Shea › hair porosity app
the hair porosity app
Short answer: Shea (free on iPhone and Android). It stores your porosity as low, high or unsure, and then scores every product you scan against it. That is the part that matters. Knowing your porosity is only useful if something acts on it, and otherwise it is a fact you remember once and never use again.
Porosity is the single most useful thing to know about your hair, and it is the thing most people get told last. Curl pattern gets all the attention, but 4C hair with low porosity and 4C hair with high porosity want almost opposite routines. Two women with identical curls can follow the same advice and get opposite results, and both conclude they are doing something wrong.
what porosity actually is
The outside of every strand is a layer of overlapping scales called the cuticle. Porosity is just how easily water gets past it.
Low porosity means the scales lie flat and tight. Water takes a while to get in, and once it is in it stays. Product tends to sit on the surface at first, so it can feel like your hair rejects everything you put on it.
High porosity means there are gaps, either naturally or from colour, heat or years of manipulation. Water gets in fast and leaves just as fast. Your hair drinks a whole jar and is dry again by morning.
Neither one is damage and neither one is better. They just need different things, and almost every argument about a product online is two people with different porosity talking past each other.
how to work out yours, without the float test
The float test, where you drop a strand in a glass of water and watch whether it sinks, is the one everybody knows and it is not reliable. Residue, oil from your fingers and how long you wait all change the answer, and the same head can get three different results in a row.
Your own wash day tells you more:
what changes once you know
low and high, side by side
| on wash day | low porosity | high porosity |
|---|---|---|
| getting wet | water beads and takes a while | soaks through almost at once |
| drying | damp for hours | dry quickly |
| heavy butters | sit on top, feel greasy | often exactly right |
| protein | goes stiff fast, use sparingly | usually needs more than it gets |
| build-up | frequent, clarify more often | less of an issue |
| deep conditioning | warmth and time help it open | protein alongside the moisture |
If you are unsure, treat that as a starting point rather than a problem. Most people work it out from a few wash days once they know what they are watching for.
how Shea uses it
Your porosity is part of your profile, alongside curl pattern, density and what you are trying to do with your hair. It is not stored to be displayed back at you. It is used.
When you scan a product, the ingredient list is read and then scored against your own hair. A rich butter can score well for high porosity and poorly for low porosity from the identical label, and the reason is shown, not just a number. Heavy on low porosity, seals well, leans protein, and so on. When your porosity is unsure, the scan says so rather than guessing.
low porosity, so skip the butter 🫶🏾
the part an app cannot work out alone
An ingredient list predicts. It cannot tell you that a product flaked under gel in humidity, or that it took three washes to stop feeling coated.
That is what the Circle adds: 4,000+ Black women with 4C, 4B, 4A, 3C, 3B and 3A hair. Asking women with your porosity, not just your curl pattern, is the shortcut nobody tells you about.
is Shea free?
Yes. Shea is free on iPhone and Android. Setting your porosity, the Circle and daily care are free, and scanning is included on the free tier with a monthly limit. Premium raises that limit and is optional. There are no ads and your data is not sold.
Related: the type 4 hair app, the ingredient scanner app, and the hair growth tracker.
frequently asked