Wondering how to straighten hair without heat? Here are 4 effective ways

As a curly or wavy-haired person, you must have wondered how you can straighten hair without heating them. This might have seemed like an impossible task as the most popular ways to get perfectly straight and shiny hair are generally by either using heat tools or through chemical treatments.

Both of these methods can leave your hair dry and damaged. It can also ultimately lead to breakage, hair loss, and even split ends. Surely no one wants their hair to go through this just to make them look good. Then you must be thinking what is the other solution for this.

In this article, we will discuss the top four methods to straighten hair without heat that give amazing results in most cases. However, it is necessary to keep in mind that these methods may not work to perfectly straighten hard curls, but can help to soften them.

4 easy ways to straighten hair without heat

There are many non-heat and non-chemical methods to naturally straighten hair without heat, but their results vary depending on your hair type. The key is to try and identify what works best for your hair type.

1. Blow drying on cold-air setting

Keep the mouth of the blow-dryer away from hair to prevent tangling (Image by Freepik on Freepik)

While blow-drying with hot air can cause heat damage to your hair, trying the same technique with cold air-setting can help straighten hair without heat damage. In fact, blow-drying your hair with cold air is found to be less damaging than air-drying.

Firstly, air-dry your hair until it is almost 80% dried. Then divide your hair into smaller sections, and switch your blow-dryer to the 'cold' setting. Dry all the sections by moving continuously from the root to the tip. Ensure that the blow-dryer is at least six inches away from the hair. Apply a light oil or a leave-in conditioner to tame down any frizz.

2. Flat wrapping your hair

Wearing satin bonnets over the hair gives better results (Image by Yulia Gapeenko on Vecteezy)

Flat wrapping has been a known method to achieve naturally straightened hair without heat for many years, but it has recently gained a lot of popularity through social media influencers trying and showing this trick on TikTok and Instagram.

All you need is long bobby pins and a satin hair scarf or bonnet. Separate your hair into sections and comb each section flat while wrapping it around your head in the opposite direction. At the end, clip these sections using bobby pins and wear a satin hair scarf or bonnet above it to reduce frictional damage.

You can wear this hairstyle overnight to straighten your hair without heat and achieve good results in the morning. If you are confused about the steps or if it will work for your hair length, then you can refer to various tutorials online that show how to do this method on all hair types and hair lengths.

3. Using plastic rollers

You can get that ‘90s blowout effect using plastic rollers (Image by Wayhomestudio on Freepik)

Plastic rollers have been in fashion since the ‘90s and since then, they have been among the more popular methods to straighten hair without heat, while achieving a good volume, bounce, and shine.

They are somewhat tricky to use initially, but it gets easier with practice. You can experiment with different sizes of rollers, like using big-size rollers on the top of the head gives extra volume and bounce.

Make sure your hair is damp and not wet. Divide the hair into sections and roll them onto the plastic rollers before sleeping to achieve bouncy straight hair in the morning.

4. Sleeping with wet hair

To Straighten hair without heat just damp it enough and not completely drip it wet (Image by Diana.grytsku on Freepik)

Sleeping with wraps or rollers can seem like a tedious task if you are new to this. In such a case, you can begin with a simpler approach, that is, sleeping with wet hair.

Make sure to squeeze excess water out of your hair using a cotton t-shirt, so that your hair is not completely drenched and dipping wet. Apply a serum of your choice or any light oil on the ends of your hair and tie them in a loose ponytail. After that, wrap your hair around the ponytail to create a bun and secure it using a pin.

Ensure that you use a satin pillowcase which is effective in reducing the frizziness of the hair and gives maximized results of this method.

Therefore, you don’t have to sacrifice the health of your hair to straighten them. These tricks can do the work for you. However, one should note that they cannot achieve heat or chemical treatment-like results using these methods. It is also important to note that the final results can change as per the hair type, and these methods are found to work better for finer, wavy hair.