Adobe Photoshop is a powerhouse when it comes to photo editing. You can do everything from smoothing skin to removing blemishes, and more. With Photoshop's selection tools, you can also find out exactly what you'd look like with a different hair color, without going through the trouble of dyeing your hair.

Below, we walk you through the two different methods of doing this, in detail.

How to Select Hair in Photoshop

First, you need to make a selection in Photoshop. To select your hair, follow these steps:

  1. Open the Quick Selection tool in the tools menu. You can also use the keyboard shortcut W.
  2. Select the area of the portrait with hair. You can use the square brackets [ and ] to increase and decrease the size of the brush. Hold down the Shift key to add additional parts of the image to your selection, and hold down the Alt key to remove sections of the image from your selection.
    Select the hair area in Photoshop
  3. You can also refine your selection by clicking Select and Mask. Adjust the sliders for the select and mask settings: Smooth, Feather, Contrast, or Shift Edge. This is very much a trial and error process, and you'll find that it's best to play around with the feature to see what works best for your image.
  4. Once you're done, click OK.

Now that you have your selection made, below are the two ways you can go about changing the hair color. Proceed with your preferred method.

How to Change Hair Color in Photoshop

In the first method, we will use the Selective Color feature to make the changes. Here is how to do it:

  1. Go to Image > Adjustments > Selective Color.
    Choose the Selective Color option
  2. Select Neutrals from the dropdown menu.
  3. You can now adjust the sliders based on the color you want in your end result. Bump up the yellow slider if you want blonde hair. Bump down the cyan slider if you want redder hair. And bump down the black slider if you want gray hair.
  4. Play around with the other options in the dropdown menu if you're looking for a more drastic change of color.
    Changed hair color in Photoshop

Your adjustments will vary depending on the original hair color—experimentation will go a long way to find the right hair color you're looking for. This method is more forgiving when it comes to the accuracy of your selection.

Alternatively, you can also use the Hue/Saturation option directly to make these changes. Here is how to do that:

  1. Open the targeted image and press the Ctrl + J keys if you are using a Windows computer and Command + J keys if you are a Mac user. This will duplicate the background layer.
  2. Move to the right pane and click on the half-filled circle in the bottom right corner.
  3. Choose Hue/Saturation from the context menu.
  4. Now, adjust the color range as per your requirements. Set the Hue, Saturation, and Lightness according to your preferences, and at this point, don't worry about the skin or the background colors changing. Just focus on adjusting the hair.
    Modify the saturation, hues, and lightness in Photoshop
  5. Once done, press the Ctrl + I or Command + I keys.
  6. Select the Brush tool from the left pane and ensure that white is the foreground color.
  7. Pick an appropriate brush size and paint over the hair area that you want to modify.
    Pick the brush tool in Photoshop

And that's it! You should now have your desired hair color. Apart from changing the color of your hair, you can also use the Hue/Saturation feature to change the color of the entire image in Photoshop.

Play With Hair Colors in Photoshop

As is the case with most things in Photoshop, there are multiple ways to do things. The steps above should help you get the hair color of your dreams in no time. Do you have a preferred method for changing hair color in Photoshop?