A SleekShop Editorial
Hot roots & other color mishaps.
The term "hot roots" may sound like a fun time — they're more like a hot mess. Here's how to diagnose the most common at-home color mishaps, and better yet, how to never meet them at all.
What are hot roots?
Hot roots are when the first ½ inch of hair turns significantly warmer or lighter than the rest — as if your hair was colored with two different formulas, even though you only used one from root to end.
They can occur in any level or shade. So listen up, brunettes, blondes and redheads: this could happen to you.
Anatomy of a strand ✦ tap each zone
The roots heat zone
Your scalp gives off heat — and heat gives color more power. That first ½ inch processes faster and can lift lighter or warmer than everything below it. This is ground zero for hot roots.
It's also where regrowth lives: virgin, uncolored hair that behaves differently than hair you've already dyed.
The mid-lengths memory zone
Previously colored hair holds on to its shade. Remember the golden rule — color does not lift color — so a lighter formula applied here simply won't budge what's already deposited.
If you go lighter than last time, the mids stay put while your roots lift. That contrast is the hot root.
The ends porous zone
Your oldest, most porous hair drinks in pigment. Layer color over color here every time you touch up and the ends grow darker and darker — the opposite mishap of hot roots.
Refresh the ends with a clear gloss instead, and only pull color through them 2–3 times a year.
The golden rule of hair coloring
"Color does not lift color."
You can't go lighter than the shade you've already colored your hair. Going lighter will most likely require some kind of lightening — highlights, balayage, or a bleach and tone.
The two ways hot roots happen
Hot roots should be avoided at all costs — they're tricky to fix without changing your color entirely or spending big bucks at the salon. Luckily, avoiding them isn't hard once you know the two scenarios where they strike.
During a root touch-up
Use a formula that's lighter or warmer — more gold, more copper — than your previous color, and you will get hot roots. Your mid-lengths and ends stay the previous shade while only the natural regrowth lifts.
The fix: keep track of your formulas, and use exactly what you used last time — including the same developer. Wanting to go lighter? That's a lightening job (highlights, balayage, bleach and tone), not a box of lighter color.
Coloring virgin hair root to end
Even hair with no color in it can go hot at the root — scalp heat gives the color extra power up top, so the first ½ inch can process lighter or warmer while the rest lands exactly where you intended.
The fix: use demi when possible! Going darker without needing gray coverage? Demi only deposits color, so your chances of hot roots are very low. Must use permanent? Split your developer — or color the roots a ½ shade darker than your mids and ends.
The developer split, visualized
The pro trick for even root-to-end processing with permanent color
What went wrong?
Pick your mishap and get the diagnosis — symptom, cause and prescription.
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