gunslinger

10 Chin Strap

11 Chin Strip

12 The Imperial

13 The Garibaldi

14 The Verdi

15 Box Beard

16 The Ducktail

17 The Corporate Beard

18 The Hollywoodian

19 The Winnfield

20 Rap Industry Standard

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Co-authored by Jacob Joseph and Eric McClure

Last Updated: February 18, 2026 Fact Checked

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Facial hair has never been more “in” than it is right now, so if you’re thinking about growing out your facial hair (or adjusting what you’ve already got), your timing couldn’t be better. There are so many distinct and interesting options out there! To help break all of your options down, we met with several master barbers and men’s grooming experts to get the inside scoop on what kind of fun ideas you can explore.

Best Facial Hair Styles for Men

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Facial hair styles for men come in three different genres: full beards, partial beards (like goatees), and moustaches. Some of the most popular options include the anchor beard, Van Dyke, Balbo beard, and circle beard.

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1

Goatee

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1. 
   A goatee is simply a small beard that only surrounds your lips and chin. The classic goatee is much more versatile than people realize, explains professional barber Jacob Joseph. For instance, he says you can do a normal goatee where everything is connected, and go pretty thin with it if you like. Or, you can do a disconnected goatee and round it on the chin area or keep it squared. Joseph also explains this is a great option if you’re bald, since it balances out the lack of hair on top of your head.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Oval or round.
   • Level of maintenance required: Minimal. You just have to shape it periodically, but that’s not especially difficult.
   • Variations:
     • Petite goatee
     • Disconnected goatee
     • Soul patch with ‘stach

   Meet the wikiHow Experts

   Jacob Joseph is a professional barber who specializes in helping men solve issues with their beard.

   Igor Sadurskii is a men’s grooming expert with expertise in classic and modern styles for men.

   Craig Whitely is a master barber with over 15 years of experience working in men’s grooming and styling.
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2

Moustache

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1. 
   If you’ve got hair above the lip and below the nose, you’ve got a moustache. Men’s grooming expert Igor Sadurskii says, “The moustache is one of the best ways to elevate your style.” He explains that you just have to find the right shape and length. If you choose a long style, that requires a bit of care with some balm or wax, he adds.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Triangle or diamond. For rounder faces, thicker, fuller moustaches tend to look best.
   • Level of maintenance required: Minimal. Regular trims and the occasional combing are all you normally need unless you’re getting really abstract with it.
   • Variations:
     • Chevron
     • Horseshoe
     • Pencil ‘stash
     • English moustache
     • Cowboy moustache
     • The Wild West
     • The Dali
     • Fu Manchu

3

Stubble

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1. 
   Also known as 5 o’clock shadow, stubble is just a full beard that has been trimmed so thin that it has the texture of soft sandpaper. The hair has to kind of hug your face. That said, you can totally grow out parts of your face to be a little longer than others to create more depth or emphasize one part of the beard over another.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Any, but it helps if you have some defined features. Stubble tends to look more distinguished on sharper features.
   • Level of maintenance required: Surprisingly high. There’s a thin line between “that’s a rugged dude” and “that guy forgot to shave.” You’ll have to find your ideal length, then shave at regular intervals to maintain that length and your beard’s shape.
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4

The Van Dyke

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1. 
   The Van Dyke beard is a popular type of goatee with a detached moustache. Master barber Craig Whitely says it’s defined by “a disconnection between the moustache and the beard and nothing…on the sides.” It’s a very striking, mature look that is making a lot of waves these days as a great option for more refined styles.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Triangle or diamond.
   • Level of maintenance required: Moderate. You do have to pay attention to the symmetry a bit more when you’re trimming, and you’ll likely need to trim more often than you would with a full goatee.

5

Balbo Beard

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1. 
   The Balbo beard is defined by a moustache that isn’t connected to a chinstrap-style beard with moderate coverage. It’s a kind of gentlemanly look that feels like it would be right at home on the face of a pirate or powerful politician. It’s both modern and classic, making it a fun option if you want to mix things up without getting too crazy.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Square, triangle, or diamond.
   • Level of maintenance required: Light. This isn’t a tough beard to take care of.
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6

Anchor Beard

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1. 
   Also known as the royale beard, the anchor beard is named after its shape, which resembles an old school anchor. You have a moustache with a strip under the lips that feeds into a round chinstrap. The chinstrap ends around the middle of the cheek and doesn’t extend up to the sideburns. It’s a tight, clean look with a little bit of flair to it (just like Robert Downey Jr., who popularly rocks one of these).

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Round, square, oval, heart, and diamond faces all look great with an anchor.
   • Level of maintenance required: Moderate. The shape of the chinstrap can be a bit of work to maintain symmetry when you trim, but nothing crazy.

7

Circle Beard

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1. 
   A circle beard is similar to an anchor beard, except the moustache and chinstrap are connected. Basically, you can draw a circle around the lips and chin and then fill it in, ergo, a circle beard.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Any. A circle beard can help accentuate the natural contours of a round or oval face, or help provide contrast for a square or triangle face.
   • Level of maintenance required: Very little. An occasional trim and you’re golden.
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8

Mutton Chops

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1. 
   Named after the cut of meat, mutton chops refer to a sideburn-beard combination where your sideburns grow all the way down to the corners of the mouth, usually leaving the area directly under the chin clean-shaven. There are two popular variations: one where you grow a moustache that connects to the sideburns, and one where you don’t. Both are very old-timey and vintage looks.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Oval and round. The longer your face, the more natural mutton chops will appear.
   • Level of maintenance required: High. Trimming can be a bit of a pain since you can’t look directly at the sideburn in the mirror, and it can be a lot of work to grow out those hairs and condition them so that they look good.

9

Gunslinger

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1. 
   This Western-style beard is really making a comeback (Jim Hopper from Stranger Things rocked one for a few episodes). The gunslinger requires a thick moustache that ends at each corner in long bands of hair that lead down to the chin. It’s an extremely distinct and expressive look.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Square and rectangular faces tend to do very well with the gunslinger.
   • Level of maintenance required: Moderate. Keeping the gunslinger crisp and clean requires a lot of regular trimming. It’s low-maintenance if you want to go for the rugged 5 o’clock shadow version of the beard, though.
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10

Chin Strap

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1. 
   The chin strap is kind of what it sounds like, a long bead of hair that wraps around the entirety of the chin. Chin strap beards normally connect to the sideburns and form one continuous loop, but they don’t have to. You can keep a small gap between the beard and the sideburns if you’d like.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Any, though it helps if you have a defined jawline.
   • Level of maintenance required: Relatively high. It’s a pretty distinct beard that requires regular trims to look “normal.”
   • Variations:
     • The Klingon
     • The Amish beard (or “Shenandoah”)

11

Chin Strip

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1. 
   Chin strips are pretty straightforward—they’re just thin strips of hair that run from the bottom lip to the bottom of the chin. They’re considered less trendy now, but they were all the rage in the early 1990s.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Square, oval, and diamond.
   • Level of maintenance required: Almost none.
   • Variations:
     • Soul patch
     • Jazz dot
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12

The Imperial

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1. 
   Also known as “friendly mutton chops,” the imperial beard requires a moustache, mutton chops, and thick cheek hair. Basically, picture a full beard without anything on the chin or the area under the bottom lip. It’s a very unique look that can be very expressive without looking as “old-timey” as standard mutton chops on the right face.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Oval, square, or heart-shaped faces.
   • Level of maintenance required: High. Grooming your facial hair will be a regular task, and you’ll want to bring a comb with you everywhere you go.

13

The Garibaldi

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1. 
   At first, it may look like a normal mountain man beard, but the Garibaldi has a few distinct features. It’s a full beard that’s trimmed so the hair ends in a flat shelf, 6–8 inches (15–20 cm) below the base of the chin. It also requires thinner sides and a thick moustache, which most guys opt to curl out a bit.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Any, although square and round heads tend to pull this one off the most. It’s a great option if you want to give your head some shape or cover a double chin.
   • Level of maintenance required: Relatively low once you’ve grown it out. The trimming is surprisingly easy since the shape of the beard is pretty simple, but you do have to brush regularly.
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14

The Verdi

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1. 
   Named after the composer Giuseppe Verdi, who pioneered the look, the Verdi requires a full beard that wraps around the chin and connects to the sideburns, trimmed very short. You also need a shortly-trimmed moustache that doesn’t connect to the beard, and the moustache is traditionally twirled at the edges. It’s a super dramatic, artsy look that will have people wondering whether you’re a secret agent or foreign art dealer.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Due to the big chin beard, round, oval, and square jaws tend to work best.
   • Level of maintenance required: High. You do need to keep the lengths in check here for the look to work, and the curled moustache typically requires wax.

15

Box Beard

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1. 
   The box (or “boxed”) beard looks a lot like what a lot of people probably imagine when someone says “beard.” It’s a full beard with cheek hair, connecting sideburns, and a goatee that feeds into the cheeks and chin. The “box” part comes from how the upper portion of the cheek is trimmed bare, creating a neat corner where the sideburn feeds into the chin. It looks kind of like there’s a box of hair missing on each cheek.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Any. This is a versatile beard.
   • Level of maintenance required: Moderate-low. The only hard part here is making sure you trim the cheek hair at the right angles, but that’s not especially complicated.
   • Variations:
     • Short boxed beard
     • Long boxed beard
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16

The Ducktail

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1. 
   The ducktail beard is defined by the shape of the hair below the chin, which resembles the tail of a duck. The rest of the beard’s styling is sort of flexible, but most ducktail enjoyers opt for a thicker box beard look.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Square, diamond, and triangle.
   • Level of maintenance required: Pretty high. The beard is really defined by the sharpness of the point under the chin, so regular sculpting and shaping are key.
   • Variations:
     • Ducktail goatee
     • Ducktail full beard
     • Long ducktail beard
     • Braided ducktail
     • The French fork

17

The Corporate Beard

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1. 
   The corporate beard, or just “corporate,” is a full beard, meaning that you grow the hair out everywhere on your chin, upper lip, cheeks, and sideburns. The unique element here is the length. Corporate beards must be trimmed to be 1 in (2.5 cm) in length or shorter. The story goes that this length was a common work rule for major corporations, thus the name. It’s a great option if you want a full beard, but you don’t like the unruliness of a bigger beard.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Any, but it does tend to help if you have a more defined jawline.
   • Level of maintenance required: Low. You just have to trim the length and shape occasionally.
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18

The Hollywoodian

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1. 
   Often referred to as the “extended goatee,” the Hollywoodian requires a long (usually more than 1.5 in (3.8 cm) moustache, chin strap, and chin strip. The overall appearance is basically a long goatee plus more cheek hair running up the jaw line. It’s a very distinguished, artsy look that will perfectly match the vibes of reading by a fire in a smoking robe.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Any. This is a very customizable look. For instance, you can thicken the cheek hair to give more definition to your jaw or thin the goatee portion out to widen your face.
   • Level of maintenance required: Moderate. You do need to shape it periodically and carefully trim it to avoid making it too short.

19

The Winnfield

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1. 
   The Winnfield is what Jules (played by Samuel Jackson) is rocking in Pulp Fiction. It’s a long horseshoe-shaped moustache with strands of hair that extend past the chin, plus long sideburns that don’t connect to the beard. It’s a really fun, unique look you don’t see a lot anymore, but it’s the kind of beard that could have a comeback at any moment. If it strikes you as a fun option, give it a shot.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Triangular, diamond, and square faces tend to have the best luck here, but a good Winnfield can also give more definition to an oval face.
   • Level of maintenance required: It’s flexible. You can shape it to be really tight, or let it kind of grow unwieldy for a more laid-back look.
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20

Rap Industry Standard

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1. 
   Yeah, that’s actually what it’s called. The name comes from its prevalence in the hip hop community. 50 Cent, Freeway, Action Bronson, Ghostface Killah, and Drake have all rocked this look at one time or another. The beard requires a very thin moustache that hugs the upper lip, which feeds down in thin strips to a thin beard. It’s an oddly delicate beard considering how many gangster rappers have rocked one.

   • Ideal face shape for this facial hair: Square, triangle, and diamond faces tend to do best. It’s a very angular beard, so a more angular face complements it well.
   • Level of maintenance required: High. You do have to trim a lot and the line variation can be a challenge if you aren’t a wizard with the razor.
   • Variations:
     • The Rick Ross

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