Here’s the thing about America: it’s really freakin’ big. Hell, it spans the entire width of a continent for chrissakes. From Portland, Maine to Portland, Oregon, San Diego to that mysterious alternate universe we call Florida, our fine country spreads its wings wide, and in between those endpoints, what you’ll find is a whole lot of people. Three hundred eighteen some-odd million of them to be exact. And you know what comes with that many people? Just as many opinions.

When we reached out to barbershops, stylists and salons across the country, asking over five hundred individual scissor-wielders to name the top three cut-requests they got from their clients, we were expecting men would have vastly different preferences depending on where they lived. Perhaps the buzzcut would be more popular in Iowa, while in New York undercuts would be choice. Or maybe the South would prefer to keep things high and tight, as opposed to caesars potentially ruling the Southwest. When we tallied up everyone’s responses, and took a good hard look at the data to see what trends had emerged, it became clear pretty quickly that one ‘do was consistently coming out on top.

As seen here on the dashing Mr. Ryan Reynolds, a clean, professional and endlessly versatile style that’s longer at the crown and fades into a short clipper cut around the sides and back is what guys are looking for from Boise to Raleigh, Oakland to Milwaukee to Juneau and back again. Sure, in certain metro areas the length on top tends to tread on undercut territory (we’re looking at you, New York and Los Angeles), but the same general formula stands strong regardless of which state you call home.

The nation has spoken.

Want the cut? Ask your barber to scissor-cut the top of your head to about an inch and a half, adding a bit of texture to the ends with a razor. Around the sides and back, have him use a clipper to taper the length down to about a quarter inch, or an eighth if you feel like going really short.

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