An Overview Of Natural Hair Types

Have you ever wondered about which type your natural hair is? It’s sometimes just simply straight or curly or wavy, but each of this type will be classified into smaller versions with different proper hair care routines. Therefore, understanding the features and characteristics of your natural hair will help you look after and style your hair easily.

To provide you deeper knowledge about types of natural hair and answer your question “what is my natural hair type?” in this post, we will analyze and point out main features of popular types of natural hair.

One of the most popular natural hair type chart that is used widely by hairstylists and hair styling specialists was created by Andre Walker, Oprah Winfrey’s hair stylist. This system was mentioned in his book named Andre Talks Hair. It’s quite simple and easily to understand, so many people refer to use this chart to classify natural hair type.

As we can see from the chart, there are different natural hair types with different characteristics. Andre divided natural hair into 4 main groups including straight (1), wavy (2a, 2b, 2c), curly (3a, 3b) and kinky (4a, 4b, 4c). Therefore, it’s quite clear to see and recognize which one is your natural hair type.

1. Straight Hair

In straight hair group, there are three different versions: fine/thin, medium and coarse straight hair. Straight hair is quite popular in Asian countries due to gene, climate and other surround living factors.

Fine thin hair is very soft, smooth and shiny. Among black natural hair types, black fine thin hair is considered as one of the main natural hair types of Asian countries like Japan, China and so on. However, because of softness, fine thin hair is hard to hold curl when you do by traditional ways like using hair rollers. Curl your hair electronically can cause damage for your hair.

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Medium straight hair has more volume than fine straight hair and make your hair look fuller. If your hair is straight with fine and shiny strands, it exactly belongs to this type.

Coarse straight hair is also difficult to curl since the hair strands are rough and not smooth or soft. There is an increasing in the number of Asian women falling into this category.

2. Wavy Hair

Wavy fine/thin hair (2a) sit among types of natural hair that lots of women want to have or dream to get this texture and hair sticks close to the head. This type can be styled in various ways since the hair strand is a little bit curly and easy to get shaped.

Wavy medium hair (2b) tends to frizzier and a bit resistant to styling. Its curls look like S-pattern. This natural hair type is also loved by many women since wavy texture is never out of fashion and brings a charming look to women.

According to natural hair type chart mentioned above, 2c can be called coarse wavy hair. Hair has thicker waves with frizzy strands. If your hair belongs to this category, you will find it difficult to style, especially when you try to straighten your hair. It’s nearly impossible.

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3. Curly Hair

Loose curly hair (3a) is thick and full. It looks a bit like wavy hair, however the end of hair strands tends to rough while in wavy texture, it’s pointy. Hair strands are also in S pattern. This texture is quite popular in US & UK and gets perfect in blonde color.

Tight curly hair (3b) is also popular and one of the most favorite hairstyles which can go well with different hair color. Tight curly hair can also have combination texture.

3c curly hair style can be called corkscrews because the hair is tightly curly with lots of strands blend together or densely packed together. With this style, straightening is desperately difficult since the strands are hard with natural curls.

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4. Kinky Hair

Soft kinky hair (4a) is tightly coiled and fragile. Type 4 is most popular with black women. Kinky hair require a proper and serious hair care routine, so you need to choose hair products carefully. We advise you to use sulfate-free shampoo to keep moisture for your hair to avoid dryness.

Type 4B has fluffy cotton. Unlike 4a, hair strands in 4b have “Z” shape and don’t have a concrete curl pattern. This hair type usually feels wiry when touching and is tightly coiled. Because the hair strands sharply blend together, hair is drier and easier to get broken.

Type 4C is even much more tightly coiled than type 4B and has no curl pattern. Women who have this natural hair type need to braid or twist their hair to create pattern. Since hair strands are tightly coiled, it looks shorter than it actually is. Of all type 4 natural hair types, type 4C is the most fragile and extremely easy to break. Therefore, if your hair is type 4C, you should spend time caring it to reduce dryness as well as provide nutrition to your hair.

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Natural hair types are various in different countries all around the world. Hopefully, now you can know exactly what type of hair you are having. Understanding your type of natural hair is the key to deal with every problem related to hair.

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