Keep Your Chargers From Getting Tangled While Traveling With This Hair Accessory

Gather ye round children, to hear the tale of yesteryear, when travelers only needed to pack clothes and a good book. You scoff, but in those days, there was a curious service known as *checks notes* an internet café! 'Tis where you accessed your Hotmail and MySpace. Alas, today this kind of travel is long gone because almost all of us carry luggage that not only is bogged down by iPhones, iPads, and laptops (hello digital nomads!), but also the myriad of charging cords that come with them. The struggle is real when it comes to packing all these cords. Not only do we have to bring them along, but we also have to make sure they don't snap, bend, tangle, or break in two whilst shoved at the bottom of our bag.

The market has come up with many fancy-schmancy cord carrying cases you could purchase to keep your cables and chargers organized and out of harm's way, and honestly, they're not bad. Both Travel And Leisure and CNN have published reviews of cord organizer kits that seem pretty fly, but with some priced as much as $135 or even $155, they risk threatening your travel budget. Luckily, it turns out there's a cheap travel hack around to keep your cords safe, and you probably already have it handy. Take a second look at your claw hair clips, because they might be the solution you've been looking for. 

Big or small, claw hair clips are so versatile, every traveler should carry them, and not just for their hair. As TikTok user @mrhackslondon points out, if you loop your charging cord through the claw clip, it will stay in place and the clip will protect it from any bending or tangling. He's not alone; there's even a whole Reddit thread dedicated to using claw clips to keep cords organized even when at home. What we love most about this hack is that it doesn't require big, cumbersome cord organizers, ensuring you pack light, and you probably already have these clips lying about at home.

But on the off chance you don't have a claw hair clip, we got you. TikTok user @jessicahaizman suggested the perfect alternative: binder clips. Honestly, claw hair clips are just binder clips, but make it fashion! Barring that, have you ever considered keeping your cords safe in good ol' Ziploc bags, which are just as ubiquitous and cheap as claw hair clips? Chances are you have extras in your kitchen right now. Or you can head to the bathroom and fish out those empty cardboard toilet paper tubes from the bin. Don't throw them out when the roll is done — wrap your cords through them to protect them from damage and also prevent tangling. This isn't recycling, it's upcycling.