Do baking soda and hydrogen peroxide work to lighten your hair shade? We asked hair care experts and senior colorists all about how to bleach hair with hydrogen peroxide and baking soda, and they are effective for lightening your hair. 

Hair experts advise that you should consider the results you want to achieve before trying any technique for bleaching your mane. Now keep reading to learn more about how to bleach hair. 

Does hydrogen peroxide bleach hair?

On its own, only hydrogen peroxide from a drug store cannot lighten your hair as it will dry before taking place any chemical reaction. Hence, it is usually combined with other ingredients to bleach. For instance, when you mix it up with baking soda, they create a form of a paste and sit on your hair longer. 

The mix is commonly used to lighten the hair shade up 1-2 shades. Take a little notice, you may see hydrogen peroxide appeared in the ingredients in most hair dyes. They will turn your dark hair into a lighter color before you put another color.

However, you should use 3% hydrogen peroxide to avoid damaging hair strands. If you let a large quantity of these chemicals have prolonged contact with your skin, it causes redness and irritation.  Hence, experts advise to mix peroxide with other products to reduce its power. When buying the item, you have to check the ingredients on the label before taking it. Find out how much to use it, and how long you can leave it on your head to get the maximum results.  

How to bleach your hair with hydrogen peroxide and baking soda

Before starting bleaching your mane, you have to prepare some supplies needed:

— Hydrogen peroxide

— Baking soda

— A plastic bowl

— A brush to put the mix on your mane

— Gloves

— An old T-shirt

The followings are simple steps on how to bleach hair with peroxide and baking soda

Step 1: Clean your hair

It would be best if you started with clean hair. Make sure that your hair is clean enough so that baking soda and hydrogen peroxide can easily soak into your hair strands. 

You can wash your hair 2-3 days before bleaching your hair. And before bleaching, gently rinse the hair again to remove dirt and oils. You should not use any products containing oils as they prevent the chemicals from penetrating your locks. 

Then let your hair air dry or you can leave it damp. Avoid using your hairdryer to speed up this process because it may cause dry and damaged hair. 

Step 2: Mix up hydrogen peroxide with baking soda

Wear gloves and start mixing the ingredients until they become a paste. Depending on how light your hair you desire and hair density, you can take an appropriate amount. 

Take a cup of baking soda into a plastic bowl and make sure that it has no clumps. Add 2-3 tablespoons of hydrogen peroxide, you can use 3% peroxide, into the bowl. Stir the mixture evenly until it forms in a paste. The paste is fluid enough to spread into your strands quickly.

Note: Don’t use metal supplies such as bowls or spoon as they are possible to react with the chemicals in hydrogen peroxide. 

Step 3: Apply the mix

Before doing the next step on how to bleach hair white with hydrogen peroxide and baking soda, wear your old T-shirt. It prevents the chemicals from falling on your clothes and skin. 

Section your hair with clips and leave one. Now start applying the bleach until it coats the whole of your hair strands. Make sure that the bleach distributes evenly on your mane. Wear a shower cap and wait for 15-30 minutes.

— You should do a small test before putting the mixture on your head. Coat the bleach on a few hair strands and wait about 30 minutes before you rinse the hair. Check the results, and you can decide if you want to bleach your mane. 

— The mixture will lighten your mane up 1-2 shades. Hence, if your hair color is dark and you want to get a harsh transition color, you should try other techniques. 

Step 4: Rinse your hair

Once the time is up, rinse your locks with cool water. We don’t recommend using shampoo after bleaching as it may stress your strands. Just condition your hair after lightening and rinse with water again. The cool water will make your hair look shiny. Let the hair air dry to avoid being damaged. 

If the results are not as light as you desire it to be, you have to wait two weeks or more before bleaching again. Your hair needs time to recover after processing. 

Other common techniques to lighten hair

Besides using hydrogen peroxide and baking soda, there are a bunch of ways to bleach your hair. How to naturally lighten hair? People always use ingredients lying around the house, such as lemon juice, apple cider vinegar, vitamin C, etc. to lighten their natural locks. 

For example, some mix up lemon juice with hair conditioner to bleach the hair. You may know that lemon juice contains acid; thus, it does lighten your locks. Nevertheless, you should be careful when applying this bleaching technique. Don’t overuse it since it may burn your strands. 

To bleach your hair, you mix up lemon juice with your normal hair conditioner or coconut oil. While lemon lightens your hair color, the conditioner will supply more moisturization and hydration to hair strands.  

Our conclusion

Layla hopes that this article has somehow offered you an idea about how to bleach hair with hydrogen peroxide and baking soda. Follow these above steps and try to lighten your hair. 

Remember to take care of your hydrogen peroxide hair to avoid damage. Hair dyes and hydrogen peroxide contain chemicals; hence, you have to use it carefully and properly. Or go to a hair salon and a senior colorist will help bleach your mane. They know how to minimize hair damage and ensure you get your desired hair hue.