Category Archives: How Many Hairs on Head

How Many Hairs are there on a Human Head?

It is said that humans first notice their scalp hair loss only after one-half of existing head hair has disappeared. I am not sure if this is a proven fact. I would have guessed that one would notice significant hair loss even after one-quarter of ones locks have disappeared. The normal rate of daily hair loss varies significantly from person to person.

Number of hairs on human head.
How many hairs are there on a human head?

In any event, that got me thinking as to how many hairs there are on an average human head? It seems like the answer is surprisingly easy to find, and researchers are in general agreement about the statistics.

How Many Hairs on the Human Head?

Answer: The range is from 90,000 to 150,000 hairs on the average human head.

A typical human scalp measures 120 square inches (774 square cm). According to Harvard Biological Numbers database, The color of your hair makes a difference as to how many strands are on your head:

  • If you are a blonde, you likely have the most hair at birth at around 150,000 follicles.
  • Brown haired people have an average of 110,000 hair follicles.
  • Black haired people, who represent a majority of the world, are born with 100,000 hairs.
  • And last but not least, possibly soon to be extinct redheads have only 90,000 hair follicles. Only 2% of humans are redheads.

Note that the entire human body has around 5 million hair follicles. The only areas of your body that have no hair (vellus or terminal) are the palms of your hands, soles of your feet, nipples, lips and parts of the genital regions.