Wow. There’s a lot of bad advice out there about how to get stubble that looks right. If you follow some of this advice, you’ll be washing incessantly, moisturizing two or three times in five minutes and scraping your face with an unguarded beard trimmer. That’s all nonsense.

If you want to learn how to get stubble that looks great, stay right here for stubble advice you can use.

First, let’s get one thing out of the way. If your stubble doesn’t grow much or looks patchy, there’s nothing you can do about that but wait a few months or years. There are no products that make stubble grow faster — and neither shaving nor letting the hair grow speeds things up.

But if you let your beard grow, the extra length and the natural cyclical nature of hair growth means that some thin spots could fill in or become less noticeable. In other words, not caving and shaving too soon could be the best advice for how to get stubble that looks like it should when things don’t grow as well as you’d like.

Now, on to some other advice on how to get stubble that looks great every time:

1. Get a good stubble trimmer. If you want your stubble to be consistent and just the right length, getting the best stubble trimmer you can find is a smart idea. Note that this isn’t necessarily the same thing as a beard trimmer, which might not have a setting that’s short enough. You may want stubble as short at 0.4 mm, depending on your growth pattern.

2. Use an exfoliating wash or scrub. Shaving is good at getting rid of dead skin cells, but if you aren’t going to shave, you’ll have to do that another way. Rub the cleanser to a lather and massage it over your face — avoiding your eyes — and scrub well over your facial hair. Wash thoroughly to clear away dead skin cells.

3. Start by trimming longer first. When trimming your stubble, go with a longer setting first. You can always go shorter, but if your growth isn’t very dense, leaving it longer can make your beard look denser and more appealing. If you aren’t sure what looks good, leave it longer and ask your friends what they think. You can always cut it shorter next time. You’ll have to experiment a bit to get the best results.

4. Cut against the grain. Beard trimmers often tell you to cut with the grain of growth — which doesn’t always work anyway — but with a stubble trimmer you should cut against the grain for the most uniform appearance.

5. Shave the odd bits. You may need to shave your cheeks and will almost certainly want to clean up the neckline. You can do that using the trimmer with the guard removed or you can shave with a razor, depending on what you prefer. Don’t go too high with the neck line or too low with the cheek line or the results will look very unnatural. In most cases, you should shave just above the Adam’s apple for the neckline and keep the cheek line as natural as possible.

6. Moisturize. Moisturizing isn’t just for girls. All that work on your face can irritate your skin, so go for a light moisturizer to help even out your skin tone and reverse and damage from the stubble trimming. A moisturizer with too much oil or that is applied too heavily can increase bumps and irritation while a light one can decrease redness and make you look better.

Of course, lots of guys simply shave every other day or every two or three days, but if you want consistent results that you can depend on so you look well-maintained and carefully groomed every day, use this advice for how to get stubble you can be proud of.