Paper towels or hand drier?

Neither. Paper towels are an environmentally costly solution to a non-problem. Hand driers harbour Legionnaire's Disease. Shake the water off your hands and either leave them temporarily damp or dry them on your clothes. Zero cost and zero impact.

Thinking in terms of energy efficiency,
paper towels are better only if you use them more than once.But if you do,that's potentially more unsanitary.So the better solution would be only using paper towels to wipe your hands off when it is actually needed,and avoid touching too many dirty things,so you don't have to wash your hands too often.That's why Japaneses don't take their dicks in their hands while peeing.
That way you do not touch your dick with dirty hands if you don't wash them before,and do not need to wash them again afterwards.So you don't have to use either the dryer or the towels.
Actually you don't even have to use water and soap.And if they meet somebody,they do not shake their hands,they do not hug them,they just lower slightly their heads and go:
Morning sir.They rarely touch eachother rice bowls.And in some of their public bathrooms you can actually find ultrasounds or UV sterilizers that kill germs without using any water or soaps.On their way:Special nanotechological paints capable of killing germs on contact.
Keep in mind that bacteria usually carried on genitals or the skin have a limited survival time once they detach from their hosts which varies based on air humidity and temperature and conditions of light.They tend to survive longer in cold and humid environments.
This doesn't apply to dust particles and spidermites.Which float in the air differently based on air current temperature and humidity and light.If they are made out of porous materials they absorb water from the air and fall onto the ground,if they are big enough and there isn't any air current lifting them up...
but if they are not porous...
maybe we talked enough for today.

I'm lazy so I flick and wipe on my clothes, probably not the most hygenic way but never did me any harm :P

I like hand sanitizer more but if I had none I would flick or pat them on my clothes.I hate that cheap paper.

Usually paper towels, but if they only have hand dryers, it better be the strong ones.

Better option is to stay out of public bathrooms!

water evaporates dummy

Where is the "Breath On Hands Until Dry." option?

I like hand driers the best because they generate heat. It makes a difference using a hand drier vs. paper towels, especially if you're cold. js.

Paper towels were taken out to stop the homeless from bathing in the restrooms.

paper towels: not so bad if they're made from recycled paper and then get composted but if not then they're horrible for the environment (in terms of trees cut down, energy used to make them and then space in landfill)

hand driers: I would never ever EVER use one of these things. they take air from the bathroom and blow it all over your hands, air that containes all sorts of pathogens: fecal coliform (from the aerosolization of fecal matter that occurs when poop is flushed down a toilet, especially the industrial public toilets that use a ton of high powered water) rhinovirus from the lady that just sneezed, ect. ect. they're so uncleanly its disgusting.

I just shake my hands off and if I need to, wipe them on my shirt or something

I usually use whatever's there, but I prefer to use hand driers. (It feels nice, lol.)

Whatever is there.

Keep in mind however both methods have pros and cons.

Paper: creates more waste.
Air: Unsanitary if it's warm because the "heat" is the perfect temperature to GROW bacteria, not kill it.

Now if the air driers were like the ones in Japan - where the cold air really blows the water off of your hands, then I'd prefer that... but most places in America don't have those yet.

I don't like the noise from the dryers, plus I heard they're germy.

I always wipe my hands on my pants. I'm glad I'm not the only one too.

i liek the feeling of the hand dryer ^^

I wipe them on the bottom of my pants (so its not so obvious) - hand-dryers blow around urine particles and paper towels are wasteful.