Whether your hair is a fade, shoulder-length, or a mullet, you’ll need to maintain a steady flow of maintenance haircuts. Hell, even bald guys need to shave their heads regularly so they don’t look like they’re still hanging on to those last remaining follicles. There’s no single right answer to how often you should get a haircut, but there are definitely limits, depending on your hairstyle.
“Every haircut has a different lifespan,” says Julius Arriola, co-founder of haircare brand STMNT and a celebrity barber. julius sieveserThey say. “It depends on many factors – whether it’s precise details, different lengths, textures, or simply designed around a person’s natural hair growth rate.”
A good way to tell when it’s time to get back in the barber’s chair is to look in the mirror and think. I’m looking a little out of shape. It’s only a matter of time before a grown-out buzzcut starts making you look like a mature chia pate or mullet, becoming less a fashion statement and more an lapse of extremely loose personal grooming.
As Arriola notes: “Hair doesn’t know what day it is.” Their clients can come for anywhere between one and six weeks. So when is it time to call your barber and schedule an appointment for a chop? Here are some general guidelines to help you figure it out when the time comes.
How often should I get a haircut if I have short hair?
Do you have a buzzcut? A little textured crop? A fade? You’ll probably need to get a trim every one to three weeks. The shorter the hairstyle, the more often you’ll want to do this to maintain a consistent look.
“Shorter styles like the skin fade are created on precision with precise lines and exaggerated gradients, so they naturally require more maintenance,” says Arriola. Since hair is short, it is more noticeable when it grows even slightly longer. An increase of one centimeter on a buzz looks much more pronounced than the same amount on a longer style. Plus, there’s a proper way to grow out the buzzcut we’ve reported on, for both those who want to try a new style or just want to bide their time before going to the salon.
And if you’re willing to cut your own hair, maybe put the clippers down a bit. Barbers are trained to give you precise, custom-tailored details for your cut. Arriola says attempting to replicate an expert’s skills may only result in “pushed-back outlines, disconnected sections, and a haircut that ultimately requires a complete reset.” There is a proper way to grow Buzzcut, but if you are not ready for it
How often should I get a haircut if I have long hair?
Long hair is now in style, with celebrities like Connor Story wearing a mullet at the Golden Globes and Jimin wearing an androgynous shoulder-length cut at Men’s Fashion Week. These longer looks – where hair is at least three inches long – may be able to withstand a lot of time between barber visits. The person cutting your hair should cut your hair so that they don’t stop looking good after a few weeks, and over time, the hair actually begins to reveal more of its character: a certain desired texture, the way the hair falls on the face, its shape becomes more defined.
“If (your hair) suddenly takes twice as long to style, loses its shape and balance, or no longer reflects how you want to present yourself, then maybe it’s time (to cut it),” says Arriola.
