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How To Hydrate Your Hair After Bleaching
Updated on June 9, 2026 | 5 min read
Jaclyn LaBadia, Davines Writer
Bleaching dark hair can give you a bold new look, but it also leaves your strands vulnerable, dry, and fragile. With the right routine, you can restore hydration and keep your bleached hair looking healthy and vibrant so that you can wear your new look with confidence.
Below, we break down what bleach actually does to your hair, plus professional tips, treatments, and DIY remedies for deep hydration. This includes expert advice from Davines Regional Master Trainer Julia Tomczek.
Key Takeaways
What to Know Rehydrating Hair
- Bleach weakens and dehydrates hair by opening the cuticle and stripping natural oils.
- Wash less frequently and use moisturizing conditioners to avoid further drying.
- Weekly hair masks can nourish damaged hair.
- Always treat bleached hair gently, especially when wet or towel-drying.
- Add oils before and after washing to lock in hydration and protect from further damage.
- Use protein treatments and bond repair treatments to give your bleached hair extra strength.
In This Article
What Does Bleach Do to Hair?
How To Make Bleached Hair Soft and Silky
Bonus Lifestyle Tips for Softer, Healthier Bleached Hair
FAQs
Hydrate Your Bleached Hair the Davines Way
What Does Bleach Do to Hair?
Understanding the science behind bleaching can help you better care for your hair. Your hair porosity can be high or low. High porosity hair has open hair cuticles, and low porosity hair has more closed hair cuticles. When you bleach your hair, you’re opening up the hair cuticles to allow alkali agents in that dissolve the melanin (natural pigment) in your hair and break down fatty acids. After you bleach your hair, it begins to have high hair porosity, causing moisture loss and breakage, which leads to the split ends and dryness we associate with damaged, bleached hair.
How To Make Bleached Hair Soft and Silky
These easy but essential habits and product swaps can help you bring softness and shine back to bleached hair.
1. Wash Your Hair Less Often
In the first three weeks after your bleach treatment, your hair is weak and more susceptible to breakage. Using shampoo strips the cuticle of even more of the natural oils you need for hair growth and health. Wash your hair every three to four days, and use a shower cap on the non-wash days.
Stretch your time between washes
Add a refreshing dry shampoo like This is an Invisible Dry Shampoo into your hair care routine to make hair last as long as possible between washes.
2. Choose Ultra-Moisturizing Conditioners
Washing your hair less often doesn’t mean giving up your hair care routine entirely. Bleaching your strands leaves them dry, so it’s important to use hydrating conditioners and deep conditioners like the NOUNOU Conditioner, which leaves your hair up to 9.9 times shinier.
Expert tip from Julia Tomczek
Your hair needs more moisture, and getting wet just isn’t enough. Imagine jumping into a pool vs. drinking a glass of water. If you’re parched, the first doesn’t do much to quench your thirst. Using moisturizing conditioners will push the hydration back into those weakened strands (like drinking a glass of water) and repair the hair to give it softness and shine. Make sure all your products are made for bleached hair to give max moisture.
3. Use Weekly Hair Masks
After undergoing the stress of bleach, treat your hair to weekly nourishing hair masks by The Circle Chronicles, with hair masks for all types of hair. Coconut oil, avocado oil, and olive oil masks are perfect for replenishing essential lipids. Focus the application on your ends, where dryness and damage are most pronounced. DIY recipes work too! Try using a DIY coconut oil mask overnight or honey and olive oil for a 30-minute boost.
Hair masks for every hair need
From deep repair to boosting softness and shine, there's a mask for you.
4. Be Gentle When Drying Your Hair
Wet hair is extra fragile. Use a microfiber towel or cotton T-shirt to gently blot water instead of rubbing. Comb while your conditioner is still in to prevent snagging.
Expert tip from Julia Tomczek
Be gentle with your bleached strands when drying. It is the most fragile when it's wet, so being too rough can further damage. Use a softer towel or t-shirt to squeeze the water out rather than rubbing, and try detangling while the conditioner is in to reduce roughing the cuticle and creating more harm.
5. Add Hair Oils to Your Routine
Oils are key to making bleached hair soft and silky. As both a pre- and post-shower treatment, a nourishing hair oil helps hydrate and protect roughed-up cuticles from the bleaching process.
Expert tips from Julia Tomczek
- Using a hair oil before shampooing can be a great way to lock in moisture. Pre-treating your hair with oil before shampooing can create a buffer for your strands to keep the shampoo from stripping your hair.
- Using oil after you get out of the shower helps lock hydration in. Oil creates a layer that moisture can’t escape. Bleached hair needs all the help it can get.
- The first 3 weeks after bleaching are the most crucial, so use that oil every day to repair the lack of that natural oil barrier.
6. Avoid Hot Tools Temporarily
If you’re using hot tools on bleached hair, you're exposing dry, vulnerable strands to even more damage. Heat styling can rough up already delicate hair. Let your hair air dry and use a leave-in heat protectant if you must style.
Heat protection up to 446°F
Our best-selling OI All In One Milk has everything your hair needs in one spray. Combat frizz, protect from heat, boost softness, and add shine for your healthiest, silkiest hair yet.
7. Use Hair Treatments
A protein treatment for bleached hair works hard to give your hair the extra nutrients needed to keep your hair looking and feeling strong. You can also incorporate a bond repair treatment or conditioner like the HEART OF GLASS to strengthen your hair, repair the damage, and allow you to enjoy your bleached hair for longer.
For blondes and color-treated hair
Formulated to illuminate color and restore hair health.
8. Incorporate Products With These Key Ingredients
Whether you’re searching for shampoos, conditioners, masks, or treatments, keep an eye out for these ingredients: hyaluronic acid, ceramides, keratin, glycerin, silk proteins, and amino acids. They work together to keep your bleached hair hydrated and help lock in moisture.
Bonus Lifestyle Tips for Softer, Healthier Bleached Hair
There’s a difference between moisturizing your hair and hydrating it. It’s important that you do both. By hydrating your hair, you’re pulling water in. By moisturizing your hair, you’re locking in that hydration. These tips will help you do both.
Drink Plenty of Water
Soft, shiny hair starts with internal hydration. The answer to most beauty woes is usually to drink more water. Make sure you’re drinking enough water to hydrate your body from the inside out.
Eat a Hair-Healthy Diet
What you eat directly affects the health of your hair. Add foods rich in omega-3s, biotin, and antioxidants to your diet for healthier, shinier hair. Try adding some of the following to your breakfast, lunch, snacks, or dinner!
- Salmon
- Avocados
- Blueberries
- Leafy greens
Protect Your Hair From UV Rays and Chlorine
Bleached hair is vulnerable to sun and pool damage. Use hats and SPF hair treatments outdoors, and rinse hair before and after swimming to avoid damage or greenish hues.
Wash Your Hair With Cool Water
Hot water can strip the moisture from your hair, so keep it lukewarm when you wash. Finish with a blast of cold water when rinsing out your conditioner. This seals your hair’s open cuticles and the pores in your scalp, locking in moisture and adding a boost of shine.
Take Care of Your Scalp
Your bleached hair care routine should focus on more than just your hair strands. Give your scalp the much-needed attention with a hydrating and relieving scalp treatment to keep your hair looking healthy from scalp to end.
Get Regular Trims
The more you trim off the damage, the less likely they are to become dry and brittle. Trimming your hair every 6–8 weeks keeps it feeling healthy and looking silky.
Healthy hair must-haves
Protect from environmental stressors, lock in moisture, and enhance texture.
FAQs
How long does it take to rehydrate bleached hair?
With the right hair care routine for bleached hair and products, it’s possible to rehydrate bleached hair within 4 weeks. For more severe damage, it can take a few months.
Can I use purple shampoo right after bleaching?
Purple shampoo after bleaching can be beneficial, but it’s best to wait 3-4 weeks after your bleaching treatment.
How often should I deep condition?
Adding moisture and hydration back is important for your bleached hair care routine. We suggest starting once per week and adding one more deep condition treatment if and when needed.
Does bleached hair ever fully recover?
Bleached hair doesn’t fully recover since the treatment itself is considered damaging and irreversible. It’s possible to rehydrate it and moisturize it, but bleaching your hair kills the strands.
Hydrate Your Bleached Hair the Davines Way
Keeping your bleached hair soft and silky comes down to this:
- Be gentle and consistent with moisturizing products
- Avoid heat and harsh treatments
- Feed your body and hair the hydration they need
Whether you're struggling with dry ends or overall breakage, knowing how to repair hair after bleaching is essential for restoring strength and shine. With the right mix of TLC, science-backed products, and pro guidance, your bleached hair can look and feel healthy again.
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Visit your local Davines salon for customized color, cuts, and care.
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1 Comment
1 Response
Michaela Hemsley
November 10, 2020
Thanks for explaining that using a hair oil can help prevent frizz and keep your hair shiny. I recently bleached my hair white-blonde because I thought it would be cute for the winter. However, it dried out my hair pretty badly, so I’ll have to look into getting an oil that can help hydrate it so it doesn’t start breaking off at the ends. http://xoticsproducts.com/collections/hair/products/kasmere-hair-oil-treatment-sweet-jamila-oil
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