How to Repair Chemically Damaged Hair

Chemical hair treatments — like bleaches, dyes, and perms — can create stunning results. But they can also leave your hair dull, dry, brittle, and damaged, especially if you overdo it. 

The good news is that you can repair even severely chemically damaged hair with the right combination of time, patience, and good hair care habits.

Below, we share 11 simple tips for how to repair chemically damaged hair and help you improve your hair’s smoothness, strength, and elasticity.

Shampoo helps wash away dirt, sweat, dead skin cells, and sebum — a natural oil that can build up on your scalp over time. 

It’s important to wash your hair regularly with shampoo to keep it clean. But using a shampoo that’s a bad match for your hair type, or overusing shampoo, can harm your hair cuticle and leave you with overly frizzy, dry hair.

So, to repair chemical damage and avoid dry, brittle hair, choose a shampoo formulated with your hair needs in mind. 

Need help picking the right shampoo? Our shampoo is designed to strengthen and moisturize your hair, all while controlling excess hair shedding and helping you maintain thick, healthy hair. Combine the moisturizing shampoo and conditioner for extra benefits.

One of the most important steps you can take to repair chemical damage and prevent brittle hair is to condition your hair every time you wash it.

Conditioner works by reducing static electricity and smoothing the hair cuticle on each of your hair shafts. This smooths out your hair and adds extra moisture, giving your hair more shine and volume.

Conditioning regularly can help to strengthen your hair and reverse some of the negative effects of chemical treatments. 

To get the best results from conditioner: 

• Apply it as soon as you finish rinsing away any leftover shampoo.

• Concentrate the conditioner on the tips of your hair. This gives the outer layers of your hair extra moisture without making your hair look limp and lifeless.

• Consider using a deep conditioner if you have very dry or frizzy hair. Your hair salon may offer this type of conditioning treatment before chemical treatments like straightening or coloring.

Not sure which conditioner to use? Our conditioner is formulated specifically to strengthen and repair your hair, all while providing much-needed moisture to keep your hair looking and feeling its best.

One easy way to reduce the severity of chemical hair damage is to wait longer between hair treatments.

Instead of touching up your hair color each month, try to wait eight to 10 weeks (or longer), especially during winter. This gives your hair time to recover and reduces the risk of dry air worsening existing damage.

If you typically get multiple treatments (e.g., perming and coloring your hair at the same time), consider booking separate sessions. Even a two-week break between services can help limit damage from chemical treatments.

Heat styling can cause serious damage to your hair shaft, which can result in breakage if your hair is already weakened from chemical exposure.

To help your hair recover from bleach or dye damage, avoid (or minimize how much you use) heat styling tools like:

• Hot combs

• Hair straighteners

• Curling irons

• Blow dryers

When you do use these hot tools, use a heat protectant and choose the lowest heat settings. This may help prevent your styling tools from getting in the way of your hair’s natural recovery process.

Contrary to popular belief, brushing your hair 100 times a day doesn’t stimulate growth or have any positive effects on your hair’s strength and thickness.

In fact, brushing your hair too much — or brushing it when it’s weighed down by moisture or styling products — can worsen chemical hair damage and cause split ends and breakage. 

To help your hair recover from damage, only brush it when you need to detangle and remove knots. When you brush, use a wide-toothed comb and avoid pulling or tugging on your hair strands as you move the comb through your hair.

Most importantly, never brush wet hair. Instead, let your hair air dry naturally for a bit (or dry it gently with a towel if you’re in a hurry), then carefully brush your hair until it’s tangle-free enough to style.

One exception: Curly and texture hair. In this case, it’s okay to brush through damp hair. Just avoid being too rough. 

Just like the rest of your body, your hair follicles depend on a steady supply of nutrients to grow strong, healthy hair.

While there’s no single food that will instantly repair chemical hair damage, a healthy, balanced diet that’s rich in fresh fruits, vegetables, lean protein sources, and essential vitamins and minerals can provide hair with nourishment and help to stimulate hair growth.

Learn which foods to eat for healthy hair in our guide. 

And as for hair supplements, you might have heard about biotin. Our biotin gummies contain biotin and other vitamins to promote healthy hair growth.

Many chemical treatments can damage the outer layer of your hair shaft, leaving you with brittle hair and a dry scalp.

In addition to conditioning regularly, you can help relieve dryness and tame unwanted frizz by applying a hair mask. 

Our Rapid Repair Hair Mask is designed to condition your hair deeply and improve hydration in just five minutes. 

And if your hair is looking a little thin from chemical damage, check out our guide to the benefits of hair masks for hair loss.

Pulling your hair back tightly can put pressure on hair follicles, leading to a form of hair loss called traction alopecia, or ponytail hair loss.

Traction alopecia usually first develops as flesh or white-colored bumps around your hairline. It can eventually lead to permanent hair loss, as the hair follicles in areas of your scalp subjected to pressure suffer from mechanical damage that prevents new hairs from growing.

You may be more at risk of this type of hair damage if you’re a woman of color, or if you often wear tight hairstyles like:

• Braids

• Cornrows

• Heavy locks

• Tight ponytail

• Tight buns 

Products that clip into your hair, like hair extensions, can also pull on hair follicles and cause damage.

If you have chemically damaged hair, try to avoid tightly pulled-back hairstyles. They may cause traction alopecia, and the extra tension can increase the risk of your hair breaking. 

Consider wearing your hair down when possible. If you need to tie your hair up, go for a loose ponytail over one that’s ultra-tight.

Exposure to bright, strong sunlight doesn’t just damage your skin — it can also worsen chemical damage to your hair. 

The UV radiation in sunlight can break down the structural proteins that give your hair its strength and thickness. The end result is hair that’s dry, brittle, and frizzy.

This damage can be especially severe if you’ve bleached your hair, as bleaching strips away the natural pigments that provide your hair with UV protection.

To let your hair recover from chemical damage, it’s important to keep it protected whenever you spend time outdoors on a sunny day.

Here’s how: 

• Shield your hair from sunlight by wearing a wide-brimmed hat. Try to cover as much of your hair as possible. 

• Avoid spending too much time outdoors when UV rays are at their strongest between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. 

• Apply a leave-in treatment (like a conditioner with zinc oxide) to get some UV protection. 

Check out our guide on whether sun is good for your hair for the pros and cons.

Swimming can be a great workout, but the chemicals in many swimming pools can harm your hair.

More specifically, the chlorine that’s added to swimming pools to keep them free of bacteria can break down the natural fats that keep your hair moisturized and protected, leaving it dry, lifeless, and brittle. This can make any hair breakage caused by chemical damage even worse.

To stop chlorine from damaging your hair: 

• Apply hair oil or leave-in conditioner before you get in the pool. 

• Rinse and wash your hair as soon as possible after you’re done swimming to get rid of residual chlorine. 

• Use a conditioner post-swim to provide some extra moisture and rebuild your hair’s protective barrier.

To make washing away harmful chemicals easier, try keeping two small bottles of shampoo and conditioner in your personal care bag whenever you go to the swimming pool.

The right combination of products and hair care habits can help you fix damaged hair and improve your hair’s health, strength, and appearance. 

But, restoring your hair health takes time, especially if you’re trying to repair severely chemically damaged hair.

Try to make the habits above a regular part of your hair care routine. Over time, you’ll likely notice that your hair begins to feel smoother, look better, and retain more strength than before. 

Chemical damage makes your hair look and feel unhealthy. And it can contribute to certain types of hair loss. 

Dyeing or perming hair can affect the structure of the hair shaft, which may impact the hair growth cycle. 

You can learn more about what chemicals cause hair loss in our guide.

Generally, though, chemical damage won’t cause widespread hair loss. 

Androgenetic alopecia, or female pattern hair loss, is the most common form of hair loss affecting women. It’s caused by genetic factors and sensitivity to hormones, like dihydrotestosterone (DHT).

The chemicals in hair dye and styling products don’t affect your DHT levels or cause this type of hair loss. 

If you’re starting to lose hair, you may want to consider treatments like minoxidil, which can slow hair loss and stimulate hair growth.

Our guide to hair loss goes into more detail about the causes of women’s hair loss, and your options for maintaining healthy hair growth.

The right combination of hair care products and healthy habits can help you grow longer, thicker hair. 

Let’s recap what we know about how to repair chemically damaged hair.

• The right products can help repair damage. Some may even help reverse chemical damage that happens when you bleach, dye, or style your hair. 

• Repairing chemical damage takes time. But the results are worth it. Be patient and stick to your hair repair routine. 

• If you have noticeable hair loss, something else might be going on. Chemical damage isn’t likely to cause widespread hair loss. Consider consulting a medical professional if you’re seeing major thinning. 

For more information about caring for your hair, check out our list of simple hair care tips for different hair types.

And if you’re concerned about hair loss, check out our range of hair loss treatments, including minoxidil and supplements. You can also take our free hair quiz to discover the best treatments for you.