Hair color level is the number, from 1 to 10, that describes how light or dark hair is. Level 1 is black and level 10 is the palest blonde hair can reach without being white. The scale measures lightness only. Warm, cool, golden or ash is tone, written separately as the letter or decimal after the number, so two heads at level 7, one coppery and one mousy, share a row in the table below.
Levels are a scale of lightness agreed by eye, and two colorists reading the same dry section at the same window can still put it one level apart.
The ten levels
Each level sits over a warm pigment that is uncovered as the hair is lifted. The table gives the level, its common name, the pigment exposed at that point, the color that cancels it and the developer that usually carries healthy, uncolored hair there from one level below. One brand's dark blonde is another's light brown, and I think the names cause more misreadings than they prevent, so my own notes carry the number alone.
| Level | Name | Underlying pigment | Neutralizer | Typical developer from one level below |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Black | Dark red-black | None needed; reads as black | Deposit only (10 vol demi) |
| 2 | Darkest brown | Dark red | Green (matte) | 20 vol permanent |
| 3 | Dark brown | Red | Green (matte or ash) | 20 vol permanent |
| 4 | Medium brown | Red-orange | Green and blue (matte ash) | 20 vol permanent |
| 5 | Light brown | Orange-red | Blue and green (ash) | 20 vol permanent |
| 6 | Dark blonde | Orange | Blue (ash) | 20 vol permanent |
| 7 | Medium blonde | Yellow-orange | Blue-violet (ash) | 20 vol permanent |
| 8 | Light blonde | Yellow | Violet | 20 vol, 30 vol on resistant hair |
| 9 | Very light blonde | Pale yellow | Violet | 30 vol permanent or high-lift |
| 10 | Lightest blonde | Palest yellow | Pale violet | High-lift 40 vol on virgin hair, otherwise bleach |
Level versus tone
Level is depth. Tone is the direction of the color at that depth: gold, copper, red, ash, violet, neutral. A shade written 7.1 or 7A is level 7 with an ash tone; 7.3 or 7G is level 7 with gold; 7N or 7NN is level 7 in the natural series, with no dominant tone and, in the double-letter version, extra pigment for gray coverage. A request for "lighter but not so warm" is two requests, a level change and a tone change: developer volume moves the level, and the tone of the shade, and later the toner, deals with the warmth.
Underlying pigment
Natural hair color is a mixture of two melanins: eumelanin, brown to black, and pheomelanin, red to yellow. Lightening breaks down eumelanin first and fastest, so the hair passes through a fixed sequence of warm stages on the way up. At levels 1 to 3 the warmth is a red so dark it reads as black or mahogany. Levels 4 and 5 expose red-orange and orange-red. Level 6 is clean orange, level 7 yellow-orange, level 8 yellow, and levels 9 and 10 pale to almost invisible yellow. Green cancels red, blue cancels orange and violet cancels yellow. Every lightening formula either lifts past the stage it will stop at or neutralizes that stage with its opposite from the list.
Levels of lift versus developer volume
Lift is the number of levels the hair moves lighter in one application. Developer volume is the peroxide concentration that drives it: 10 volume is 3 percent peroxide, 20 is 6, 30 is 9 and 40 is 12. More peroxide means more lift, with more heat and stress on the cuticle. Permanent color reaches a ceiling because the same alkaline mixture that lifts also has to deposit, and the two jobs work against each other after about three levels. A high-lift series used with 40 volume stretches to four on virgin hair. Past four, only bleach, which lifts without depositing anything.
| Developer | Lift | Where it belongs |
|---|---|---|
| 10 vol (3%) | 0, deposit only | Demi-permanent, toners, glosses, going darker |
| 20 vol (6%) | 1 to 2 levels | Everyday permanent color and gray coverage |
| 30 vol (9%) | 2 to 3 levels | Lightening with permanent color on healthy hair |
| 40 vol (12%) | 3 to 4 levels | High-lift series on virgin hair; off-scalp bleach |
| Bleach, any volume | 5 levels and more | Every result past the reach of permanent color |
Volume decides how far; time decides how completely. A 20 volume taken off early under-lifts. But a 30 volume left on too long does not turn into a 40, because lift stops once the peroxide is spent, roughly 35 to 45 minutes in. The mix calculator covers quantities and the processing time calculator covers the clock.
Reading your own level
Read the hair in daylight, near a window. Bathroom bulbs add warmth and hide depth, and salon spots do the same. (I once read a client as a 6 under the spots and formulated for a 6; at the window afterwards she was a plain 5, the color stopped a level short, and the afternoon went to a toner I had not planned for. I read at the window now.) Look at the root, the first inch from the scalp, the only part that is reliably natural; ends are sun-faded, colored or both. Take a section from the mid-back of the head, because hairline and nape run darker than the crown, hold the mid-strand against a swatch, and match for lightness only, ignoring warmth, which is the part people find hardest. Dry hair, always. Wet hair reads one to two levels darker than it is, and hair with product in it darker still. Previously lightened hair is a separate case; the porosity test says how it will take color.
Why level 7 goes orange
Most box-dye disappointment happens at level 7. A level 4 or 5 base lifted with a 30 volume permanent lands at 7, and the underlying pigment at 7 is yellow-orange, the most saturated warmth in the sequence. The ash in a "light ash blonde" box is built to cool a level 7 or 8 starting point, with far too little blue to cancel the full orange a brunette reveals on the way up. More permanent color on top does nothing for it, because color cannot lift its own deposit. The fix is to stop at 7 and tone with a blue-based demi, or to keep lifting with bleach to level 9, where the yellow is pale enough for a violet toner.
Common misreadings
People almost always place themselves one level lighter than they are. Self-described light brown is usually a level 4 with warm ends, and "dirty blonde" is more often a 6 than a 7. A "black" head is usually a 2. We judge hair by its lightest, sun-exposed parts and by memory of a younger color. And the cost is the one described above: a formula planned from a level 6 that is really a 5 stops a level short and lands on orange. When two swatches both look possible, the darker one is the safer basis, and a strand test settles the rest.