Short answer
Every hair's colour is set by the pigment its own follicle makes — dark eumelanin, reddish pheomelanin, or less of both — so hairs from different areas, and even neighbouring follicles, can differ. Greying happens follicle by follicle as pigment cells are lost, which is why beards often show a mix of dark, red, grey and white hairs that the eye blends into one overall colour at a distance.
Hair colour comes from two kinds of melanin made by pigment cells (melanocytes) in the follicle. Eumelanin gives black and brown; pheomelanin gives red and yellowish tones. Large amounts of eumelanin make hair black, moderate amounts brown, small amounts blond, and a predominance of pheomelanin with little eumelanin makes it red. The MC1R receptor on melanocytes is the best-known switch between the two. Because the balance is set in each follicle, different body areas do not have to match: many people notice red or lighter hairs in a beard that is otherwise the same colour as their head hair, or a beard noticeably warmer or darker than the head. Colourwise treats that as a normal variation, not something with a single explanation for everyone.
Grey and white hairs are hairs with little or no melanin. Research on human follicles found that grey hairs still contain a few active pigment cells in the bulb, while white hair bulbs had none detectable, and work in mice and human follicles traced greying to melanocyte stem cells failing to maintain themselves in their niche. Greying is therefore gradual and follicle by follicle, not a colour change of the whole beard at once. Almost everyone's hair greys eventually; when it starts varies widely, and exactly why is still not fully understood.
A beard with dark and white hairs mixed together is optically a fine mosaic. At normal viewing distance the eye cannot resolve individual hairs, so it averages them — the same partitive mixing that makes a fine black-and-white tweed look grey. The proportion of unpigmented hairs, how light scatters from their surfaces and the colour of the skin showing between them together set the overall shade. Close up, the individual colours are visible; across a room, only the average is. White hair also reflects the colour of the light and surroundings more readily than dark hair, so a grey beard can look warmer under indoor light and cooler in shade.
Facial hair frames the lower face with a colour that contrasts with skin by lightness and sometimes hue. A dark beard creates a strong lightness edge; a light, grey or red beard a softer one. That contrast interacts with clothing near the face in the same way hair colour does, and the personal colour tool lets the reader explore it as a preference. Whether to keep facial hair its natural colour, lighten it or dye it is a matter of personal choice; Colourwise explains the optics and does not treat grey as something that needs changing.
In photographs, dark beards can merge with shadow under the jaw; a little light from below or the side keeps their shape.
Why: Natural beards are a mosaic of hair colours; a single-shade dye removes that variation, which the eye reads as artificial.
Fix: If dyeing is the preference, a slightly lighter shade or one that leaves some variation tends to read as more natural.
Why: Warm light and camera white balance emphasise pheomelanin's red tones.
Fix: Photograph in daylight or set white balance with a neutral reference.
Each statement is labelled by kind — established fact, a standard’s requirement, observed market data, a convention, or Colourwise’s own interpretation or analysis — with the strength of the evidence behind it.
FactStrong evidence
Hair colour depends on the amounts of eumelanin, which gives black and brown, and pheomelanin, which gives red; the MC1R receptor influences which of the two melanocytes produce.
Source: MedlinePlus Genetics: Is hair color determined by genetics?
FactModerate evidence
Grey human hairs retain a small number of active pigment cells in the hair bulb, while white hair bulbs have no detectable melanocytes.
Caveat: Studied on scalp hair; beard follicles are assumed to behave similarly but were not the subject.
FactStrong evidence
Hair greying has been linked to the failure of melanocyte stem cells to maintain themselves in the hair-follicle niche.
Caveat: Mechanism research largely in mice with supporting human samples; it does not predict when any individual will grey.
Colourwise interpretationLimited evidence
Differences in colour between beard hair and scalp hair on the same person are commonly observed and consistent with follicle-level control of melanin, but Colourwise found no source quantifying how often they occur.
Based on: Follows from the follicle-level melanin mechanism described by MedlinePlus Genetics; frequency not established.
Caveat: No prevalence figure is implied.
Reviewed 29 September 2026. Colourwise summarises its sources in its own words and does not reproduce standards text or proprietary colour data. Spotted an error? Tell us.