If you’re looking to dye your hair for the first time, you may be concerned about the rumors that coloring causes damage to your natural hair. Having the hair color you want is not worth dealing with dry and split hair, after all.

Thankfully, proper care and professionals can minimize any damage that is naturally caused by using a coloring procedure.

In this article, we’ll give you a quick understanding of how hair is damaged during the coloring process and the best way for you to have a brand new look without extensive damage.

Difference in Colors

Lightening or darkening your hair is a chemical process that either deposits or strips away natural color; this process either deposits or removes color particles. It does this by lifting up your hair cuticles and applying the color or stripping it from the hair.

Whenever you lift your natural hair color to apply a lighter color, you first pull the pigment from the strand of hair. The follicle is opened up with chemical relaxing agents, which leaves room for a new color to be left behind.

Yes, there is damage done to your hair with any chemical dye or bleach. But, there are varying degrees of damage that dye can cause depending on the hair dye type used.

Semi-Permanent Dye

Semi-permanent dye is widely available and very popular for makeovers done at home. The dye particles in semi-permanent dyes are too big to sink into the hair and eventually wash away.

Semi-permanent dyes usually last 6-8 weeks. These dyes cause far less damage than permanent colors.

However, a majority of semi-permanent dyes are vivid colors such as green or pink. Many people have naturally dark hair, and to see the bright dye, they need to bleach their hair multiple levels lighter.

While semi-permanent dye itself is less damaging, you need to use a lightening/bleach to allow the dye to be seen. Bleaching your hair like this can be just as harmful as using permanent dyes.