DIY Banana Hair Mask

Strengthen and deeply nourish your hair with this easy-to-make-at-home DIY Banana Hair Mask. The all-natural ingredients supply your locks with essential nutrients for healthy hair growth and a happy scalp.

Whether your goal is to encourage your hair follicles to grow shiny, long hair, or you need to moisturise your dry hair or soothe an itchy scalp, this banana pack is for you.

In this helpful, comprehensive guide I will give you a few recipe ideas with different ingredients you can choose from as well as a tutorial on how to make and apply the hair mask.

Contents

• Benefits
• Ingredients
• Banana Hair Mask Recipes
• Instructions
• Storage
• Safety & Warnings
• 📖 Recipe

Benefits

This homemade banana hair mask has a ton of benefits for our precious mane. It addresses many hair problems that most of us are faced with: hair fall, brittle hair, hair breakage, and scalp issues.

Although our hair health has a lot to do with our hormones, high stress levels, unhealthy diet and damaging styling methods, we can still help from the outside in.

Benefits of Bananas

• improves hair strength for stronger, thicker hair
• scalp health: relieves dandruff symptoms and moisturises a dry scalp
• natural humectant: moisturises and nourishes deeply into the hair shaft
• smoothes frizzy hair
• prevents hair loss
• protects against hair breakage by improving the hair elasticity
• repairs sun-damaged hair
• suitable for all types of hair

Bananas are rich in minerals (such as potassium and silica), vitamins (especially B6 and C) and natural oils supplying many essential nutrients to improve your hair and scalp health.

They may not boost hair growth as much as other natural ingredients do but bananas will help you keep the hair you’ve got by strengthening the hair follicles to prevent hair loss.

The mineral silica in bananas may help synthesise collagen, making your hair stronger and thicker and improving your hair elasticity so it doesn’t break off easily.

Bananas are a natural humectant, meaning highly hydrating, which not only benefits your dry hair but also your scalp. Especially, when you suffer from a dry, flaky and itchy scalp and dandruff.

Also, if your hair is exposed to a lot of sun, the moisturising properties of bananas nourish and recover sun damage caused by harmful UV rays (free radicals).

Vitamin C and vitamin E are antioxidants that help in the fight against free radicals. These are the cause of oxidative stress in the body and disrupt a healthy scalp and may influence normal hair growth.

Ingredients

fresh banana

Additional Ingredients

• natural oils: coconut, argan, jojoba and avocado oil
• aloe vera gel
• egg yolk
• ripe avocado
• honey
• yoghurt
• essential oils: lavender, rosemary and chamomile

(find quantities in recipe card and under “Banana Hair Mask Recipes”)

Banana: You want to use a yellow, ripe banana for this DIY banana hair mask. An overripe banana is okay too because it has high antioxidant levels and is still nutritious. A ripe banana is also easier to mash.

Depending on your preferred outcome, your goals and your hair type, you can add more ingredients to your homemade hair mask (recipe ideas follow in a bit).

Additional Ingredients

Natural Oils

Some of the best oils to use for your hair care routine are coconut oil, argan oil, olive oil, jojoba oil and avocado oil ^[1].

Coconut oil is loaded with fatty acids (particularly lauric acid) and is able to penetrate the hair shaft to nourish the hair deeply and reduce the loss of protein (your hair’s building block).

As it contains antibacterial properties it also helps fight dandruff and may even get rid of lice and other bugs on the scalp.

Olive Oil is highly moisturising and great for conditioning. People with dry hair will benefit the most and should be avoided by people with oily hair or thin hair as it is very heavy.

Argan Oil is amazing for dry, brittle and damaged hair (especially from dyeing) as it’s hydrating and nourishing.

Jojoba Oil is a light oil so people with thin, fine hair are able to use it. It moisturises, softens and reduces hair breakage. I may also be helpful in the fight against dandruff.

Aloe Vera

Aloe Vera has so many benefits for our hair (too many to list here), ranging from boosting hair growth, to moisturising, to cleansing.

Egg Yolk

Eggs are high in protein and a great addition to your DIY banana hair mask when your main aim is to strengthen your hair.

Avocado

Avocado has a lot of natural oils that moisturise dry, coarse hair as well as prevent inflammation while restoring the natural balance of the skin and your hair roots.

Honey & Yoghurt

Yoghurt & honey are both natural humectants and deeply condition the hair shafts. Honey also has antimicrobial properties that help with a healthy scalp (especially with dandruff caused by bacteria or fungus).

By the way, vegans can use dairy-free yoghurt too as long as it contains lactic acids (yes, they’re vegan when in a plant-based product). Coconut yoghurt would be your best choice!

Essential Oils

My favourites are lavender, chamomile and rosemary essential oil—particularly, if your focus is on hair growth. Essential oils always need to be diluted, so you have to use a carrier oil in your recipe!

Banana Hair Mask Recipes

Here are a few recipe ideas that you can try. You can also combine them if you like—there’s no limit. But just don’t go overboard and overfeed your hair and scalp (yes, that’s possible)!

Moisturising Hair Mask

• 1 mashed banana
• 1 tablespoon of yoghurt
• ½ tablespoon of argan oil (or choose according to your hair type)

Hair Growth Boost Mask

• 1 ripe banana
• 1 tablespoon of aloe vera gel
• ½ tablespoon of oil of choice
• 1-2 drops of rosemary or lavender essential oil

Aloe vera is one of my favourite ingredients for hair growth and health. In this recipe post, you’ll find out more about it and how you can use it for a mask in combination with coconut oil.

Hair Mask for Stronger Hair

• 1 mashed banana
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 tablespoon of coconut oil (or jojoba oil for fine or oily hair)

Avocado Banana Hair Mask

• 1 ripe banana
• ½ avocado
• ½ tablespoon of oil of choice
• 1-2 drops of rosemary, chamomile or lavender essential oil

If you like to know more about this particular recipe and its benefits, I’ve got a detailed post about this avocado banana hair mask here on my blog.

Dandruff & Dry Scalp Hair Mask

• 1 ripe banana
• 1 tablespoon of honey
• 1 tablespoon of coconut or jojoba oil
• 1 drop of chamomile essential oil

Instructions

How to Make this DIY Banana Hair Mask

To prevent banana chunks in your hair, I highly recommend pureing the banana with a blender (hand-held or high-speed) instead of mashing it with a fork.

How to Use this DIY Banana Hair Mask

Step 2. Gently massage your head in a circular motion. This increases the blood flow and ensures the nutrients can get into the hair follicles.

Step 3. Cover your head and hair with a shower cap to prevent the hair mask from drying out. Also, this keeps your hair warm (by your body heat) which increases the absorption of nutrients.

Leave the hair treatment in for about an hour for best results (30 minutes minimum). Every now and then, check that the banana isn’t drying out somewhere. If it does, spray your hair with water.

Step 4. Wash your hair with lukewarm water and a mild shampoo as per usual. Make sure, you get rid of the mask. Some hair types (like mine) like to retain oils and other residue from the ingredients.

If your hair feels sticky or a bit weird after the first wash, apply another round of shampoo (you likely won’t need much though).

Scalp Treatment: You can use this homemade banana hair mask as a scalp and root treatment, too (for dandruff, see recipe above). After all, it’s our hair follicles we should focus on when we want healthy hair.

You do the same things as just described but you simply won’t spread the mask all the way down to the ends. Concentrate on the scalp and apply it part by part.

How often should you use this homemade hair mask?

We want to be careful not to overfeed our hair and skin (yes, that’s possible! Just like you can overeat at a meal). I recommend using the hair treatment 1-2 times a week for optimal results.

As we’re using natural ingredients, it’s highly unlikely you notice a big difference after only one treatment (there are always exceptions to the rule).

Don’t expect a magical remedy with overnight success. Things take time! And, don’t forget, you also need to find out the cause of your hair problems and address them at the core (such as healthy lifestyle, diet and habits).

DIY hair masks are simply supporting your health naturally and should never be considered a remedy. Patience and consistency are key to your success!

Storage

It’s possible, you end up with leftovers. If they’re enough for a second hair mask, store them in an airtight container in the fridge for up to a week. Or freeze them for up to 4 months.

If you’re only left with a little bit, use them on your face! The ingredients we use in these homemade hair masks are also beneficial for our skin!

Safety & Warnings

Allergic reactions to bananas are possible and may even become life-threatening. Use caution when allergic to any other fruit or vegetable in the latex family.

If unsure, make a patch test before using this hair mask. Choose a small part of your skin and apply this mask. Leave it on for about 20-30 minutes and check for reactions (they can appear up to 48 hours after!).

📖 Recipe