Prince William Makes Rare Joke About Updating His Facial Hair While Admiring Soldiers’ Mustaches

The Prince of Wales has been sporting a beard since 2024, but he made a quip about changing up his style

Prince William, as Colonel-in-Chief of the Regiment, meets with soldiers of the 1st Battalion Mercian Regiment in Bulford in south-west England on March 26, 2026.Credit : JUSTIN TALLIS / POOL / AFP via Getty 

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Prince William joked about shaving his beard and keeping a mustache while meeting soldiers and their families in Wiltshire
The Prince of Wales has sported a beard since 2024 after years of being clean-shaven
Beards were banned in the British Army in 2024 and Prince Harry claimed William was once denied permission to keep his

Prince William may be ready for a makeover.

The Prince of Wales, 43, visited the 1st Battalion Mercian Regiment in Bulford, Wiltshire, on March 26. William is Colonel-in-Chief of the regiment and visited the unit last year in Estonia, meeting up with them again following the conclusion of their six-month deployment there for Operation Cabrit.

There, the heir to the throne revealed the change he might make to his personal appearance during a coffee morning with the officers, soldiers and families of B Company in the Officers’ Mess, seemingly inspired by some of the men’s personal style.

The Daily Mail reported that Prince William admired some of their mustaches and said, “I might end up taking mine off and leaving a tash.”

Prince William meets with soldiers of the 1st Battalion Mercian Regiment and family members following their six-month deployment to Estonia on March 26, 2026.JUSTIN TALLIS / POOL / AFP via Getty 

The Prince of Wales has rocked a beard since the summer of 2024, shaking up what had been his clean-shaven look for decades (with one exception: a scruff that caused buzz on Christmas Day in 2008).

William appeared with a beard in an August 2024 video congratulating Team Great Britain on their wins at the Paris Summer Olympics with his wife, Kate Middleton.

However, William’s facial hair was gone when he and Princess Kate drove to church near Balmoral Castle in Scotland a few weeks later, raising the question if it was gone for good.

Prince William meets with soldiers of the 1st Battalion Mercian Regiment and family members following their six-month deployment to Estonia on March 26, 2026.JUSTIN TALLIS / POOL / AFP via Getty 

When he resumed royal duties that September following a traditional summer break, Prince William’s beard was back in action, and the look has stayed constant since.

The Prince of Wales has continued to sport a clipped beard, which a former aide has claimed wouldn’t happen if Princess Kate didn’t approve.

“If she didn’t like it, it wouldn’t be there. I could tell you that,” Jason Knauf told 60 Minutes Australia during a February 2025 interview.

Knauf, who previously served as a royal aide to the Prince and Princess of Wales and currently serves as the CEO for William’s prestigious environmental Earthshot Prize, added that William means business when it comes to his beard.

“I love it. I think it’s great,” Knauf said with a laugh when asked to share his thoughts on the prince’s facial hair. “But I’ve talked to him about it — or tried to talk to him about it. He’s like, ‘It’s here. I have a beard.’ No further conversation.’ “

Prince William meets with soldiers of the 1st Battalion Mercian Regiment and family members following their six-month deployment to Estonia on March 26, 2026.JUSTIN TALLIS / POOL / AFP via Getty 

The Prince of Wales previously shared that his first beard of 2024 didn’t stay because one family member had a strong reaction:  his daughter, Princess Charlotte.

“Well, Charlotte didn’t like it the first time. I got floods of tears, the first one I got tears, so I had to shave it off,” he said during an interview at the 2024 Earthshot Prize Awards in Cape Town, South Africa.

“Then I grew it back. I thought, hang on a second, and I convinced her it was going to be okay,” he added about the negotiation with his 10-year-old daughter.

In Prince Harry’s 2023 memoir Spare, he alleged that his brother was jealous when Queen Elizabeth gave him special permission to wear a beard for his 2018 royal wedding to Meghan Markle, where he sported a military uniform despite beards being banned in the British Army then. The Duke of Sussex, 41, has had a beard since 2013, and facial hair has since become one of his style signatures.

Prince William meets with soldiers of the 1st Battalion Mercian Regiment on March 26, 2026.JUSTIN TALLIS / POOL / AFP via Getty 

Prince Harry wrote in Spare that when he asked Prince William why he was bothered by their  grandmother’s decision to let his scruff stay, William said, “Because I wasn’t allowed to keep my beard.”

“Ah — there it was,” Harry wrote. “After he’d come back from an assignment with Special Forces, Willy was sporting a full beard, and someone told him to be a good boy, run along and shave it. He hated the idea of me enjoying a perk he’d been denied.”