Excessive hair washing, or using harsh soaps or alcohols. Excessive blow-drying. Dry air due to the climate. Malnutrition.
Here's something you didn't know: Conditioner not only smoothes your strands but can help them dry faster, too. The silicone coats each strand and seals it down,1 repelling water in the process.
According to Colombini, healthy hair actually takes the longest to dry. While it's less than ideal, your hair may take a long time to dry simply because you maintain healthy hair practices and your strands are able to easily absorb and retain moisture.
"If your hair takes a long time to dry, it typically means it's highly porous," she explains. "For example, if it takes a day to dry or it takes a longer time than average to blow dry your hair, then you know you have high porosity hair."
While low porosity hair holds onto water more tightly, high porosity hair has the opposite problem. Although high porosity hair dries quickly, your hair's loose cuticle allows much more water to enter your strands. Because your hair is holding onto so much liquid, it'll take significantly longer to dry.
The best way to dry your hair is to let it air dry under the fan as much as possible. However, some experts believe combining air and blow-drying is healthier than just air drying. It is good to let your hair air-dry seventy percent of the way and then blow-dry till they become dry ultimately.
Heat is damaging to hair, so blow drying with cold air is a healthier choice for your mane. It would take a long time to dry and style damp hair using only cold air, but cold air is great for touching up dry hair or setting a heat style.
Hair is at its most fragile when wet, so if you go to bed with it damp and proceed to toss and turn against a pillow, you run a higher risk of breakage. But aside from being rough on your delicate strands, hitting the pillow with damp hair puts you at risk of developing skin infections, primarily on your scalp.
When to wash. Rossi generally tells his patients they should wash their hair once or twice per week. But if you've had chemical treatments that can make your hair drier — such as bleach, perms or relaxers — you might want to wash it less than once weekly to avoid breaking or brittle hair or split ends, he said.
There are four primary factors that cause frizz: the environment, diameter of the hair fiber itself, level of curl, and the amount of damage. Avoid long and hot showers, excess exfoliation, and hot tools like traditional hairdryers and flat irons to prevent frizz.
Each strand of your hair has an outer shell of cuticles that kind of look like shingles on the side of a roof. These cuticles are like doors that open and close to absorb moisture and then seal it in.
When your fingers touch your hair too much, they can actually steal away essential oils, leading to dry and easily broken hair strands. Solution: don't scrunch too much — once you apply product to your hair, scrunch it in 1-3 times to enhance your hair texture and prevent frizz.
Towel-drying your hair is important to help remove water, so hair can dry faster. Yet, the wrong technique can result in extra frizz, tangles, and poufiness. The right ways to air dry hair include gentle drying techniques. It's best to use your towel to squeeze water out from your hair.
“What tends to happen, particularly in humid weather, is that the cuticles don't seal properly, which leads to frizz.
Wet hair is far weaker than dry hair, being more susceptible to breakage and damage from just about anything – heat and pulling on the hair strands are more likely to damage wet hair than dry. Hair is made up largely of a number of proteins called keratins.
While excessive heat can cause damage to the surface layer of the hair, air-drying can cause trauma to that inner lipid layer, which will make your strands weaker as a result. Over time, something called hygral fatigue happens, i.e. repeated swelling of the hair.
One hair stylist's tip to a successful air dry is to shake the water out of the hair. “It sounds a little crazy, but shaking your head up and down for a few seconds helps hair dry faster,” said stylist Amanda Dyer.
If you want a wet hair look that lasts all day, your best bet is to make a mixture of products. Dueñas says to use a cocktail of mousse, conditioner, and a lightweight gel on damp, towel-dried hair to achieve a wet look that'll last all day.
After wrapping your hair in a microfiber towel for around 30 minutes, it will be almost totally dry. Another benefit is the lack of friction caused. With no need to rub the hair to extract the water, less strain and friction is imposed on your hairs, leading to less breakage over time.
Usually, it takes an hour or two for damp hair to dry completely. However, this time may vary depending on the hair length and porosity. Highly porous hair can take an entire day to dry. It's because porous hair quickly soaks water and takes longer to dry.