Someone asked me about this L’Oreal Professional product on Instagram recently, so I thought I would talk about it in a bit more detail in a post and compare it to this cheaper product by V05.

The L’Oreal Professional Tecni Art Thermo-Smoothing Milk is a product I bought from a hair salon a few months ago. I have quite wispy hair which has a tendency to be a little uncontrollable, especially around my forehead. I used to have a fringe to hide the wispy bits, but now that I don’t, they are a lot more noticeable. The stylist at the salon recommended that I use a tiny bit of this cream just to tame the wispy bits. You can also use it to tame frizzy hair. The added bonus is that it also protects your hair from the damaging affects of blow drying or straightening. It retails for around £12.60.

The V05 Smoothly Does It Frizz Free Creme is designed to do the same job and also protects your hair from heat at the same time, but it costs just a fraction of the price. I believe it’s £3.89 in Boots at the moment.

To apply these products, you simply take a tiny amount on your hands, run it through towel-dried hair and then blow dry as usual.

I have to say it is really hard to distinguish between these two products. They smell virtually identical – a sweet, almost floral scent – and they have the same consistency. They seem to work equally well in terms of taming unruly hair, although I don’t know how well they protect from heat. I don’t blow dry my hair very often so it doesn’t suffer from split ends or dryness.

The one thing I would say is that the L’Oreal cream does seem to be a little oilier. I have to be very careful with this product – if I use to much it makes my hair feel and look quite greasy. I always avoid the roots with both products for that reason, but the L’Oreal is definitely worse than the V05.

Given the price difference and the fact that the L’Oreal product is more difficult to work with, I would definitely say the V05 is better value for money and it’s certainly the one I would choose to buy again.