How Much Time Does a Hair Take to Cycle?

Hi Doc,

Just wondering about the hair cycle.

In a normal situation (ie with no MPB) how much time would you expect for a hair to go from when it falls out through to when the hair is back to its previous length (lets say 5cm?)

And when you say ‘the time it takes to notice a difference in amount of hair’ do you mean when the hair has returned to the length of all other hair on your head or just when it has cracked the surface? (because different people notice different things – some might look very closely to the scalp and see hairs breaking through whereas others may not be as observant.)

And finally, have you got any super close up pictures of what hairs look like when they are coming through. (I am 16 weeks into proscar (large amount of shedding from weeks 2 – 10) and am seeing an abundance of hairs coming through at my hairline and temples and I want to tell if they are miniaturised or not)

And as an interesting side note i read somewhere on your site that everybody has miniaturised hairs on there hairline even if they are not balding, at about week 12 I noticed my miniaturised hairline hairs begininning to grow and then are now getting to normal length when they had sat at about 2-3cm for months and months and are now 5cm+.

Sorry for so much writing, very excited about my progress!

I am pleased you are seeing some positive results with finasteride and are excited about where things are headed. It generally takes about 6 to 12 months to see the difference after starting the medication. With respect to hair cycles, our hairs are constantly cycling with about 90% of them growing (anagen phase) and 10% shedding/resting (telogen/catagen). The entire cycle varies with people, sex, and age. The cycle can be as long as 7 years, but normally averages about 2-3 years. The growing phase lasts several years and the shedding/resting phase lasts a few weeks to months. This is why it takes several months to notice any changes in hair after starting finasteride.

I am not sure what difference it would make to see macro photos of hairs as they grow through the scalp, but I’ll see what I can come up with.