Hair Fall or Hair Breakage? Find Out the Distinction and Treat It Naturally!

Jan 30, 2026

Authored by: Adeeba

Reviewed by: Kapil Dhameja

Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes

The sight of strands of your hair on your pillow or in places such as your bathroom floor or between your fingers when you're oiling the hair or washing your hair creates panic. Your first instinct is to think the worst: "Oh no, I'm losing my hair!" It's important to know that not all apparent hair loss means your hair is falling out. What may appear to you as hair falling out could actually be hair breakage. Understand that there are different root causes and treatments for hair breakage versus hair loss. The most important step in correcting your situation is to determine if you're experiencing hair loss, hair breakage, or both, because treating the wrong thing will likely create more problems.

Table of Contents

What is Hair fall?
What Is Hair Breakage?
Hair Fall vs. Hair Breakage
What Are The Reasons For My Hair To Fall Out?
What causes hair breakage?
Easy home Tests for Hair Problems
How to prevent Hair Fall Naturally
How to prevent hair breakage?
When Hair Loss and Hair Breakage Occur Together
Hair care routine based on your hair type
When to Visit a Dermatologist
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about Hair Loss & Breakage

What is Hair fall

Hair shedding or Hair fall is a natural biological cycle of hair. Your hair grows in three stages:

- Anagen, or the stage of hair growth.

- Catagen, or the transition stage.

- Telogen, or the stage where the hair is resting.

At any point in time, approximately 10–15% of your hair will be in telogen. Every day, 50–100 strands of hair will fall out, with a small white bulb at the root. The average person will regrow these same strands because new hair is growing concurrently.

Normal Hair Loss:

Normal hair loss is 50–100 individual strands each day. When hair loss occurs, a small white bulb can be seen at the root of the strand.

Normal new growth replaces normal hair loss.

Abnormal Hair Loss: If you lose more than 100–150 individual strands of hair per day. And If your ponytail becomes thinner or your part is wider than normal, or if you are noticing a greater amount of hair loss while you shampoo, when you are applying oil to your hair, or when you are combing your hair, lastly, If new growth is occurring more slowly than normal. Then this is abnormal hairfall.

Internal problems such as hormones, nutritional deficiencies, stress, or medical issues are often the cause of excessive hair loss.

What Is Hair Breakage?

Hair breakage occurs when the hair shaft is broken (not pulled out from the root). Hair breakage is a physical damage problem; it is not part of the hair's life cycle.

Signs of Hair Breakage:

Uneven, non-uniform, shorter length strands of hair with no white bulb at the end of the strand. Hair breaks when combed or styled, they normally are frizzy, coarse, dry hair texture with split ends and flyaway hair

Hair breakage is often due to weak, dry, or over-processed hair; therefore, it requires appropriate care.

Hair Fall vs. Hair Breakage

Hair breakage and hair fall may seem to be the same, because they both manifest as hair at times on your pillow, your floor and/or your comb; however, the difference in how hair falls versus breaks actually starts at the scalp.

When hair falls, it completes its natural cycle and comes out at the root. When hair falls, typically, it will fall out with a small bulb at one end; this bulb indicates that the hair has separated from the follicle end of the growth phase of its cycle. The primary impact of hair loss is on the density of the hair over time as a result of genetic or health factors (i.e., hormones, nutrition, stress, etc.).

Unlike hair fall, which starts from the scalp, hair breakage may occur anywhere along the length of the hair shaft due to a weakness in the hair shaft. Broken hair strands typically do have a white bulb at the end. The number of hair follicles on your scalp is not affected by breakage, unlike hair fall, which reduces the number of follicles gradually. However, the effect of hair breakage makes a person's hair appear frizzy, inconsistent, and thin at the ends.

Hair fall and hair breakage affect your hair's appearance in different ways over time. As your hair continues to grow from your scalp, the number of hair strands that are actively growing decreases due to hair fall, thus leading to a larger degree of thinning or decrease in the size of your ponytail. Hair breakage, however, will create an appearance of being dry, coarse, damaged, having split ends, or having flyways, even though the scalp may still have an adequate amount of hair present. Most people will experience both hair fall and hair breakage simultaneously, leaving their hair feeling very weak at the roots and fragile throughout its length.

What Are The Reasons For My Hair To Fall Out?

The reasons that cause hair to fall are primarily related to factors occurring inside the body. Some of the major causes of hair loss include the following:

1. Changes in Hormonal Levels:

There are many times during a woman’s life where she may experience fluctuations in her hormone levels. These changes occur after childbirth, due to polycystic oncology syndrome (PCOS), as well as due to an imbalance of thyroid hormones. Also, these hormone fluctuations often occur when a girl goes through puberty or when a woman has reached menopause.

2. Nutritional Deficiencies:

Iron, protein, vitamin D, vitamin B12, zinc and biotin are the most common nutritional deficiencies that will weaken the root of the hair.

3. Stress and Anxiety:

When a person is under extreme emotional or physical stress, this can trigger their hair to fall out in the first place by pushing the hair into the shedding phase of its cycle (telogen effluvium).

4. Illness or Fever:

Fevers, like COVID and other types of viral infections, usually cause a person's hair to have a higher than normal rate of falling out about 2 to 3 months after becoming sick.

5. Genetic Factors:

If a member of your family has a history of thinning or baldness, this factor could be a determining factor on how thick your hair will be in the long term.

6. Scalps Suffering from Conditions:

Common scalp conditions (such as dandruff, fungal infections, etc.) can cause damage to your hair follicles and hence weaken the root of your hair.

What causes hair breakage?

Hair breakage is usually caused by damage from the outside. The most common reasons include:

1) Overuse of heat styling tools

Straighteners, curling irons, and hair dryers, all these tools cause the weakening of the hair structure.

2) All chemical processes

Colouring, bleaching, rebonding, perming, breaks the bonds in the hair that keep it healthy.

3) Washing your hair too often

This takes away the natural oils in the hair, which leads to dry, brittle strands.

4) Using harsh products on your hair

Any product that has sulphates (sulphur) or alcohol in it can cause your hair to dry out.

5) Handling your hair too aggressively

When styling it, for example, when drying your hair with a towel, putting your hair in tight hairstyles, and brushing your hair very aggressively.

Easy home Tests for Hair Problems

You don’t need to visit the lab for these tests.

The bulb test:

Check the fallen strands for a bulb.

If you see a white bulb at the end of your hair, the reason for your hair loss is hair fall. A strand without a bulb means breakage.

Length test:

Check the fallen strands against the current length of your hair. If you see full-length strands, the problem is hair fall; short strands are caused by breakage.

Texture test:

Gently stretch a strand of your hair, and pay attention to how it snaps. If your hair snaps quickly, your hair is dry and near breakage. (You should also consider where the thickness of your hair is.) Thinning scalp indicates hair fall; frizzy ends indicate breakage.

How to prevent Hair Fall Naturally

Hair fall is a common problem that has a variety of causes. To treat hair loss naturally, you will need to pay close attention to what is going on with your body. There are several natural ways to treat hair loss, such as:

1. Make sure your diet is balanced

Rich in protein, leafy green vegetables, nuts, seeds and fruits. Eating well will also help the body balance your hormones which will help in promoting hair growth.

2. Use an oil treatment on your scalp

By using oils such as Bhringraj, onion, castor and Amla, you will help nourish and moisturize the hair follicles.

3. Use gentle scalp massages

This helps in increasing blood circulation in the scalp, as well as to signal the hair follicles to produce more hair.

4. Be mindful of managing stress

Sleep well, do deep breathing exercises, and decrease the amount of mental overload in your life.

5. Use a mild soap for washing your hair

Avoid washing your hair too many times per week or using a harsh cleanser.

6. Use herbal remedies

By using Ayurvedic herbs such as Amla, Bhringraj and Fenugreek, you can support the health of your hair and promote new growth.

How to prevent hair breakage?

Preventing and repairing hair breakage through adequate protection, moisture, and care is a critical first step in keeping your hair looking and feeling healthy.

1. Deep conditioning weekly

Masks provide an extra level of hydration that will help to restore the softness of your hair.

2. Reduce heating

Avoid using heated tools or air drying as much as possible.

3. Use oil on the lengths of your hair

Apply hair oil on the lengths of the hair and not just the scalp. Applying oil to the ends of your hair will help to keep them hydrated and healthy.

4. Switch to gentle tools

Use wide-toothed combs and towels made with microfibers to avoid causing damage.

5. Protective styles

Keep your hair in loose braids, buns, or a silk scrunchie when you are not wearing it down.

6. Leave-in serums and creams

Prevent dryness and friction on your hair by using them.

When Hair Loss and Hair Breakage Occur Together

At times, hair fall also occurs because of an increased level of hair breakage or hair loss. This is evident through the presence of fallen strands, the presence of short broken hair or frizzy hair, and/or thinning ends. All these sign the presence of weakness in both the root of the hair and the length of the hair. Hair can experience both internal causes (like particles of stress, nutritional deficiencies, hormonal imbalances, or major illness) and external causes (like overuse of dry conditions caused by heat styling and harsh styling techniques, or abusive use of moisture-inhibitors) which cause these two conditions to occur simultaneously.

As previously discussed, the occurrence of hair loss continues to weaken hair and creates further opportunity for the broken pattern of the hair to continue to occur because of the continued increase in hair loss. However, the continuous exposure to environmental factors (like air pollution or sun exposure) and the lack of moisture available to the hair due to the failure to provide moisture, contribute further to the continued destruction of the hair shaft.

A proper balance of attention to both the hair’s root health as well as the hair’s length is necessary for preventing hair loss from occurring and/or allowing for the continued increase of hair growth as a result of the treatment of the roots. Through gentle treatment and care, by the proper use of nourishing oils, reduced heat use, and continued consistent hair-care routines, over time, the damaged hair can restore itself to a stronger and healthier state.

Hair care routine based on your hair type

When it comes to taking care of your hair, you should consider all aspects of hair. This means that you need to incorporate care into your entire life, not just the time that you spend with your hair. Your Hair Care Routine should be based on the problems that you are having with your hair.

If you're experiencing Hair Fall: In that case you'll want to take care of the scalp. You can do this by performing scalp care (i.e. applying oil before washing), massaging your scalp gently while you wash it, and taking a healthy and balanced diet. All three of these steps are important and work together.

For Hair Breakage: It’s a little different. If you're experiencing Hair Breakage, then your Hair Care Routine needs to include more moisturizing (you should have at least 2 to 3 products dedicated to that). You should really try to reduce how much you are styling your hair, and also deep condition your hair weekly instead of just every few weeks.

If you have a combination of Hair Fall and Hair Breakage (this can happen): Then in addition to the Hair Care Routines for both of these issues (oiling the scalp and conditioning the length of the hair) you should also use a mild shampoo that won't strip the natural oils that are in your hair and keep the heat used to style your Hair as low as possible. You should have a consistent Hair Care Routine for both Hair Fall and Hair Breakage.

When to Visit a Dermatologist

If you are experiencing persistent hair loss (more than 2-3 months) that is not improving with good hair care.
When you experience sudden or excessive hair loss, especially if it is falling out in clumps.
If you notice an increase in the appearance of your scalp or if the parting of your hair has become wider than normal.
If you have patches of baldness or if there are patches of hair missing where there was previously hair.
If you have itching, redness, flakes, burning, or pain on the scalp.
If you have experienced any of the following life events: An illness, pregnancy, extreme stress, sudden weight loss, or surgery.
If you believe your hair loss is caused by hormonal changes, poor nutrition, or other medical conditions.
If home remedies/rosemary oil/herbal remedies and gentle hair regimes have not improved the situation after a period of time. And
If your hair loss affects your self-esteem/mental state/daily routine in any way.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about Hair Loss & Breakage

1. How do I know whether I'm losing hair from the root or due to breakage?

A white bulb at the end of a strand indicates that it fell out from the root. If the strand is shorter than the rest of your hair, uneven, or does not have a bulb on the end, this means you are seeing broken hair.

2. Should I expect to lose 50-100 hairs a day?

Yes, most people expect to lose somewhere between 50-100 hairs a day; it is a completely normal part of the hair growth cycle. You should start to be concerned if you have a sudden increase in the number of hairs lost or if hair loss persists for many months.

3. Does the appearance of thinning from hair breakage?

Yes, excessive hair breakage can contribute to an appearance of thin, frizzy, lifeless hair, even if the roots are otherwise healthy.

4. Can Oiling Help both Hair Fall and Hair Breakage

While oiling is mainly beneficial to helping reduce hair breakage by improving both moisture retention and strengthening, oiling to the scalp directly addresses only external factors of hair fall. It does not treat any internal factors leading to hair fall, such as stress or nutritional deficiency.

5. Why do I lose more hair when washing?

When washing your hair, you are merely releasing all of those hairs that were already in the process of shedding. Although it is alarming to see so many of your strands fall out at once, it does not mean that washing your hair causes hair loss.

6. Can Stress Cause Hair Loss and Breakage?

Absolutely! Not only can stress trigger hair from the roots to fall out, but it can also cause weak hair strands that will break.

In summary...

While hair breakage and hair "falling out" may look the same, they require different kinds of treatment and care. If you can determine whether your hair needs stronger roots or stronger strands...everything will be easier moving forward. You can improve the overall health of your hair gently with a proper routine, and plenty of patience!

Recommended Products

Ayurvedic Shampoos for Hair Growth

Ayurvedic Hair Oils

Natural Hair Conditioners & Masks

Ayurvedic Hair Tonics & Hair Serums for Hair Growth

References

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10750333/

https://health.clevelandclinic.org/how-much-hair-loss-is-normal

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/hair-loss/symptoms-causes/syc-20372926

https://www.healthline.com/health/hair-breakage

https://www.garnier.in/hair-care-tips/difference-between-hair-fall-and-hair-breakage

https://www.goodrx.com/conditions/hair-loss/most-common-causes-of-hair-loss