Vitamin C is Great for Your Hair, Scalp, & More!

Alyssa Brown • May 01, 2023

Vitamin C is great for your hair, scalp and helping you fend off the common cold. This is because Vitamin C helps your body produce collagen which helps to build hair proteins and for healthy skin, assists your system digest other nutrients to prevent hair loss, and plays a crucial role in the creation of keratin, which your hair follicles use to create hair.

Vitamin C is also one of nature’s most potent antioxidants. This gives it a number of protective powers to keep your hair and skin safe from harsh environmental elements like ozone gas and damaging UV rays. But the protective powers don’t stop on top of the skin. Vitamin C also fights off free radicals inside the body, which helps prevent oxidative stress that can lead to premature graying (1).

Strangely, our bodies can't naturally produce Vitamin C. Turns out we're deficient in an enzyme called “l-gulonolactone oxidase,” which is required for Vitamin C production (2). But the good news is that we can get all we need from food. The amount of Vitamin C you need depends on your age, gender, if you’re pregnant, or if you gave birth and are breastfeeding.

Life Stage	Recommended Amount (3)
Birth to 6 months	40 mg
Infants 7–12 months	50 mg
Children 1–3 years	15 mg
Children 4–8 years	25 mg
Children 9–13 years	45 mg
Teens 14–18 years (boys)	75 mg
Teens 14–18 years (girls)	65 mg
Adults (men)	90 mg
Adults (women)	75 mg
Pregnant teens	80 mg
Pregnant women	85 mg
Breastfeeding teens	115 mg
Breastfeeding women	120 mg

Since our bodies don’t naturally produce Vitamin C, we need to get our recommended daily intake from food. Fortunately, it’s prevalent in all sorts of delicious foods (3).

Red peppers
Oranges
Grapefruits
Kiwis
Broccoli
Strawberries
Brussels sprouts
Tomatoes
Cabbage
Cauliflower
Potatoes
Spinach
Peas

To find the amount of Vitamin C in each, look at the USDA website for nutritional information. You can also look it up at the grocery store on the packaging or nutritional charts. And if neither is available, do a quick search on your favorite search engine. You can also hire a nutritionist to create a diet plan that incorporates the right amount of Vitamin C for your specific needs.

Now that you know how much you need, let's look at how Vitamin C keeps your scalp and hair healthy.

Scalp

Your scalp is part of your body’s largest organ, your skin. So, what’s good for your skin is good for your scalp. Collagen is a protein that keeps your skin healthy, elastic and firm, and vitamin C plays a crucial role in stimulating the production of collagen (4). And collagen can lead to hair growth according to this study from Yale.

Vitamin C’s antioxidant properties also keep your scalp safe from ozone gas that can damage the keratinocyte stem cells needed for hair growth (5) as well as from harmful UV rays that can burn your skin, even when it’s covered by your gorgeous locks (6).

Hair

Vitamin C gets an A+ for its role in making sure you have a full head of glimmering hair. For starters, Vitamin C is key for producing Keratin, a protein that your body uses as the primary building block of long and strong hair. Vitamin C helps your body break down other proteins into their basic amino acids, which it then recombines to make Keratin and grow hair (7).

Additionally, Vitamin C helps your body absorb iron. Without enough iron, you can develop an iron-deficiency anemia that leads to a number of problems including brittle nails and premature hair loss (8).

And if you’re constantly struggling with oily hair, it might be because you’re not getting enough Vitamin C. “Oily” hair comes from an excess of sebum, the natural lubricant your body produces to keep your scalp and hair healthy. Sometimes your sebaceous glands get overly excited and pump out too much, but the right amount of Vitamin C helps prevent any over production (9).

Two other immediate signs of Vitamin C deficiency are bleeding around the hair follicles and “corkscrew” hair growth. If you notice either of these, see your doctor as soon as you can.

So if you’re wondering, yes, Vitamin C is good for your hair and scalp. Now that you know how much this vital vitamin can do for you, pull out that blender for a delicious kiwi-strawberry smoothie or turn up the heat for some oven roasted broccoli and brussels sprouts. This can be your “C”-cret weapon for a healthy scalp and a gorgeous head of hair!

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