CBD is the part of marijuana that makes you chill, and it’s become the newest health food craze. You can consume CBD in the form of candy, seltzer, vape pens, topical creams, and everything in between. The origin of this cannabidiol, a molecule produced by cannabis plants, isn’t pot, though; it’s hemp. And sources as respected as Harvard Medical School have highlighted how CBD has been used to treat everything from anxiety to inflammation. But if you did some digging, you’d discover that while these ailments may exacerbate hair loss in some, CBD does nothing to affect male pattern baldness, the most common form of hair loss.

Can CBD Help Hair Loss?

Technically, if anyone asks, “Does stress cause hair loss?” the answer is, “Yes.” Telogen effluvium, trichotillomania, and alopecia areata, which all sound like bands you might listen to on CBD, are three common forms of stress induced hair loss. Telogen effluvium is when you have an experience so stressful that it causes your hair to just stop growing, trichotillomania is when you pull out your hair as a response to stress, and alopecia areata, the exact cause of which has yet to be nailed down, is when your body’s own immune system starts to attack your hair. CBD may potentially help with all of these!

The cannabidiol’s long reputation with being mellow has been established by methods more scientific methods than just getting high with the cool RA your freshman year of college. In 2019, for example, The Permenante Journal released Cannabidiol in Anxiety and Sleep: A Large Case Series, yet another in a long series of studies to suggest that CBD is good for your vibe. So if you reduce your anxiety and improve the quality of your sleep using CBD, then your body will produce less cortisol, a stress hormone, and the severity of your stress-induced hair loss may decrease. But don’t go out to buy CBD gummies just yet!

The most common form of hair loss is androgenetic alopecia. Anyone who knows the answer to, “What is DHT and does it cause hair loss?” knows that male pattern baldness happens when you have a genetic predisposition that causes your hair to malfunction when exposed to dihydrotestosterone (DHT), the product of testosterone combining with the enzyme Type II 5-alpha-reductase. When this reaction occurs in your scalp, those with the genetic predisposition experience hair loss. And, unfortunately, CBD does nothing to treat that.

While CBD may not stop male pattern baldness, it may be good for hair that you already have and your scalp in general. The Journal of Clinical Investigation published a piece that explored how cannabidiol exerts sebostatic and anti-inflammatory effects on human sebocytes. What this paper explored was the possibility of CBD reaching sebaceous glands and getting them to produce more sebum, the body’s natural lubricating oil. That would be good for your hair! Additionally, when the scientific journal Neuropsychopharmacology explored the effects of CBD on regional cerebral blood flow, they discovered evidence that suggests that CBD increases the flow of blood to your brain, which might mean more nutrients for your scalp. Also good for your hair!

Scalp Pigmentation for Hair Loss

CBD may help reduce the stress of experiencing male pattern baldness, but perhaps not as effectively as scalp micropigmentation. That’s a hair loss treatment that makes it look like you just got a fresh buzzcut! If you’re wondering, “Does scalp micropigmentation look real?” you can just browse the results yourself!