How to Grow Facial Hair Faster

You can help your facial hair grow faster with a combination of lifestyle, diet, and skin care changes. Facial hair has been trending for a while and shows no signs of slowing down. Growing a beard can be a commitment and many of our barbering clients* that desire a bigger, more burly beard often ask us for tips on how to grow their facial hair faster.

When growing out your beard, time can be all it takes, but if you are looking for ways to stimulate growth you can give your beard a boost with simple tips for faster facial hair growth. Find out how facial hair grows and get the tips you can combine together to get the growth you want.

How Does Facial Hair Grow?

Each man’s face will grow facial hair at different rates based on several variables, including genetics, diet, protein intake, and even their lifestyles. Depending on which growth phase their facial hair is in, growth might take more or less time, too.

Hair grows in a constant cycle consisting of three phases:

• Anagen – the active growth phase in which cells are dividing rapidly and new hair is being formed. Each person’s hair growth is dependent on the length of time that this phase lasts.
• Catagen – the transitional phase when growth slows to a standstill.
• Telogen – a resting phase before growth begins again and when your hair begins to shed.

The anagen phase is the most crucial to for hair growth. Genetics can affect the fullness and patchiness of your facial hair, but it also plays a part in how fast your beard grows. Having the right combination of nutrients, rest, and protein can aid the cell production of your facial hair.

How Can I Get My Facial Hair to Grow Faster?

1. Have a regular skin care routine

   Regular cleansing and exfoliation are key to giving your face the foundation it needs to allow hair to grow. It’s also important to provide your skin with moisture and sunscreen protection to avoid cell damage. Clearing oil, dirt, and dead skin cells from the surface of your skin can translate to unhindered hair growth and help you avoid ingrown hairs.

2. Reduce the stress in your life

   Stress is a key contributor to many afflictions, but did you know that it can affect hair growth too? Stress not only affects your immune system but it can inhibit hair growth by shortening the anagen phase, meaning thinner hair that will shed more often. Carve out some serious chill time to your day to get that growth going.

3. Get some rest

   Early to bed, early to rise might makes a man healthy and able to grow an award-worthy beard. Okay, so that might not be how that saying goes, but it’s true that lack of sleep can affect hair growth. Getting adequate rest allows your cells to regenerate more quickly.

4. Enjoy a healthy lifestyle

   Just like sleep, eating a healthy diet full of nutrients and protein can result in faster and fuller facial hair growth. Working out and eating well is important for men to stay healthy, which can also maintain balanced hormones. These male hormones, like testosterone and dihydrotestosterone (DHT) define your beard’s thickness and density. This list of recommended grocery items from GQ magazine online is a great place to start.

5. Take your vitamins

   Generally, taking a multivitamin with B vitamin complex, iron, and zinc is a great way to boost your body’s ability to produce facial hair. While there is some debate about additional supplements, most barbers and hairdressers say that their clients that regularly take biotin and keratin supplements have noticed better hair growth results. This has been backed by several studies, including this one from 2012. Always talk to your doctor about adding these to your health regimine.

6. Stimulate facial hair growth at the surface

   Activate the hair follicles on your face with light scratching to keep the blood flow at the surface. This gives the cells an influx of nutrients, such as collagen and keratin, needed to get that beard growing even more. Some men even use a microneedling tool to get their facial hair to grow faster. Microneedling causes minimal damage to the skin that can result in faster growing facial hair. The jury is still out on this but we say give it a try!

Time is Your Friend

This time lapse video is pretty cool. Watch this man’s beard growth over the course of 100 days.

When it comes down to it, there isn’t a secret weapon to get stubborn stubble to evolve into that manly mask of facial hair you crave. Resist the urge to shave. Patience and time are on your side, so apply the tips we’ve shared and just let it grow!

Is There More to Barbering Than Shaving Beards?

Barbershops are a great place to not only get groomed, but to talk with experts about growing a long and full beard. Barbers are trained to understand the three phases of hair growth as well as the basics for giving your facial hair the TLC it needs to avoid breakage or thinning. For more info about the other interesting things that barbers learn in school, click here.

*All Services Performed by Students Under the Supervision of Licensed Instructors.

For important information about the educational debt, earnings, and completion rates of students who attended this program click for our Clackamas report.