What Are the Best Vitamins for Hair?
As you age, you experience various body changes, including thinner skin, muscle loss, and the absorption of fewer vitamins. A lack of vitamins can affect your bones, skin, and immune system and may take its toll on your hair and scalp.
Unfortunately, there are no magic pills to give you long, flowing hair overnight; however, over time, a nutritious diet supplemented with vitamins can give your body what it needs to produce thicker, voluminous hair.
You have nearly 100,000 hair follicles on your head, most of which are in the anagen (growing) portion of your hair's growth cycle. Your hair follicles need to be nourished from the inside with specific vitamins to continue growing and repopulating. Selecting the best vitamins for your hair is vital to maintaining a healthy scalp and vibrant hair.
Hair growth vitamins and multivitamins come in all shapes and sizes, so let’s dive into what vitamins, dietary supplements, and nutrients play a role in helping to combat hair shedding and elevate healthy hair growth. And for personalized recommendations, take our hair quiz today!
What Vitamins Do for Your Hair
When your body does not have enough of a particular vitamin to meet its needs, it will prioritize using this limited resource to ensure your survival. Known as the triage theory, this means that the nutrients you ingest nourish essential processes like brain function before non-essential tasks like hair growth.
Consequently, a vitamin deficiency could result in slower hair growth, more fragile strands, a decrease in sebum (your natural scalp oil) production, and even hair loss. By supplementing your diet with adequate vitamins, you provide your body and hair follicles with the necessary nutrients to strengthen and thicken your hair.
Below is a rundown of the best vitamins for hair growth.
Vitamin A Enhances Scalp Moisture and Boosts Circulation
Vitamin A is an essential vitamin for thriving locks. Differing metabolic processes cause your body to continually produce free radicals, molecules that damage healthy cell growth and accelerate the aging process — including your follicle cells.
Vitamin A has antioxidant properties that clean up these reactive radicals and shield your hair follicle cells. Furthermore, a consistent level of vitamin A in your body is associated with improved blood circulation, spurring hair health and regeneration.
Taking a supplement containing vitamin A averts scalp dryness by maintaining the function of your sebaceous glands, producing more sebum oil for your skin and hair shaft, and giving you lush and full tresses.
It is crucial to limit your daily intake of vitamin A, however, because taking too much can cause toxicity, which can lead to health problems, including hair loss. Better Not Younger’s Significant Other Hair, Skin & Nails Supplement + Retinol Boost incorporates 1200 mcg of vitamin A.
B-Vitamins Nourish Follicles
The B-vitamin complex consists of eight water-soluble vitamins that include biotin (vitamin B7), B5 (calcium D-pantothenate), B6 (pyridoxine hydrochloride), vitamin B9 (folic acid), and B12 (cyanocobalamin).
These vitamins help manufacture red blood cells that deliver oxygen and nutrients to your scalp and hair follicles, making them critical for lustrous hair.
- Biotin supplements provide an intrinsic micro-nutrient for healthy hair and nail growth.
- B5 is also known as pantothenic acid and confronts menopause-related hair-loss issues, including sebum oil regelation and increased melanin production.
- B6 promotes red blood cell production and breaks down amino acids, turning them into keratin, your hair’s primary protein building block and the protein that prevents breakage and split ends.
- B9 Folic acid, also known as folate, is vital for DNA repair, synthesis, and use, making it necessary for the rapid cell division of your hair follicles. The results include nourished follicles and healthy, shiny hair.
- B12 is mandatory for neurological function, DNA synthesis, and red blood cell formation. Low vitamin B12 can lead to hair loss and anemia. Aging women, in particular, need this vitamin to help manufacture and nourish robust and healthy hair.
Vitamin C Builds Collagen and Protects From Free Radicals
As most of us know, vitamin C, or ascorbic acid, is excellent for maintaining your immune system; however, it is also one of the best vitamins for hair. It is a water-soluble vitamin that guards against free radical damage. Since your body cannot produce it, you must consume it through fruits, vegetables, leafy greens, or vitamin supplements.
Vitamin C helps your body absorb iron, builds collagen, and helps transport oxygen throughout your body, creating long and elastic locks and working in tandem with your shampoo and conditioner.
Vitamin D Stimulates Your Hair Follicles
Vitamin D is a fat-soluble micronutrient often referred to as the "sunshine vitamin" because your skin absorbs 50 to 90 percent of your body's daily requirement; the rest comes from your diet. Vitamin D deficiency is connected to chronic disease, bone density issues, and possibly hair loss, and it affects nearly 42 percent of Americans. Supplementing your diet with vitamin D can stimulate older hair follicles and may generate new ones.
Vitamin E Promotes Regeneration and Reduces Oxidative Stress
For your follicles to create radiant hair, they require your circulatory system to deliver a sustained nutritional supply. Vitamin E dilates your blood vessels and prevents platelet aggregation (blood clots), which would otherwise hinder blood flow — this allows blood to circulate through your body to your scalp to dispatch crucial follicle nutrients.
Vitamin E is also a proven antioxidant, diminishing your body’s free radicals and reducing the oxidative stress that can lead to cellular damage to your skin, including the skin on your scalp, as you age. This focus on scalp health makes vitamin E one of the best vitamins for long-term hair regeneration and fortification.
Other Vitamins That Can Improve Your Hair’s Integrity
Now that we have gone through the vitamin and mineral alphabet, here are a few other vitamins you can add to your haircare and skincare repertoire and topical products.
Horsetail Extract
Horsetail extract can improve circulation, your scalp included. Your scalp can produce more hair when it is reinvigorated through improved blood circulation! Many people find horsetail extract helpful by applying the oil directly onto their scalp.
Ashwagandha
Ashwagandha is host to a diverse number of nutrients, including protein and iron. Our hair is made up of protein, so it’s no wonder ashwagandha has become a power player regarding hair regeneration and health. You can find ashwagandha in the form of powders or capsules, not to mention boosting the hair-health factor in many hair growth supplements and vitamins.
Keratin
Keratin occurs naturally in hair, so it makes sense to use it as a vitamin to help your hair’s integrity. Studies have shown that with a keratinsupplement, hair health sees an improvement. Many dermatologists say that they take keratinsupplements for their own skin, hair, and nails — how’s that for a seal of approval?
Saw Palmetto
Many people who suffer from hair loss or hair thinning, especially female pattern baldness, may have hormones to thank for that. Saw palmetto comes to the rescue with its ability to block testosterone from being converted into DHT. This is important because DHT is linked to hair loss or alopecia. Saw palmetto has anti-inflammatory properties, which is another win in being a supplement that can help combat hair loss.
Many hair growth supplements and hair vitamins are available in capsules, water-soluble tablets, or gummies. Who doesn’t like a little treat that feels like eating candy in the form of promoting healthy hair? Sounds like a win-win to us.
What Vitamins Should I Take for My Hair?
Many supplements on the market carry a specific cocktail of vitamins that can help hair growth. Often, these supplements will have biotin and other B, C, D, and E vitamins as standard. Some also supply minerals like magnesium, as well as omega-3fatty acids. Many include other supplemental minerals and nourishing agents such as ashwagandha, selenium, and saw palmetto.
How do you find the best vitamins for your specific hair type and needs? Knowing if you have any vitamin deficiencies is key, and then tailor your approach to what you can benefit from. If you lack folic acid and want to get your hands on a supplement that touts a trifecta of folic acid, vitamin A, and biotin, our Significant Other: Hair, Skin, & Nails Supplement may be your go-to.
Speaking with your doctor before starting a new routine of hair growth supplements or hair vitamins is always a good way to go. You’ll want to be sure that your diet and vitamin regimen are balanced and appropriate for your needs.
Maybe you want to approach thinning hair, hair loss, or shedding. Maybe you simply want to be proactive about vitamins and hair products promoting healthy hair growth. Either way, investing in a supplement is a great way to take control of your hair care.
Significant Other Gummies Contain the Best Vitamins for Hair
If your hair is feeling lackluster and limp, you may be able to restore its health and look by eating a healthy diet, spending time outdoors, and taking a supplement like Better Not Younger’s Significant Other Hair, Skin & Nails Supplement + Retinol Boost.
These heart-shaped vegan gummy vitamins are packed with biotin, folic acid, and minerals to nourish your locks from the inside out. For questions about vitamin supplements, talk to your doctor. To discover more scalp and hair-fortifying solutions, visit our Better Not Younger product page.
Sources:
Natural Hair Supplement: Saw Palmetto | PMC
Keratin on Hair and Nail Parameters | Hindawi
Use of Dietary Supplements by Cardiologists, Board-Certified Dermatologists, and Orthopedists | PMC