Hair Porosity Explained

Understanding your hair goes beyond just knowing your curl type. One of the most important things to help you when choosing your hair products is knowing your hair porosity. I know what you are thinking, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?

Your hair porosity mainly depends on whether you have excessive heat damage, chemically treated hair, or coloured hair. If the answer is yes, then you most probably have high porosity hair. Now let’s get into defining the different grades of porosity: low, normal and high.

Test for Porosity: take a hair strand, run your fingers up and down, if you can actually feel the thickness of the strand and it feels smooth then you have low to medium porosity. However, if you notice any bumps along the way or any roughness- it means you have high porosity.

Low porosity: Your hair does not soak in water, product or colour well because of the closed cuticle in your hair, which can be prone to build up. You require warm showers to be able to open up the cuticle and to brush through/detangle your hair. You may also notice that it takes a while for your hair to get thoroughly wet and a very long time to fully dry up after styling. People with low porosity hair are usually protein sensitive too, so they prefer to use products with little to none protein in them.

Normal/Medium porosity: You probably have virgin hair, never coloured or coloured once or twice in your whole life without making any drastic changes to your natural hair colour. You can also pretty much experiment with any type of product and your hair will be okay with it. Your hair does not take too long to dry, always loves a combination of moisture and protein. You may require deep conditioning treatments once a week, and use a light leave-in conditioner in your styling routine.

High porosity: Now, if you have recently had highlights, or have gone several shades lighter than your natural hair colour, your hair cuticles are most probably very open, rough and damaged due to the chemicals. You may notice that your hair gets wet pretty quickly, and dries up in a short amount of time similarly. When washing your hair, you see a lot of hair fall due to the tangles, and your hair breaks very easily. This means that your hair requires a lot of protein to strengthen it up and reduce the frizz. A leave-in conditioner is always required, amongst other products. Extra care, deep conditioning and regular hair trims are very crucial to maintain your hair’s health and ensure it does not fall or break easily.