How to Maintain Highlights for Your Hair: Top Tips and Tricks

Did you know that people have been trying to put highlights in their hair since 4 B.C.? Back then, the ancient Greeks would try to sit in the sun with olive oil and pollen in their hair. Of course, this technique wasn’t nearly as effective as the highlighting methods we have today.

However, the problem of highlights for your hair remains the same: what is the best treatment for hair after highlights? What can you do to keep your highlighted hair healthy and what can you do to make sure your highlights last as long as possible?

Keep reading and learn more about how to keep highlighted hair healthy and long-lasting down below.

What to Know Before You Get Your Highlights?

Before you step into a salon and before you learn how to take care of highlighted hair at home, you will need to know what to expect before you get your highlights. If you have ever colored your hair before, you know that maintaining the new color can be a challenge unless you’re careful. The same goes for hair highlights.

However, the challenge of maintaining your highlights can differ depending on what your natural hair color is. You will also need to keep in mind that in order to get highlights, you will need to introduce chemicals into your hair. If you have thin or sensitive hair, these chemicals may damage your hair more than normal.

On the other hand, if you have very strong and thick hair, you might not have much to worry about. However, you still may end up with some level of hair damage because, after all, to lighten hair you often need bleach. This is especially true if you have dark hair and want to get highlights.

Bleaching your hair, even if it isn’t your whole head of hair, can cause a lot of frizz and damage. But don’t let this deter you from getting highlights in the first place. You just need to know what to do so if your hair does end up getting damaged, it doesn’t get any worse.

There are plenty of things you can do to make sure your hair doesn’t become a frizzy mess once you get your highlights. There are also several things you can do to make sure your highlights keep their color and don’t start fading soon after you get them. You will mainly need to consider your hair’s hydration and how often you wash your hair.

How to Maintain Highlights on Black Hair?

Black hair is one of the most difficult shades to highlight because it is so dark. If you try to highlight black hair without bleach, it won’t work. Or, it might create a strange color that won’t look good on your hair at all.

Because you will need stronger chemicals to treat your hair, your hair will be exposed to more heat. The more heat your hair endures, the higher the chance it might become damaged. Besides that, your highlights might end up with a brassy look that won’t look as pretty as it sounds.

Rather, instead of the blondish highlights, you might be going for, brassy highlights are very orange. The reason why brassy highlights tend to appear in dark hair is that not all the pigment has lifted out of the strands of hair. This is why you need the bleach before adding highlights.

Bleach will remove most of any pigment you have in your hair. This will prevent any brassy highlights from occurring. But what should you do once you have your highlights?

Getting toners for your hair is one of the best things you can do to make sure that your highlights last for as long as possible. Toners will be able to enhance the tone of your highlights. This is ideal because, over a period of time, you might notice that your highlights are not as bright as they used to be.

By using toners when your highlights start to fade, they will remain as bright as ever. Washing your hair too much is a big culprit when it comes to fading highlights. Many people wash their hair every day, but you might have to skip a few washes if you want your highlights to last.

How to Maintain Highlights on Brown Hair?

Whether you need to maintain highlights on black hair or brown hair, you will experience similar problems. As such, you will need to use similar solutions. Even though your brown hair might not be as dark as black hair, you will still need to put in a little extra effort when it comes to maintaining your highlights.

As with black hair, brown hair has a chance to become brassy. Since no one wants orange highlights, your stylist will need to use some bleach. The good thing is that not as much bleach will be necessary for your hair as with black hair.

This will prevent your hair from getting too damaged, although it may still sustain a certain level of damage. Most of this damage comes from the heat that the hair chemicals produce. For that reason, once you have your highlights, you should stay away from anything that will heat your hair.

So, stay away from curling irons and straightening irons. While it might be tempting to style your hair with these tools, you should avoid them at all costs. Heating your highlighted hair will only make any damage you have worse.

Do you really want to be walking around with frizzy hair after you got some beautiful highlights? Another reason to avoid hot hair tools is that your hair will likely be sensitive after the highlights. Since your hair is not as strong as usual, there is a higher chance that it could break apart if you use hot hair-styling tools.

Some hairstylists even suggest that you stay away from blow driers if you want to maintain your highlights. Letting your hair air dry is a much better option. It will also keep your hair from getting too frizzy.

How to Maintain Highlights on Blonde Hair?

You might think that getting highlights on blonde hair would be an easy task, but it isn’t. Getting highlights might not be an issue if you have hair that is naturally very light, but most people don’t have this kind of hair. Instead, you might have been very blonde as a child, but now your hair may be a darker and more drab dishwater blonde.

If this is the case, you will still face some challenges when getting highlights for your hair and maintaining those highlights. Even blonde hair may suffer from brassy highlights, depending on how dark your blonde hair is. Keep in mind that your highlights can also become brassy if they become too damaged or exposed to things such as too much sunlight.

One of the best things you can do to make sure your highlights remain as bright as possible for as long as possible is to use purple shampoo. Purple shampoo is able to balance the color of your hair like no other product can. If you think that your highlights are starting to look a little dull or brassy, hop into the shower and use some purple shampoo.

You will find that after a few weeks of using this shampoo, your highlights will look as bright as when you first got them. But again, keep in mind that washing your hair every day can lead to dull highlights as well. For that reason, try washing your hair every other day with purple shampoo.

A way to keep your highlights from getting dull in the first place is to use dry shampoo. When you use dry shampoo, you won’t be damaging your hair in the shower or bath with a bunch of hot water. Dry shampoo tends to be gentler than ordinary shampoo.

How to Maintain Highlights on Red Hair?

Very few people have naturally red hair. On the other hand, many people have red hair that is dyed. Whether you have natural or dyed red hair, there are a few tips you will need to follow to ensure that your highlights last as long as possible.

The first challenge is finding the right shade for your highlights in the first place. Highlighting red hair can often look strange, but fortunately, a good stylist such as Mockbabeautysalon.com will be able to give you the best results. A problem that may happen if you have dyed red hair is that the red dye may attempt to bleed into the highlights.

This can happen even after you get your highlights, especially if you have recently dyed your hair. If this happens, your highlights will look like a mess. To prevent this from happening, make sure your highlights are separated from the rest of your red hair when you get the highlights in the first place.

Then, when you go home with the finished product, you will have to be very careful. The act of washing your hair may start to add red pigment to your highlights. This will dull your highlights pretty fast and you can lose a lot of money and time this way.

For that reason, you will need to be very gentle when maintaining your highlights with red hair. You will want to use a very gentle shampoo and conditioner that is very hydrating. Your best bet is to use dry shampoo as mentioned before.

This shampoo is very gentle and it will cause the least amount of irritation to your hair color. Keeping your hair out of the sun is important as well. The sun might start to dull your highlights over time.

Tips on Maintaining Your Highlights:

While every hair color will have specific challenges when it comes to maintaining highlights, there are certain things you can do to keep your highlights healthy regardless of your hair color. The first thing to keep in mind is that you will need to condition your hair much more often than you usually would. This is because your hair will have sustained a certain level of damage.

If you don’t condition more than usual, you will find that your hair will be quite frizzy and dry. Keep in mind that you don’t need to get into the shower to condition your hair. Using a leave-in conditioner after your shower is a great idea.

Leave-in conditioners will give your hair the extra moisture and nutrients it needs to stay healthy. And, if your hair is healthy, it will better be able to hold onto its highlights. Besides conditioning, you might find that using hair masks will be beneficial.

Hair masks come in all different forms but you should always focus on masks that provide the most amount of hydration. You can even try using some hair masks at home. Using honey or eggs is a classic way to add some extra moisture, nutrients, and shine to your hair.

Finally, avoid products that might damage your hair. As mentioned before, curling irons and flat irons are terrible for your hair if you just got highlights. The heat is only going to damage your hair more.

The same goes for using a hair drier. If you have no choice but to use a hair drier, be sure to use it on its lowest setting. If it has a cold air setting, use that.