So you’ve got your hands on some of our luscious hair extensions and you feel ready to take on the world – but how do you make this feeling last? If you’ve worn hair extensions before you’ll know that, eventually, they start to look a little worse for wear.
Choosing a premium human hair extension brand will certainly help, but what else can you do to make your hair extensions last longer?
Fortunately, you’ve come to the experts!
Today, we’re going to be sharing our top 5 tips on how to make your hair extensions last longer.
5 Ways to Make Your Hair Extensions Last Longer
1) Learn to Wash Your Extensions Correctly
If you’ve got human hair extensions, you’re in the right to think that you can treat that hair just like your own. That said, what you can’t treat just like the rest of your hair is the adhesive (whether it be literal glue or micro rings) holding your hair extensions in place.
It’s important to remember that even thread holding in sewn-in extensions will wear over time. You need to ensure you’re not putting unnecessary pressure on your hair extensions, which is most common when you’re washing your hair.
Make sure you listen to the guidance of your stylist here (they’ll be able to advise you if any products are a no-go) and stick to sulfate-free and alcohol-free shampoos and conditioners, as these ingredients strip your hair of its natural oils.
We recommend conditioning your extensions whenever you wash your hair (so around 1-3 times a week), but make sure you don’t condition higher than a few inches below your lowest extensions.
Conditioning your roots can leave them feeling greasy, and the conditioner may cause your extensions to slip, especially as you wash the conditioner out of your hair.
2) Don’t Go to Bed Wet
Letting your hair dry naturally is a great way to avoid heat damage. But going to bed with wet hair isn’t so good, especially if you’ve got extensions. Your extensions are much more likely to become tangled or fall out if you go to bed with wet hair.
Even if you brush it out before you go to bed, there’s a good chance you’ll end up with a bird’s nest by morning, and brushing that out won’t be easy on your extensions.
Instead, avoid washing your hair late at night and make sure it’s fully dry before you hit the hay.
3) Brush Your Hair with Conditioner
As we touched on above, one of the most damaging things for hair extensions is having to brush out knots. One of the best ways to maintain knot-free hair is to brush or comb it through when the conditioner is on your hair.
The conditioner will make it easy for the comb to pass through without pulling at the hair and will distribute it, too.
Children’s anti-tangle hair spray is a good option for brushing your hair when you’re not washing it if it’s prone to becoming tangled.
4) Avoid Heat Damage
What do you want to do when you get hair extensions? Style it, of course! All that beautiful hair is ideal for trying all the styles you’ve seen on your favorite influencers and gurus, but using a lot of heat will come at a cost.
In the same way our natural hair develops damage and split ends from heat and rough brushing, so too do our hair extensions.
The difference is that while our natural hair is growing and can replace the damaged hair over time, there’s no going back for our hair extensions.
If you want to prolong the life of your hair extensions, you need to avoid using excessive heat. Here are a few quick tips to help you use less heat:
- Adjust the setting – many curlers and straighteners have heat settings now
- Use heat protection products – a heat protectant spray is a must before you style it
- Embrace heat-free looks – there are some great ways to get wavy and curly looks with heat-free rollers, braids, and even braiding socks into your hair!
- Keep the same style between washes – if you straighten your hair after you wash it, keep it straight until your next wash so you only need to touch it up each morning, rather than using heat on all your hair
5) Sleep Styled
Okay, we don’t mean you need to go to bed having just curled your hair – but going to bed without giving a thought to your hair can lead to excessive tangling and pulling.
This goes double if you have a partner who may rest an arm on your hair in the night.
Instead of leaving it loose, try tying it back in a low ponytail with a silk scrunchie or putting it into braids. The latter is a great way to wake up with wavy hair so you don’t have much styling to do in the morning.
Another option is to use a sleep cap (also known as a satin bonnet) to protect your hair while you sleep.
If you implement all 5 of these top tips your extensions will look as good as the day you got them for far longer than they would otherwise.
The good news is all of these tips are good for your natural hair, too! If you do all these tips and you’re not seeing results, it may be down to the hair extensions you started with.
Treat yourself to some of our luxurious human hair extensions to get the most out of your self-care.