Review: Panasonic Arc 5 Palm Shaver

What is this texture, I wondered, and why did I like it so much? I don't want to be the sort of person who gushes about a new kind of plastic. But here I am holding a new luxury travel shaver from Panasonic, catching feelings about it.

The white version of Panasonic's Arc 5 Palm, a compact shaver released in September in the US but much earlier in Japan, is made with a newly developed material called Nagori, made from the concentrated minerals of seawater—a common byproduct of desalination plants. Nagori is a plastic that feels organic. It is, if anything, the texture of seashell. Or a stone, washed at the bend of a river until it takes on the character of marble.

The black Arc 5 palm is not made of Nagori, and so I can't have any of these feelings about it. But in general, the Arc 5's compact form is also oddly elegant for a travel shaver. So is the little vanity-sized pouch it travels in. But the simple feeling of the white shaver in my hand is the main thing I like about it, molded easily to the shape of my palm with a pleasing heft and density like a rock I might throw.

That said, a shaver isn't a rock, and its $330 price tag is a lot of money.

Japanese Steel

The specs on the Arc 5 are on their face impressive. The blades buzz away at 70,000 crosscuts per minute; that's 14,000 cuts apiece for each of five gently flexing foils. The Arc 5 also boasts of a “built-in beard sensor” that will adjust power output to match beard resistance, theoretically avoiding overaggressiveness that leads to nicks. Plus, you gotta love the marketing that puts “Japanese steel” high in the product description, for anyone who saw Kill Bill. It's not just any Japanese steel, either: This Japanese steel is stainless.

But the steel won't cut you. Same as in your hand, the Arc 5 Palm shaver is quite comfortable on your face. Whether I pressed hard or just whispered along the surface, I got no irritation. Though the shaver's five-foil face is quite broad—about an inch across on its short side and 2 inches the long way—the battery of five blades each depress separately to follow the contours of a neck or a cheekbone.

Photograph: Matthew Korfhage

Its lid fits snugly tight, even before you tuck the thing into its travel case with the cord and cleaning brush, meaning it's well protected in any travel case. The device is, quite simply, handy, compact, and elegant, and it can go pretty much anywhere you do: showers, downpours, lakes, whatever. Not only is this thing waterproof externally (provided you keep its USB-C power cord bay safely closed), you can take the top off its foils and wash off the motor arms with a running tap. It's rated to be plunged into a bathtub for as long as 30 minutes.

To drive home the fact that this device is comfortable in the wet, the Arc 5 also boasts an oddly useless “foam mode” to play around with. Hold the power button down for two seconds for foam mode, and supposedly, vibrating the shaver foils against some shave lotion is easier than lathering shave soap by hand.

It didn't play out this way for me, nor did I need shaving cream with a device this gentle. I really had no idea why I was buzzing my shaver against a palm full of shave lotion, other than that the instruction manual suggested I might enjoy it. But for the truly sensitive of skin, this is indeed a foil shaver that's happy to get foamy, and is easy to rinse off.

Close but no Nagori

Battery life is no great shakes, with a full charge netting less than an hour, and the shave is only moderately close. I can still feel a little stubble sandpaper after multiple passes. In a head-to-head shave-off against other devices, the Arc 5 performed fairly similarly to a Philips Norelco OneBlade ($38), a popular, T-shaped ultra-smooth shaver that likewise errs on the side of protecting the sensitive. Difference is, the OneBlade costs less than $40.

The precision foil from the Philips Norelco 7000 ($69), one of the top picks in WIRED's guide to the best beard trimmers, mopped the floor with the Arc 5 for sheer close-shaving prowess. Blades, of course, like Leaf's Thorn and Twig models (8/10, WIRED Recommends), shave much closer than any of these.

Photograph: Matthew Korfhage

That said, the performance is still admirable compared to most travel shavers, provided you don't let your hair grow out too long. Like a lot of foil shavers, the Arc 5 does not like to cut hairs longer than a few millimeters. Shaving longer whiskers takes a great number of passes—and will almost certainly incur a few painful hair pulls. The Arc 5 is a neat, clean shaver for those who are already neat and clean.

The Arc 5 is also very much not a detail shaver. This is an attachment-free device that does what it does: It conforms itself broadly to a large surface area of your face and neck. If you're someone with a beard line, or tightly maintained geometry on your sideburns or mustache, this shaver won't serve you as a daily driver without a separate detail trimmer.

Photograph: Panasonic

Shell Game

But the shaver's lack of sharp edges can also be virtue. The Arc 5 Palm is so broad-faced, so edgeless, so squishy in its shaving, that I feel comfortable using it in the shower without a mirror. (If you're the sort of person who keeps a mirror in the shower, no offense, but I don't understand.) Heck, I think I might even feel OK shaving while walking.

But now we're back full circle to why I still like the white Arc 5 Palm, despite its narrow use case and middling shave and high price. I kinda just enjoy how it feels in my hand. Enjoyment is a vanishingly rare quality among shavers.

Photograph: Matthew Korfhage

“Nagori,” the name of the new material from Mitsui Chemicals that provides Arc 5's oddly organic texture, is the sort of word that people often like to call untranslatable. Nagori refers to a sort of instantaneous nostalgia, the kind you might feel for a season as it passes or a meal's final course. It derives from an old Japanese phrase, “the remains of the waves,” referencing the shells and the tracks left behind when the tide goes back where it came from.

This material's name almost certainly derives from the ocean minerals that form the basis of it. But it also describes the feeling I got when I pulled the shaver out of its packaging: an unplaceable nostalgia for an object that's right here in my hand. Over time, I know, this feeling will dull. The Arc 5's lightly granular seashell plastic will start to seem just like slightly nicer plastic.

But for now, I was able to have a small emotional experience with my travel shaver. Whether that feeling is worth $300 is between you and your accountant.