The 9 Best Shampoos for Bleached Hair of 2020

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Having bleached hair is a lot of work. Besides spending some quality time in the chair at the salon—you'll also need to do some serious maintenance at home. Bleached tresses can easily go from white to a yellow tint over time. Thankfully, just adding a simple shampoo with a purple-hue can keep your color as fresh as the day you left the hairdresser.

These purple shampoos work to combat brassiness, but should only be used once a week. Since bleaching your hair can also cause some serious damage, we've picked some favorites that address various concerns like split-ends, frizz, damage, and more.

Here, the best shampoos for bleached hair.

Best Overall: Philip B. Icelandic Blonde Shampoo

Is there a better descriptor for the luminous shade of white blonde hair most dedicated bleach lovers aspire to than “Icelandic blonde”? Fool everyone into thinking your Nordic ancestry is emerging with this editor-beloved botanical shampoo that tones down brassy yellow while playing up your blonde and silver strands.

Most bleached hair benefits from oil treatments, and this shampoo is chock-full of grapeseed oil, plum extract, and time-released botanicals, while AHAs, antioxidants, and titanium dioxide work together to give your whitest strands shimmer and shine. While it’s a little pricey, you only need to use it one a week so it will last a while.

Best Budget: Not Your Mother’s Blonde Moment Treatment Shampoo

Getting your hair colored is no cheap feat. When it comes time to maintain your color the last thing you want to do is spend a lot of money on a product. Thankfully, this budget buy gets the job done at a fraction of the cost of other high-priced shampoos.

This gentle treatment shampoo has color-protecting dark purple pigment (it’s about the same color as the packaging itself) to neutralize and prevent brassiness, glycerin to hydrate, and violet rice to revitalize damaged hair between cuts.

It’s free of sulfates and endocrine disruptors, too. Reviewers love the scent, and the clean-feeling finish after rinsing. Byrdie Editorial Director Faith tried this wallet-friendly shampoo to revive her platinum strands—check out her full product review, here!

Best for Dry Hair: Christophe Robin Wheat Germ Shampoo

Every blonde worth the investment has a Christophe Robin product somewhere in their bathroom, whether it’s their cult-favorite deep conditioning mask or this everyday moisturizing shampoo. Designed specifically for fine, colored hair, it has a low pH of 4.2, which allows for every-day washing, so if you work out a lot or have extremely oily strands, this is a great product to try.

The wheat germ in the name acts as a keratin-esque protein enhancer to protect and strengthen your hair (which some help from vitamin A, E, and F) and it won’t wash out dye if you’ve colored over your bleach. Most importantly, it’s free of parabens, silicones, and colorants, so the only thing going on your hair is a rich moisturizing complex.

Best for Damaged Hair: Olaplex No. 4 Bond Maintenance

Platinum hair is beautiful, but it comes at a cost. Bleaching the hair can lead to dry, brittle strands that are practically begging for some TLC, especially if they were damaged to begin with from daily heat styling or brushing. Luckily, there are ways to enjoy icy blonde, bleached hair while keeping damage at a minimum.

A strengthening and reparative shampoo, like this Olaplex formula, is a godsend for damaged hair. It works at the molecular level by re-linking broken bonds for smooth and strong strands. A dime-sized amount of the highly-moisturizing shampoo can reduce breakage, frizz, and flyaways, and pave the way towards the shiny, healthy hair you deserve.

Best Toning Shampoo: dpHUE Cool Blonde Shampoo

After investing time, energy, and money into achieving platinum hair, the last thing you want is for unwanted brassiness to ruin your look. To keep yellow and brassy tones at bay—and neutralize any already present—look to a purple shampoo for help.

This formula contains purple pigments and silk proteins to keep your platinum hair looking and feeling its best. It’s the perfect choice for color-treated hair or naturally blonde hair of all textures—fine, medium, and thick—looking to address brassiness and color fading while cleansing. As a bonus, this shampoo is free of sulfates and parabens.

Best for Conditioning: Verb Ghost Shampoo

If you're looking to condition rather than brighten while still protecting your color, go the way of this ultra-nourishing shampoo. The formula makes use of plant-based ingredients like moisturizing moringa seed oil, sunflower seed extract (which naturally protects color from UV damage and combats brassiness), and quinoa protein to strengthen and repair over-processed strands.

Best for Split Ends: Shu Uemura Ultimate Remedy Extreme Restoration Shampoo

ultimate-remedy-shampoo — Courtesy of Shu Uemura

If your hair is so overprocessed, broken, and crunchy you think it's beyond repair, here's your savior: Shu Uemura's line of Extreme Restoration products use lotus flower-derived lipids and ceramides to bind the hair cuticle, healing it from the inside out. Plus, the product smells like orange and jasmine. Divine.

Best Natural: Rahua Color Full Shampoo

Rahua is known for their all-natural plant-based formulas, which are gentle on hair and gentle on the environment thanks to their commitment to ethically-sourced, low-impact farming and trade within the Amazon rainforest. A lilac clay found there provides a natural way to counteract brassy tones, but their color-protection complex is safe for all shades of color and highlights.

Rahua’s signature ingredients are their namesake rahua and morete oils which nourish hair and repair damage to the hair and scalp, and it’s scented with gardenia for a truly luxurious shampoo experience.

Reviewers love that it lets them reduce the frequency of their shampoo days, letting them preserve and stretch color even longer without drying out. Since it’s a natural formula, it won’t lather up much, so make sure to use your fingers to produce enough friction to cleanse your scalp and strands.

Best for Frizz: Amika Bust Your Brass Cool Blonde Shampoo

amika-bust-your-brass-shampoo — Courtesy of Sephora

Yes, it is possible to bleach hair that has some texture, but if you’re a curly girl who’s dying to go blonde, be prepared for some maintenance to keep your strands safe. Amika’s toning shampoo enhances blonde, silver, and gray tones (both dyed and natural) and the protein- and vitamin-packed formulas help to strengthen hair. However, those proteins can also be drying, which is where Amika’s signature ingredient comes in.

Amika is known for their use of sea buckthorn berry (also known as obliphica) which they claim contains over 190 biologically active compounds: more vitamin C than an orange, more vitamin A than a carrot, and high concentrations of the rare Omega-7, normally found in fish oil, but without the smell. Omega-7 keeps free radicals at bay and promotes the production of collagen, the foundation of healthy hair, skin, and nails. It’s formulated to be free of any nasty synthetics or chemicals and has no artificial fragrance – that smell is pure, natural strength being washed back into your hair.

The Best Brightening and Repairing Shampoos for Bleached Hair

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