How To Towel-Dry Your Hair The Right Way? (2024)

Towel drying your hair after a shower can feel great. However, if you aren't careful, you can severely damage your hair and cause weakened strands to fray or break.

As much as it is important to keep your hair clean, it is equally important to know how to dry your soaking strands. Once you've given your hair proper care in the shower, it's worth examining some techniques to towel drying your hair correctly.

In this article, we look at easy ways to towel dry your hair the right way, so that you can bid farewell to unwelcomed frizz, splits, and breakage. Read on to find out how to best towel dry your hair for an effortlessly beautiful look.

How To Towel-Dry Your Hair The Right Way? (1)

Highlights:

  • What Is Towel Drying?
  • Is Towel Drying Your Hair Good Or Bad?
  • How Do You Towel Dry Your Hair Without Damaging It?
  • Benefits Of Towel Drying Hair
  • What Towel Is Best For Drying Hair?

What Is Towel Drying?

When you towel-dry your hair, you use a towel or other absorbent material like a soft t-shirt to soak up moisture from your hair. This little step helps cut the time it takes to air-dry your hair.

Is Towel Drying Your Hair Good Or Bad?

There is a right and wrong way to towel-dry your hair.

When your hair is wet, it is at its most fragile state. At this point, rubbing it vigorously with a towel can cause long-term hair damage and cause your hair to fall out. Excessive rubbing with a towel can also lead to major frizz.

However, if you are gentle, use the right kind of towel, and take a few simple precautions, your hair will thank you later.

How Do You Towel Dry Your Hair Without Damaging It?

Towel drying can be beneficial if you know how to do it right. All you need is a soft microfiber hair towel. Remember, regular towels are rough and course and tend to tangle hair badly.

Once you finish washing your hair, gently squeeze out excess water, starting from the scalp and moving towards the ends. Your hair will still be damp, but it shouldn't be dripping wet. Next, gather a section of your hair and gently blot it with a towel.

The trick is never to rub your hair, instead gently squeeze it.

Once you finish drying all sections of your hair, you can repeat the process once more. This is not a mandatory step, but if you have long hair or if you feel your hair is still not dry enough, you may want to repeat this step.

How To Towel-Dry Your Hair The Right Way? (2)

If you have thick, long, curly hair that holds on to the water for a long time, you can try the 'wrapping your hair' technique to dry your hair. This technique requires a larger towel than blotting - it has to be soft and big enough to wrap your hair.

When you finish washing your hair, gently squeeze out excess water. Next, bend over and flip your hair forward, so it hangs straight down. Place a towel over your hair, so the bottom of the hair and the towel are in line. Twist the towel by starting as close to your forehead as possible. Flip the end of the twist on top of your head.

You can leave your hair in the wrap for about 20 minutes.

Also, ensure that all your hair is hanging in the same direction before you wrap. Be careful not to twist the towel very hard. Doing so can stress and pull your hair leading to breakage.

How To Towel-Dry Your Hair The Right Way? (3)

Note:

Don't rub or twist your hair too hard, as this can cause irreparable damage to your hair. Divide your hair into small sections and squeeze gently.

Benefits Of Towel Drying Hair

When done right, there are countless benefits of towel drying your hair. Some of the most significant ones include the following:

1. When you use a blow dryer, your hair is exposed to heat. Excessive heat can turn your hair frizzy and damage it. Towel drying saves your hair from getting exposed to extreme heat.

2. When you use a towel, you do not need to apply any product to dry your hair safely. Styling products and heat protectants often accumulate and build-up on your scalp leading to other hair and scalp issues. This doesn't happen when you use a towel for drying hair.

3. There is little or no friction when you dry your hair with a towel (of course, you shouldn't be rubbing your hair with the towel). The less the friction, the better it is for the health of your hair.

What Towel Is Best For Drying Hair?

A microfiber towel is the best option out there for drying your hair. Microfibers are a hundred times finer than human hair so they can pack up many fine fibers, providing a large surface area for the towel to absorb moisture.

The most significant benefit of using a microfiber towel is the lack of friction caused. Since there is no need to rub the hair to absorb water, there is less strain and friction inflicted on your hair.

Microfiber towels also last longer, providing better value for money. You will notice no trace of fiber or lint left on your hair, unlike cotton towels, when you dry your hair with a microfiber towel.

These towels absorb better than cotton towels so you can speed up the hair drying process and save a lot of time.

Wrapping Up

The absolute best way to dry your hair without damaging it is to use a combination of towel drying and air drying.

Using the right hair products, such as a nourishing leave-in conditioner or serum, can also help maintain your hair's health.

When its time to towel dry your hair, make sure you follow these tips and tricks listed above. It will not only help you dry your hair without damage but will also help fight frizz and control hair fall.

Begin By Knowing Your Skin

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How To Towel-Dry Your Hair The Right Way? (2024)

FAQs

How To Towel-Dry Your Hair The Right Way? ›

Fortunately, that's simple. After you've squeezed the excess water from your hair in the shower, take a portion of your hair between your hands and the towel. Beginning at the roots, gently press your hair into the towel from both sides. Work your way down to the tips, avoiding any twisting or pulling on the section.

What is the proper way to dry hair? ›

Say it with us now: low and slow. Higher heat = more damage, so stick to low-to-medium temps and move through your hair in sections. Slowly follow your hair's natural flow from root to end with your blow dryer nozzle to limit tangles and tears.

What is the healthiest way to dry your hair? ›

The best way to dry your hair is to let it air dry under the fan as much as possible. However, some experts believe combining air and blow-drying is healthier than just air drying. It is good to let your hair air-dry seventy percent of the way and then blow-dry till they become dry ultimately.

How wet should towel dry hair be? ›

Towel dried means not dry all the way but not dripping wet. You want it damp but take that extra water out of the hair to allow the hair color to take and absorb into the hair strand. I hope this answered your question today.

Should you fully dry your hair with a towel? ›

Towel-drying your hair is important to help remove water, so hair can dry faster. Yet, the wrong technique can result in extra frizz, tangles, and poufiness. The right ways to air dry hair include gentle drying techniques. It's best to use your towel to squeeze water out from your hair.

How do you dry your hair like a professional? ›

Always use a nozzle to centralize air over the bristles of your brush around five inches away from taut sections of hair, and pointed down to minimize flyaways. Dry the hair from roots to ends, going slowly in small sections in order to seal the cuticle.

Does it matter how I dry my hair? ›

And while excessive heat from a hair dryer can damage your hair more than not using a dryer at all, blow-drying your hair at the right distance and temperature can actually cause less damage than letting your hair air-dry, Elizabeth says. That's because when hair comes in contact with water, it swells.

Is letting hair air dry bad? ›

While excessive heat can cause damage to the surface layer of the hair, air-drying can cause trauma to that inner lipid layer, which will make your strands weaker as a result. Over time, something called hygral fatigue happens, i.e. repeated swelling of the hair.

Is it healthier to let your hair dry naturally? ›

Which types of hair benefit from air-drying? People with fine, wavy, straight, thin, curly, and dyed hair are the most likely to benefit from air-drying. “It's healthier for people with this hair type because [air-drying] lacks heat, and it's not directly on the scalp,” Sturdivant-Drew says.

How to dry hair properly after a shower? ›

Use the best towel to dry hair

After showering, gently pat your hair dry with a soft, clean towel. During the drying process, avoid rubbing your hair vigorously. Aggressive motions can cause tangles and damage to your hair. Instead, be gentle and nurturing as you pat your hair dry.

Is letting hair dry naturally better? ›

Despite the risks, there are benefits of air-drying your hair. For starters, you avoid heat damage. "If you utilize a hair dryer too close to the scalp, you can cause excessive heat damage, creating inflammation at the scalp level," said trichologist William Gaunitz.

Does the towel method work? ›

"While the towel trick might benefit body alignment, I'm sorry to say it wouldn't do much for weight loss," noted Creveling. "There's just no quick trick for that." As f*ckutsudzi initially shared, using a towel can help enhance your post-workout stretching routine.

Why does the Japanese towel method work? ›

What this exercise really does is that it balances the spine and helps you correct your posture. So by placing a towel behind your back, the method is said to help correct the posture by aligning the spine and pelvis, pulling the navel region and preventing the fat from accumulating in the abdominal area.

Is it better to air dry or use a towel for hair? ›

Air Drying

A day when you plan to air dry is therefore a great day for a nourishing hair mask. It is also a good idea to begin with a light towel dry to get the worst of the water off and then comb through with either a paddle brush or - if your hair is more susceptible to frizz - a wide-toothed comb.

Is it better to dry hair with towel or t-shirt? ›

Using a Cotton T-Shirt on Wet Hair

Similar to microfiber towels for hair, cotton t-shirts are soft and don't catch on the hair strands or cause breakage. Also, the fibers in cotton t-shirts are woven closer together, so they absorb water without over-drying your hair. We got to say, this is a hair hack worth trying!

How to dry hair without it getting frizzy? ›

After washing your hair, gently squeeze out excess water using a microfiber towel or an old cotton t-shirt. Avoid rough towel drying, as the friction can lead to frizz and damage the cuticle. Instead, pat or scrunch your hair with the towel/t-shirt to remove moisture without causing excessive friction.

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