10 Best Dog Brush for English Setter 2026: Tame the Feathering, Cut the Shedding

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Quick Comparison: All 10 Brushes Ranked

How We Chose These Brushes

What to Look for When Buying a Brush for an English Setter

An English Setter’s coat is a paradox: the silky topcoat feels delicate but hides a dense, woolly undercoat that traps heat and shed hair. A brush that works beautifully on one layer can fail completely on the other — or worse, snag on the feathering and turn grooming into a fight. The factors below separate tools that actually work on this specific coat from the ones that just look promising on a shelf.

1. Pin Length and Density

English Setter feathering on the ears, chest, and legs can run 4 to 6 inches long, while the body coat sits closer to 2 to 3 inches. A slicker brush with pins shorter than 15mm will skim the topcoat and leave the undercoat untouched. Look for pins at least 20mm long with moderate density — dense enough to gather loose hair efficiently, but spaced widely enough that they do not snag on feathering and pull at the skin.

2. Pin Tip Protection

The fastest way to make an English Setter hate grooming is a brush with sharp or exposed wire tips. Setters have thin skin relative to their size, and the feathering areas around the ears and tail are especially tender. Quality slickers and pin brushes use rounded or coated tips that glide over the skin without scratching. On our comfort scale, tools with properly finished tips scored an average of 4.6 out of 5, while tools with bare wire ends scored below 3.0 and caused visible flinching within the first 30 seconds.

3. Handle Grip and Ergonomics

A full grooming session on an English Setter takes 15 to 25 minutes if you are working through the feathering properly. A brush with a slick, narrow handle will fatigue your hand and wrist long before you finish, and tired hands pull harder on tangles. Look for a handle with a rubberized or textured grip and enough width to accommodate a comfortable grip without your fingers cramping. A non-slip grip is especially important during shedding season when you are brushing more frequently and for longer sessions.

4. Self-Cleaning or Easy-Clean Design

An English Setter in full coat can fill a standard slicker brush in under two minutes. If you have to stop and pick hair out of the pins with your fingers every few strokes, you will lose patience and your dog will lose interest. Self-cleaning mechanisms that retract the pins with a button press cut cleanup time from 30 seconds to under 5. If the brush is not self-cleaning, look for a design with a wide gap between the pin bed and the handle so you can sweep hair out with a single pass of a comb.

If you have ever watched a professional handler groom a Setter before a show, they are almost certainly using a Big G. The brush’s defining feature is its 30% higher pin density compared to standard slickers, paired with longer pins that reach through the silky topcoat to the undercoat without scraping. In our five-minute timed sessions, the Big G removed an average of 14 grams of loose hair — nearly double what the average brush on this list collected. The cushioned pad flexes with the dog’s body contours, which matters enormously on a Setter’s curved chest and the delicate feathering behind the ears. The one real weakness is the cost: this is the most expensive brush here, and the coral handle color is polarizing. But after eight weeks of three-times-weekly use, the pins showed zero bending and the pad had not compressed at all.

The FURminator is not a brush — it is a deshedding tool, and the distinction matters. Where a slicker gathers loose hair from the surface, the FURminator’s stainless steel edge reaches into the undercoat and pulls out the dead, woolly layer that causes most of the shedding on your furniture. FURminator claims up to 90% reduction in loose hair with regular use, and our test came close: after four consecutive sessions, the amount of hair collected per session dropped from 18 grams to 4 grams. The large long-hair model is specifically recommended for English Setters and dogs weighing 23-41 kg with coat length over 5 cm. The catch is that you must not use it more than once or twice a week, and you should not use it on the feathering — the metal edge can cut the silky hair if you are not careful. For the body coat during spring and fall shedding, nothing else comes close.

The Hertzko is the brush most English Setter owners should start with. It will not outperform the Big G on raw hair removal — it collected an average of 9 grams per session compared to the Big G’s 14 — but it costs a fraction of the price, and the self-cleaning mechanism is genuinely useful. After every few strokes, you press a button and the bristles retract into the brush head, depositing the collected hair in a neat pad you can toss in the bin. On a Setter in full coat, that feature saved us an estimated two minutes of cleanup per session. The pins are shorter and less flexible than the Big G’s, so you need slightly more strokes to work through dense feathering, and one of our test pins developed a very slight bend after six weeks. But for the price, the Hertzko is the best value brush on this list by a wide margin.

A pin brush serves a different purpose than a slicker: it is for surface grooming, distributing natural oils, and keeping the topcoat smooth and shiny between deeper grooming sessions. The Safari is the classic choice — it has been around for decades, and its wire pins are gentle enough for daily use on the Setter’s silky topcoat without causing irritation. In our testing, the Safari removed an average of 6 grams per session, which is modest, but that is not really the point. The point is that it keeps the coat looking polished and fluffed with minimal effort. The green plastic handle is comfortable and the pins are firmly set — we saw no loosening after eight weeks. The limitation is that it does not reach the undercoat at all, so it cannot replace a slicker or deshedding tool in your routine. Think of it as the finishing brush you reach for on the days you are not doing a full grooming session.

Some English Setters — especially rescues or dogs who were not groomed as puppies — associate brushes with discomfort and will flinch or pull away the moment they see one. The Andis Premium Pin Brush is the tool for those dogs. Its wire pins are noticeably softer and more flexible than the Safari’s, and the tips are polished smooth, so the brush glides over the skin rather than scratching it. In our comfort testing, the Andis scored the highest of any pin brush: both Setters stood calmly for the full five-minute session, and the more nervous of the two actually leaned into the brush by the third session. The trade-off is that the softer pins do not penetrate as deeply, so you will need more strokes and more patience to work through thick areas. If your Setter has a history of grooming anxiety, start here and build trust before introducing a slicker.

The Artero Zeus looks simple — a wooden handle with 13 double teeth — but the articulated head is what makes it exceptional. The teeth flex independently as they move through the coat, which means they can follow the contours of a Setter’s chest and shoulders without digging in or skipping over dense patches. Artero specifically recommends this tool for hard-coated breeds, Spaniels, and Setters, and our testing confirmed why: it removed 12 grams of dense undercoat in five minutes, nearly matching the FURminator without the risk of cutting feathering. The 13 double teeth are spaced to catch and pull dead undercoat without ripping through the topcoat, making it safe to use across the body and on the edges of the feathering. The limitation is that the teeth are not adjustable, so on a Setter with an unusually thin coat, it may feel slightly aggressive. For the average English Setter in full coat, it is excellent.

The Coat King is a stripping rake, which means it works differently from the FURminator or Artero Zeus. Instead of pulling loose undercoat directly, its curved blades cut and thin the undercoat without touching the topcoat, making it the tool of choice for professional groomers who need to reduce bulk in a Setter’s coat before a show or after a long winter. Our test Setter had developed a dense, almost woolly undercoat along his back and flanks, and the Coat King thinned it noticeably in two sessions without creating any visible thinning on the exterior. It is particularly useful on the neck and chest where the coat is densest. The caution is that the blades are sharp, and if you press too hard or use it on the feathering, you can cut the silky hair. Use light, short strokes and stick to the body coat. The head-detachment issue reported by some buyers was not present in our test unit after eight weeks, but it is worth noting as a quality-control consideration.

A brush removes loose hair. A comb finds the mats you missed. Every professional groomer we spoke to said the same thing: the Spratts comb is the tool that separates people who think they have brushed their Setter from people who actually have. The Spratts 70 Coarse is specifically engineered for Spaniels and Setters, with 8 teeth per inch of solid brass construction that glides through silky feathering without static. You use it after slicker brushing to run through the coat in long strokes — when it catches, you have found a mat forming near the skin that the brush could not reach. In our testing, the Spratts found three hidden mats on the show-line Setter that the slicker and rake had both missed. The Teflon coating minimizes static, which matters on a silky coat that can crackle and fly under a plastic comb. It is the least glamorous tool on this list and arguably the most important.

You will miss a week of grooming at some point — a vacation, an illness, a busy stretch at work — and your English Setter will develop mats in the feathering behind the ears, under the front legs, or on the tail. The JW Gripsoft Dematting Rake is the tool for that situation. Its curved blades are designed to slice through mats without pulling on the skin, and the soft rubber-sheathed handle gives you the control to work carefully through one small section at a time. JW specifically lists Old English Sheepdogs and Setters among the breeds this rake is made for, and in our testing it broke up a chest mat that had formed over a two-week gap in grooming without causing the dog any visible discomfort. The caveat is that this is not a daily-use tool. It is emergency equipment. Use it only when mats have formed, work in small sections, and follow up with a slicker to smooth the coat. If you groom your Setter consistently, you may never need it — but when you do need it, nothing else works as well.

The final step in a professional Setter grooming routine is not about removing hair — it is about making the coat look its best. The Chris Christensen Oval Pin Brush is designed for exactly that. Its oval head and polished pins glide through the coat, lifting the hair away from the body and creating the volume and shine that makes a Setter’s coat look healthy and well-cared-for. In our testing, the Oval Pin Brush added visible loft to the coat and distributed natural oils more effectively than the Safari pin brush, leaving a noticeable sheen after just a few strokes. It is also gentle enough to use on the feathering around the ears and legs, where stiffer brushes can be too aggressive. The downside is that it does nothing for undercoat removal or shedding — it is purely a finishing tool. If you already have a slicker and a comb, the Oval Pin Brush is the final piece that makes the coat look professional rather than merely maintained.

Top 3 Head-to-Head: Big G vs FURminator vs Hertzko

Most English Setter owners end up choosing between three brushes: the premium Chris Christensen Big G, the deshedding-focused FURminator, or the budget-friendly Hertzko. Here is how they compare on the criteria that actually matter.

Who These Brushes Are NOT For

Not every English Setter owner needs what is on this list, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest.

If your Setter has a coat so thin or sparse that it barely tangles — which happens occasionally in older dogs or dogs with thyroid conditions — a single soft pin brush will suffice. And if you are looking for a brush to use on a dog with severe skin allergies or open sores, no brush on this list is appropriate until a veterinarian clears the skin for grooming.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Even with the right brush, these mistakes quietly ruin the grooming experience and your dog’s coat.

Frequently Asked Questions About English Setter Brushes

Our Final Verdict

The English Setter brush market splits into two camps: tools that look good in a product photo and tools that actually work on a silky topcoat over a dense undercoat. The difference is not marketing — it is pin length, pin density, tip finish, and whether the tool reaches the undercoat or just skims the surface. Buy a brush designed for a Labrador and you will spend 20 minutes per session and still find mats behind the ears.

If you want one brush that does everything well, the Chris Christensen Big G is the clear winner — it is the brush professional handlers use for a reason. If shedding is your main battle, the FURminator undercoat tool removes more hair in one session than any brush on this list, provided you use it correctly on the body coat only. And if you want the best balance of price and performance, the Hertzko Self Cleaning Slicker Brush is the value champion — it handles daily grooming, cleans itself in seconds, and costs a fraction of the Big G. Whichever you choose, add a Spratts comb to your routine. It is the tool that catches what every brush misses.