Ammonia-free hair dye: is it better?

In the hairstyling world, trends come and go faster than Ramona Flowers or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’s Clementine can change her hair colour. How can you settle on just one colour, anyway? Ammonia-free hair dye has slowly been spreading up from small organic companies and family-run salons into the mainstream market. L’Oreal (Garnier) and Proctor & Gamble (Clairol) are a few of the larger companies that have recently introduced ammonia-free hair colour product lines.

Constantly changing her hair colour doesn’t make her “fickle, impulsive, and spontaneous” it just means her hair’s damaged and probably lost a lot of its protein and moisture.

First, let’s understand why ammonia is in hair colour in the first place. Ammonia is an alkaline agent that swells up the cuticle of hair fibre. This allows the colouring chemical to penetrate the hair better. When the cuticle opens, protein and moisture escapes, which is how hair is damaged by constant colouring.

People with black or grey hair usually need to use products with ammonia because their hair tends to be resistant to the dye.

“The simple answer is that it’s better for you,” says Remo Rinaldi, a hair colourist at Toronto-based Tangerine salon. "In perm hair colour, you need alkaline solution, the alkalinity comes from ammonia. If you take ammonia out, you gota use another alkaline, called ethalonamine."

The more ammonia, the more harsh the hair dye is. This applies to ethalonamine as well, as another alkaline. So is it really better?

It's less damaging. Instead of opening your hair cuticles wide open for the gates of your scalp for all its protein and moisture to rush out. It's like a spring breeze, instead of the big bad wolf huffing and puffing your cuticles down.

"The cuticle layer is tightly compacted, there are about 7-12 layers of cuticle or scales protecting the inner hair structure, the medulla," said Rinaldi.

"As the hair grows farther away from the scalp the cuticles are naturally relaxed from sun and water over time, so it's not necessary to blast them open every time you colour your hair."

A good rule of thumb Rinaldi says is to not treat your hair ends with the same formula you use on the roots. 

As for his job as a professional hair colourist, ammonia-free hair dyes makes it easier. Not only does he have less of the ghastly ammonia fumes to smell every day, “ammonia-free is better when you’re washing the bowls, it comes off nicer and cleans easier.”

Fact: Hair is naturally a little acidic, to keep the bacteria and sebum inside hair and scalp. Your cuticle is closed to keep the bacteria inside and healthy. Hair is around 4.5 – 5.5 on the pH scale. (Water is neutral, a 7. Anything lower than 7 is acidic, anything from 7-14 is alkaline) A permanent hair dye should bring your hair pH up to between 9.5-10.5. And keep in mind, each unit on the pH scale is 10 times, so five times is 100,000 times more alkaline.