How to Identify Real Human Hair Wigs

Stephanie Robinson.
3 min readMar 21, 2022

When you buy a human hair wig, you want it to be natural-looking, versatile, and long-lasting. That’s why when you purchase a human hair wig, even though pricier than synthetic wigs, you consider it as an investment. So, it is important that even when you buy human hair wigs online, you do not get fake or poor-quality wigs. To help you avoid being scammed, this article discusses how you can identify real human hair wigs.

How to Tell Real Hair Wigs from Fake

1. Check Reviews
2. Do a Fiber Test
3. Check its reaction to water
4. Feel the Texture
5. Use bleach

1. Check Reviews
If you’re planning to buy wigs online, whether synthetic or human hair, reading customer reviews would help you make an informed decision whether you should make that purchase or not. When you check reviews, watch out for the poor ratings as those would give you a proper view of the downsides to expect. A useful tip is to look for reviews in discussion forums other than the site of the vendor, as reviews on their website would likely be biased.

2. Do a Fibre Test

Once you’ve purchased your wig, this is something you can do to decide if it is a real human hair wig or if it is fake. To do this, take a few strands out of the wig and light it up. If the hair is fake, the fibres would melt and give off the same smell as burning/melting rubber. Whereas, real human hair would curl up and immediately catch fire. It would smell as if actual hair was burning.

3. Check its reaction to water
Another after-purchase test you can perform is the water test. You can also look out for what people’s reviews say about what happens to the hair when water is applied to it. If the hair remains straight or tangles when you spray water on it, then it is not real human hair. But if it curls or becomes wavy when wet, then you’ve got real human hair.

4. Feel the Texture
If you’re buying your wig from a physical store, checking the texture of the wig with your fingers is an easy way to tell if the wig is made from real human hair. While holding the wig, you can tell whether it is soft, thick, and natural-feeling. In addition, run your fingers through the hair to check for tangles. Wigs with excess tangles are made from poor-quality or fake hair while real human hair wigs have little to no tangles.

5. Use bleach
The bleach test is a final test you can do to convince yourself of whether the hair is real or not. Simply take a few strands and dip in a small quantity of bleach. Real human hair would take in the bleach and tighten, whereas the chemical would burn fake hair.

Final Thoughts

Note that if the shop does not have a refund policy, you will not be able to return the wig. So, before you make the purchase, ensure to read the terms and conditions and make sure it has a refund or exchange policy that you’re comfortable with. Whether or not the store has a refund policy, be sure to read as many reviews as possible to find out what people are saying about the wigs they bought from the website or vendor.

Also, ensure that you’re careful when carrying out any of these tests. For example, if you’re using any fibres from the wig for a test, first run through the wig with your fingers to check for any shed hairs that you can use. If there are none, gently pull out two or three strands from the back of the wig. Remember that if you damage the wig, returning it would be impossible. To avoid the hassle of buying fake human hair wigs and dealing with refunds, the best way to go is to shop only from online wig stores that offer real, high-quality human hair wigs.

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Stephanie Robinson.

Coily-haired girl who likes to read, talk about natural hair, and tutor Law students.