How To Determine Your Hair Type And Style It Accordingly

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How To Determine Your Hair Type And Style It Accordingly

What’s your hair type? If you already know, clever you! If not, you’ve come to the right place. Just as it’s important to know our blood type, skin type and sex language (in that order, of course), knowing our hair type can determine how we manage our daily styling and the products that will best suit our strands.

So, whether your mane falls flat at the slightest increase in humidity, or your curls continuously refuse to behave, we’re here to help.

From super-fine to coarse to frizzy and everything in between, it’s time to determine your hair type and how best to style it, once and for all.

What are the three hair types?

#1 Straight

Greasy, oily, limp, lifeless – are these the words you associate with your ‘do? Fret not, fellow flathead, for there is beauty in straight hair, too!

The way to approach it is this: know what styles are going to work – and what won’t – in your favour, because the sooner you do, the sooner you’ll stop those dead-straight strands from raining on your parade.

So if you can’t get more than one-and-a-half days between washes and you’ve got an unnerving addiction to dry shampoo, then stick around, because we’re about to get real.

#2 Wavy

Those with straight strands might look at this category of locks with envy, but it can be tough getting those waves to behave. Without the right haircare goods on your side, wavy locks can mean risky business.

#3 Curly

Whether you’re working with tight corkscrew curls to ones you can poke a finger through, curls are typically much coarser than other hair types. Because of the many twists and turns of this texture type, it’s hard to get moisture to the scalp and maintain shine.

How to style your hair type

Styling straight hair…

Featuring baby-fine strands with no real oomph, straight hair can often refuse to hold a curl, no matter how hard you try. For an instant lift, keep a dry shampoo or texturising spray like the Batiste Original Dry Shampoo ($9.99, Chemist Warehouse) on hand.

Remember to avert your eyes from heavy shampoos and conditioners – they’ll only weigh your ‘do down and turn up the grease factor twofold.

If your roots are lacking any real oomph and body, try sprinkling a weightless volumising powder – like the got2b Powder’ful Volumizing Styling Powder ($8.39, Chemist Warehouse) – through your roots.

Styling wavy hair…

Wavy hair will often toe the line between intentional bed head and needs a brush. Funnily enough, nailing this effortless texture actually requires some effort.

Take small sections of hair and loosely curl them with a curling iron. Follow up with a light spritz of a sea salt spray like the JUSTICE Professional Sea Salt Spray ($19.95, Justice Professional), and scrunch.

If your waves are on the thicker and coarser side, however, they’ll typically require a little more maintenance. In this case we we recommend a mousse like the De Lorenzo Elements Motion Styling Mousse ($23, Hair House) to help create control without interfering with your natural movement.

If your hair is frizz-prone with little relief, we recommend ditching your usual shampoo in place of smoothing and humidity-repellent formulation like Redken’s Frizz Dismiss Shampoo ($36, Adore Beauty).

Styling curly hair…

When your hair is bigger than your body it can take a full 24 hours to dry. Throw heat styling into the equation and you might be there all night.

Instead of trying to tame and control your curls, why not just embrace them? After all, you’re the hair type with natural body – consider yourself blessed. Finger-styling and deep conditioning treatments are a must to keep curls looking bouncy, beautiful and tangle-free.

And when things start looking a little dry, boost your hair’s hydration by adding a nourishing hair oil like the Kérastase Paris Elixir Ultime ($72, Adore Beauty).

Which of these hair types is best suited to you?

Have you tried any of the products mentioned?

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Comments 60

  1. To apply anything in your you have to find out what type of hair you have so can use the hair care products according that. As I have the dry and frizzy hair, so I use onion oil which makes my hair so smooth and I always use this, But I definitely will say this is very informative blog which can help out us.

  2. I have fine, soft straight hair (but a lot of it) with a very slight wave. Nothing ‘gentle’ stays in my hair or is somehow helpful. Pins fall out, products make my hair heavy and I’m still looking for those perfect hair products.

  3. Assuming that straight hair is limp and lifeless is just wrong.

    Mine is straight but thick and there’s lots of it. So my challenge isn’t giving it volume, it’s keeping it tame. I only wash once a week, and literally the first two days it has too much oomph, it’s not until day 3 that it’s actually a bit more manageable.

  4. Mine is definitely somewhere between all three depending on my hormones, the weather, the shampoo and conditioner and products I use (and other inexplicable things). I just got a good hair cut and the curls are really coming through. I like sea salt spray but it’s drying so only on special occasions. I also make a gel with flax seeds (I just boil up flax from the supermarket with a little water until it starts to thicken) strain and scrunch it through which definitely helps the curl come through and doesn’t dry my hair (I think it’s actually nourishing). If my hair is acting very straight I’ll let it be and won’t try to fight it – otherwise it’s all frizz. Straighteners (and especially silicone based products designed to make hair sleeker) do not work for me – my hair gets very straight for about 30 mins and then pays me back with ugly, messy, frizzy hair that isn’t nice. I’ve learned to just enjoy the variations.

  5. One side of my hair is really wavy the other side is straight hair. So it is very hard for me to style my hair looking at getting a long bob hairstyle, haven’t had my hair cut in a very long time.

  6. I have fine-textured hair, but lots of it. My hair has always been prone to knots, but now it is so super dry and tangled that it is hard to manage. After trying some hair products with protein a few years ago, they made my hair brittle and straw-like so I avoid anything with protein. Thankfully I have discovered a few detangling brushes that help me manage the tangles.

  7. I like wavy hair. My hair already naturally wavy. So I don’t need do much effort to styling it.I use John Frieda sea salt spray and Tony and Guy leave in conditioner to style it.

  8. My hair is mostly straight but tends to be wavy at the end. I also end up with random curls sometimes as a result of how I sleep on my side particularly overnight after I have just washed my hair.

  9. Why does all content about waves and curls jump from slight waves to teeny corkscrew curls.
    Umn I think I’m wavy/curly. My hair changes though, I shocked my hairdresser by turning up after a year asking for a perm and she was saying to everyone “but she had really curly hair last year, now it’s the slightest wave”. It’s weird, I don’t understand it or know how to look after it.

  10. I love dying my own hair because not only does it save me a small fortune but I also get to try out a new colour or new brand when I want to rather than being tied to what a Hairdresser finds easier.