How Often Should Curly Hair Be Washed?

June 2, 2015

Do you sometimes wonder whether you’re washing your hair too rarely or too often?

As a curly or afro haired girl, it’s important to have a regular hair regimen which will make your hair easier to manage.

Keeping a good, healthy hair regimen will also enable you to look after your hair even when you’re super busy and pressed for time.

How often should you wash curly and afro hair?

So, how often should you wash your tresses?

Firstly, it’s important to remember that there are two types of hair washing.

Shampoo washing (simply washing your hair with shampoo and then conditioning it)

AND

Co-washing (washing your hair with conditioner only e.g. no shampoo required)

If your hair is out (not in braids, weave or plaits), you should co-wash it once a week using a silicone-free conditioner.

Typically, you should shampoo curly hair once a month and co-wash in between shampooing.

However, the looser your hair texture is, the more often you need to shampoo it. For example, if you have wavy textured hair, you’ll need to shampoo either once a week or once every 3-4 days.

If however, you have afro textured hair, you’ll only need to shampoo once a month. If your hair is mixed (e.g. contains a mixture of hair textures that vary from wavy to tightly curled or afro) then you’ll need to do a bit of testing to see how your hair responds to being shampooed less often.

You can then adjust your hair regimen to meet your mixed hair’s needs.

As a rule of thumb, you should shampoo once a month and condition once  a week.

Now you might be wondering why shampooing too often is bad. For curly and afro textures, our hair has a tendency to be more dry and vulnerable to breakage. It’s therefore essential that we are cautious with it and handle our hair with care.

When you over-shampoo curly, mixed or afro hair, the hair’s natural oils are depleted which causes dryness, knots, split ends, frizz and tangles! In essence, it’s not good!

In contrast, if you condition your hair regularly, you’ll restore lost moisture whilst also keeping your hair tangle and frizz-free. Conditioning is quite simply one of the best things that you can do to your hair which is why it’s recommended that you condition once per week.

If your hair is in braids, a weave or any other ‘covered’ style then you’ll only need to wash it when it’s out. However, your hair is likely to be dirtier than usual because the dirt in your hair will have built up over time.

How often do you usually wash your hair?

Leave a comment below and share your thoughts.

Victoria x

Written by Victoria Posted in Afro Hair, bi-racial hair, black hair care tips, black hairstyle ideas, co-washing, co-washing natural hair, going from relaxed to natural, going natural, hair care regime, how to look after a short afro, how to look after a teeny weeny afro, how to look after mixed race hair, How to maintain a twa, how to shampoo natural hair, how to stop hair breakage, shampoo Tagged with shampoo