How to Trim Your Neckline

If you can't tell where your facial hair ends and your chest hair begins, you've got a neckbeard. Gross.

There are very few things that can ruin the appearance of a beard quite like excessive neck hair. It makes you look like you don’t give a shit about how you look, and not in the cool way. Don’t squander a great beard with unkempt neck hair. It's worth taking the time to learn how to trim your neckline.

Supplies

Before you start shaving, you’ll need some clippers. There’s a pretty wide variety of beard trimmers available on the market at many different price points.

The Brio Beardscape is a quality beard trimmer that a few of my bearded friends swear by. If you don’t believe them, believe the 4½/5 stars on Amazon. It’s cordless and charges pretty quickly, it’s extremely quiet, and it comes with 8 size guards for all around trims and fades (more on that later).

Step-by-Step Guide

Now that you’ve got your tool, here’s a step-by-step guide to shaving your neckline.

1. Finding Your Neckline

First thing’s first, you need to know where you need to start shaving. You don’t want to go too far and end up ruining your beard. Fortunately, this is pretty easy to do. Imagine a curved line connecting the spots just below your ear lobe and meeting an inch above your adam’s apple. Use the picture below for reference.

2. Decide on Your Style

Before you put blade to skin, you want to determine how you want your neckline. Do you want a rounded line or squared? Do you want a hard line or a faded one? Deciding these things will determine how you trim the beard.

3. Trim It!

Time to put that trimmer to work. If you’re going with a hard line, you can stick with no guard and simply trim everything below that neckline you established in step 1.

Now if you want to fade your neckline, this takes a bit more time. Use a guard that is two measures lower than the guard you use to trim your entire face. Trim up your neck two inches above your adam’s apple. Then use a shorter guard to trim up to the bottom of your neckline to create a gradual line. Then take the guard off your trimmer and shave off everything below your neckline.

In the angle of the jaw, you can shape the hair into either an angular line or a rounded one. An angular line will look more refined, while a rounded one looks more natural.

4. Aftercare

After you’re done trimming, apply some aftershave to the shaved areas to help the skin recover and moisturize.

With great beard comes great responsibility, and as a bearded man, it is your responsibility to keep your beard looking it's best. Take the time to properly groom it and make it all it can be.

Cheers!