Fact Or Fiction: If You Pluck A Gray Hair, Will More Grow In Its Place? Experts Weigh In

It's the ever-popular beauty myth told to spook you into submission: If you see a gray hair, don't pluck it! If you do, more will grow in its place. If you've heard the warning over the years, perhaps you, too, have some hard-hitting questions. The fact that a single silver strand can entice a whole sprinkling of grays does seem a bit suspect, no? 

Is there any weight behind the commonly held claim? We consulted celebrity colorist and Redken brand ambassador Matt Rez to separate fact from fiction. 

So, uh, why all the panic about plucking gray hair? Well, says Rez, the reason people think more grays are summoned as soon as you pluck a single strand is because it looks and feels more noticeable on your scalp. "Being shorter, having a more wiry texture and being white in color—the new growth will be poking out and more noticeable as it regrows," he explains.

Essentially, gray hair actually has a different texture from the rest of your pigmented strands as it tends to be a bit more coarse (when the follicle produces less melanin, it tends to produce less sebum as well and results in a drier, coarser hair). So when the hair does regrow in the same spot, it'll stand out a bit more than its neighbors. 

This, of course, doesn't give you permission to pluck every gray you lay eyes on. Even if you remove the hair from the follicle, the new one will grow back gray—it's an internal process that happens when your pigment-producing cells start to deteriorate, so removing the actual strand does next to nothing. Plus, pulling out hairs can cause trauma to the follicle; it may even become damaged and die if you do it over and over again—once that happens, the hair will never be able to grow back. 

The bottom line? There might not be more grays peppered throughout your strands, necessarily, but the ones you do have may look and feel more noticeable. You still shouldn't pluck gray hairs—not because more grays will follow in its wake but because plucking hair, in general, is not a good practice. Best to embrace the gray or follow some expert coloring methods.