Does Braiding Your Hair at Night Make it Grow Faster?

Bebelyn says…There is an old mexican wives tale that if you braid your hair at night it will grow faster, I doubt this is true but I would like to know what hairstyle has the most benefit for the hair in terms of preventing damage at night while sleeping…braid, bun or wrapped up???

The Right Brain responds:

That’s an interesting wives’ tale and I can certainly see the grain of truth that may have sparked it.

More breakage = takes longer to grow out

While no cosmetic product or treatment can truly make your hair grow faster, it can help your hair reach a certain length faster by reducing breakage. In other words, the more your hair breaks the more time it will take to reach the length that you desire. So anything you can do to reduce breakage helps you grow it “faster,” in a manner of speaking.

Reduce breakage by reducing friction
Braiding could help reduce breakage because when you wrap your hair in a tight style, the fibers are immobilized and can’t rub against the pillow as you sleep. By reducing the fiber-fabric friction you can reduce damage to the hair. Therefore, the ”best” hairstyle to wear while sleeping is the one that reduces damage-causing  friction the most. While braiding may reduce the friction against the pillow it doesn’t prevent fibers from rubbing against each other inside the braid. Theoretically, the best thing to do is oil your hair to reduce fiber-fiber damage. Of course this creates another problem: oil will transfer to your pillowcase. So perhaps the best option is to wrap your hair in some sort of bun cover.