14 Tips on How to Take Care of Dyed Natural Hair

Hair dyes add a special touch to natural hair.

Whether you’ve dyed your hair with a bold color to spice up your look and personality or you’ve dyed it black to improve its natural color, one thing’s common:

You’ve got chemical hair dye on your hair.

Natural hair is prone to dryness and breakage because of the structure of hair strands.

Chemical hair dyes are known to have a drying, damaging effect on hair.

Your hair is at greater risk, but only if you do not know how to take care of dyed natural hair.

With the tips below, you’ll be able to keep your dyed hair in good shape for a long time and maintain your hair’s health.

How to Take Care of Dyed Natural Hair

Chemical hair dyes damage the hair because they affect the hair cuticle to change its color.

They also usually contain ingredients that are not good for your hair’s health like ammonia and quaternium-15.

So you need to take extra care if you want to keep your hair healthy while using hair dyes.

The tips here will help you avoid chemical hair damage and keep your hair’s health intact.

They may require a bit of work but considering the possible side effects of hair dyes, it’s definitely worth it.

Here are things you’ve got to do:

1. Prepare before dyeing

Caring for your dyed natural hair begins before you get the dye on your hair.

Since the hair dye will be exposing your hair to some level of damage, you want to ensure that your hair is free from damage before coloring it.

Check for knotted hair ends, split ends, and breakage; conditions that indicate that your hair is dry and likely not ready for dyeing.

You may want to get an experienced hairstylist to check your hair for these areas and correct them before color treatment

You should also ensure that your hair benefits from regular moisturizing and conditioning weeks before you dye it.

2. Shampoo less often

Most shampoos are not nice to your hair’s natural oils.

They’d remove oil and moisture and leave your hair dry.

Considering that your dyed natural hair is already prone to dryness and breakage, you should shampoo your hair less often.

You may want to consider co-washing as an alternative.

You should not shampoo your dyed natural hair more than once a week, to keep it from drying out.

When you wash your hair, use either lukewarm or cold water. Hot water can ruin your hair color or even damage it.

3. Moisturize more often

After dyeing your natural hair, leave-in conditioners and hair oils should be your new best friend.

You should moisturize your hair with them at least once a day.

Many who keep dyed natural hair have found coconut oil, argan oil, and jojoba oil to be very effective moisture sealants.

Apply these hair oils to your all through, focusing on the hair ends since they are usually weaker.

You should also have an effective leave-in conditioner for natural hair, like the mega growth leave-in strengthener.

Use these products daily to keep your dyed natural hair in good health.

4. Be picky with hair products

With your dyed natural hair, you should not just smear on any hair product that comes your way.

When buying hair products like shampoos, moisturizers, or conditioners, try to choose those specially formulated for color-treated hair.

If a hair product label does not indicate that it is meant for color-treated hair, ensure that it does not contain harsh hair ingredients like sulfates before buying.

Otherwise, you’ll be doing your hair more harm than good with hair products. Regular hair products that contain sulfates are masters at drying out hair, and that’ll be worse for dyed natural hair.

5. Practice night care

Before going to bed, you should ensure that your dyed natural hair is ready for the night.

That’s important because rubbing your hair against pillows and bedsheets when you sleep increases its chances of breaking.

You should apply hair oils or leave-in conditioners to your hair and keep it in a simple protective hairstyle.

If you have a busy schedule that leaves you crashing into bed almost immediately you get home, taking a few seconds to tuck your hair in a satin or silk bonnet can keep it safe through the night.

Then, you can do the usual moisturizing the next morning.

6. Treat your hair gently

This is especially important when styling your dyed hair.

You should go to a hairstylist who knows the dos and don’ts of dyed natural hair.

Your stylist should part, comb, and style your hair gently.

You also want to reduce how often you manipulate your hair.

Remember that dyed natural hair is fragile and should be treated as such.

7. Reduce heat styling

Frequent use of heat tools can damage any type of hair, so it’s a no-no for dyed natural hair.

If you’ve dyed your natural hair, you should provide it with as much moisture as possible and keep it away from anything that can dry it out — like curling irons, hair dryers, and straighteners.

If you have to use them a few times to achieve a certain style, always use heat protectants and set the tool to a low heat setting.

8. Avoid other chemical processes

Hair dyeing is a chemical process, one that you likely repeat every five to six weeks.

Since you do that already, you should avoid other chemical hair processes like perming, relaxing, or texturizing so that you do not expose your hair to further chemical damage.

Exposing your hair to a lot of chemicals at a time will cause hair damage and may even lead to health issues.

9. Hot oil treatments

To maintain your dyed natural hair, you’ll need hot oil treatments.

It will moisturize your hair and add luster to your dyed hair to improve its look. Although they are called “hot oil” treatments, you are not going to be applying hot oil to your hair here.

All you need to do is to warm your favorite hair oil for about 20 seconds and turn off the heat source.

When it feels warm enough to touch without causing burns, apply it to your hair and cover it with a plastic bag for about 30 minutes.

Then, rinse off with a mild shampoo.

You can add a few drops of essential oils like lavender oil to add a nice scent to your hair.

10. Deep condition

Regular deep conditioning should be a part of your dyed natural hair routine.

It helps to deeply moisturize your hair. While you moisturize your hair daily with leave-in conditioners and hair oils, you’ll need a deep conditioning session every month.

This will help to deeply infuse your hair with moisture so it stays healthy.

Deep conditioning is pretty easy when you follow the right steps to deep-condition hair.

11. Avoid chlorinated water

Water that contains chlorine can damage your dyed natural hair, causing it to dry out and look lifeless.

Swimming pool water usually contains high levels of chlorine, so if you’ve got dyed hair, be ready to let go of ‘dripping wet hair in the pool’ picture ideas.

If you’ll be swimming, ensure to tuck your hair in a protective covering that prevents contact with water like shower caps.

If your home water contains high levels of chlorine, it’d be wise to install a shower filter to remove chlorine from your water when you shower. 

12. Protect from UV

Ultraviolet (UV) light from the sun damages dyed natural hair.

It can lighten your hair color, which would be sad considering your efforts to achieve a certain hair color.

Aside from the aesthetic effects, UV light can cause protein loss in hair, making your hair weaker.

To keep your dyed natural hair safe, use hair products that contain UV protectants (you can check the product label to confirm).

Also when you go out on very sunny days, ensure to cover your hair with a hat, scarf, or other hair coverings.

13. Make trims regular

Each time you retouch your hair color, look out for split ends and fix them by trimming. Regular trimming is important to prevent your dyed hair from splitting further and getting damaged.

Apart from preventing damage, regular trims also help your colored hair look healthy, not frizzy, weak, and rough.

14. Choose a good hair dye

True, all hair dyes are made of chemicals (except if you’re opting for natural ways to darken hair).

But some hair dyes contain even more dangerous chemicals like formaldehyde.

Other hair dyes contain natural oils, and keratin boosters, and are less harsh on the hair.

It’s obvious which ones are best.

Check the ingredients list before choosing a hair dye or ask for expert advice.

Choose hair dyes that contain less harsh ingredients and more natural oils.

That way, you can get nice colored hair and still protect your hair.

Color And Stay Safe

Dyeing your natural hair is a nice way to stand out and have some fun with your hair.

Like almost every other hair process, there are damage risks attached to it.

You can reduce the chances of your hair getting damaged by dyes by practicing the tips above.

Shampoo less often, moisturize and deep condition regularly, and be gentle with your hair.

That way, you’ll not just protect your hair’s health but also get to keep your color popping for a long time!

Or you can save yourself some stress and opt for natural black hair dyes.