Hair Growth Rates
A: No. If you look at two men - one whose hair is cut in an extremely short style (less than ¼ inch or 6 mm long) and one whose hair is in a longer style (falling to about mid-ear, say 4 inches or 10 cm) - you would swear that the man with the very short cut has hair that grows at least twice as fast as the man with the longer hair. That visual impression is false.
The Illusion of Faster Growth
So, based on this average, after two weeks of hair growth, the guy with the ¼-inch or 6 mm cut will have added about ¼ inch or 6 mm of new growth. His total hair length expands to roughly half an inch (12 mm). That is a visual length increase of 100%.Meanwhile, the guy whose hair was 4 inches or 10 cm long will also have added about ¼ inch or 6 mm of new growth. His hair will now be roughly 4¼ inches or 10.6 cm long. That is a visual increase of only about 6.25%.
The actual amount of hair grown is identical in both men. The difference is that the new growth represents a much larger percentage of the total starting length when you start with very short hair.
Impact on Maintenance Frequency
This also means that if the goal is to keep the hair maintained at a specific proportional length - such as if you intend to cut the hair whenever it exceeds 50% of its starting length - the very short cut will need to be trimmed much more frequently than the longer hairstyle.For example, if the hair starts at ¼ inch or 6 mm, a 50% increase means gaining ⅛ inch (3 mm) to reach ⅜ inch or 9 mm. At a growth rate of ½ inch or 1.25 cm per month (about ⅛ inch per week), that amount of growth takes roughly one week.
On the other hand, if the hair starts at 4 inches or 10 cm, a 50% increase means gaining 2 inches or 5 cm to reach 6 inches or 15 cm. At the same growth rate, gaining those additional 2 inches would take roughly 4 months.
While fixed maintenance schedules and percentage targets are useful theoretical tools, they highlight why shorter hair seems to race ahead of longer styles. The hair isn't growing any faster; every fresh millimeter is simply far more obvious when starting close to the scalp.
The Biology of Hair Growth
There is a biological reason why cutting hair cannot change how fast it grows. Hair growth happens entirely underneath the skin inside the hair follicle. The visible hair shaft sitting above your scalp consists of dead keratinized cells. Trimming or shaving the ends of dead tissue sends no signal back to the living follicle beneath the skin to speed up or slow down cell division.Very long hair can sometimes give the impression that it has stopped growing altogether. This isn't because long hair grows slower, but because long hair is more prone to breakage and split ends at the tips, or because individual hairs reach the end of their biological growth phase (the anagen phase) and fall out naturally. If the tips break off at the same rate new hair emerges from the scalp, total length remains stagnant.
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See also:
Does different people's hair grow at different speeds?
Does a man's hair grow faster than women's hair?
Does the sun make your hair grow faster?