Key findings
The five most quotable stats in the dataset. Cite freely.
79.2% of curly-hair users have mixed textures, not a single curl pattern.
74% name frizz as their top frustration. 69% say they don't know what their routine should be.
Frizz is the #1 frustration in 4 of the 5 largest country markets — including 100% of UK respondents and 88.9% of users in Egypt.
4a users report the highest frizz rate at 83.3%. Among well-represented patterns, 3a is second at 81%.
Heat-damaged users are 10 percentage points more likely than naturally curly users to say they don't know their routine (70.3% vs 60.3%).
Hair profile
What our users self-report about their curl pattern, hair journey, density, strand thickness, and wash frequency.
Curl pattern
Self-reported. Multi-select.
N = 245 · Multi-select
245 users answered. Users may select more than one pattern. "Consistent" means the user reported one uniform pattern throughout. 4d / other suppressed (cells under 5).
Hair journey
Self-reported.
N = 251
Only three options recorded in this window. Categories like "transitioning" or "chemically treated" had no recorded selections.
Hair density
N = 231
Strand thickness
N = 231
Wash frequency (times per week)
N = 244
5 times/week suppressed (cell under 5).
Frustrations
What curly-hair users say is going wrong with their hair, in their own words.
Top hair frustrations
Multi-select. Percentages are share of respondents who selected each option.
N = 250 · Multi-select
Respondent count is approximate (n ≈ 250). Percentages are directional within ±2 points until corrected counts land.
Goals
What curly-hair users actually want their hair to do.
What curly-hair users want
Multi-select.
N = 250 · Multi-select
Respondent count approximate.
Barriers
What's actually stopping curly-hair users from getting the hair they want.
What's blocking curly-hair users
Multi-select.
N = 250 · Multi-select
Respondent count approximate.
Styling preferences
The kinds of styles users want help with most.
Styling help wanted
Multi-select.
N = 250 · Multi-select
Respondent count approximate.
Geography
Where curly-hair users in our sample are based, plus the weekly intake trend.
Geography of respondents
GeoIP-derived. Country-level only.
N = 372
Weekly onboarding starts
Unique users who started onboarding each ISO week.
Cross-tabs
The interesting intersections: frizz by curl pattern, routine confusion by curl pattern, frustration by country, and routine confusion by hair journey.
Frizz rate by curl pattern
Among users who selected each pattern, the share who also selected frizz.
| Curl pattern | Users (N) | Selected frizz (N) | Frizz % |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2a | 6 | 6 | 100.0% |
| 4a | 12 | 10 | 83.3% |
| 3a | 58 | 47 | 81.0% |
| 2c | 24 | 18 | 75.0% |
| Mixed textures | 194 | 143 | 73.7% |
| 3b | 78 | 55 | 70.5% |
| Consistent | 46 | 30 | 65.2% |
| 2b | 37 | 24 | 64.9% |
| 3c | 16 | 10 | 62.5% |
Cells with frizz N below 5 suppressed: 4c, 1b, 4b.
"Don't know my routine" by curl pattern
Share of each curl-pattern group who selected this barrier.
| Curl pattern | Users (N) | Selected barrier (N) | % |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2a | 6 | 6 | 100.0% |
| 3a | 58 | 45 | 77.6% |
| 2b | 37 | 28 | 75.7% |
| 2c | 24 | 18 | 75.0% |
| Mixed textures | 194 | 140 | 72.2% |
| 4a | 12 | 8 | 66.7% |
| 3c | 16 | 9 | 56.2% |
| 3b | 78 | 43 | 55.1% |
| Consistent | 46 | 20 | 43.5% |
Users with a single consistent curl pattern report substantially lower routine confusion (43.5%) than users with mixed or wavy textures (~72-78%).
Top frustration by country (top 5 markets)
The most frequently selected frustration in each market, with the share who chose it.
| Country | Users answering | #1 frustration | N | % |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States | 102 | Frizz | 78 | 76.5% |
| Egypt | 18 | Frizz | 16 | 88.9% |
| United Kingdom | 13 | Frizz | 13 | 100.0% |
| Canada | 11 | Undefined curls | 8 | 72.7% |
| France | 8 | Frizz | 7 | 87.5% |
Frizz is the #1 frustration in 4 of 5 top markets. Canada is the outlier: undefined curls leads. UK reaches 100% on a small N of 13.
"Don't know my routine" by hair journey
Share of each group who selected the routine barrier.
| Hair journey | Users (N) | Selected barrier (N) | % |
|---|---|---|---|
| Heat-damaged | 37 | 26 | 70.3% |
| Naturally curly | 199 | 120 | 60.3% |
| Straight to wavy | 15 | 9 | 60.0% |
Heat-damaged users skew about 10 points higher on routine confusion than naturally curly users.
What this data actually says
The pattern is consistent across every section. Curly-hair users are not confused about what is wrong with their hair. They are confused about what to do.
Frizz tops the frustration list at 74%. Undefined curls is right behind at 65%. The #1 stated goal is "defined, bouncy curls" at 79%. The #1 barrier to getting there is "don't know my routine" at 69%.
Mixed textures dominating the curl-pattern data (79.2%) reframes the entire premise of curl-type-based content. If most users do not have one neat curl pattern, then any guide that asks "are you a 3b or a 3c?" is starting from the wrong question. The better question is "which sections of your hair behave differently, and what does each one need?"
The geographic data flattens another assumption. Frizz is not a humid-climate problem or a Western-product problem. It is the dominant complaint in the United States, Egypt, the United Kingdom, and France alike. The product industry's focus on shine, definition, and softness as separate categories does not match how users describe what they actually want.
Heat-damaged hair users are a particularly underserved segment. They report 10 points more routine confusion than naturally curly users and currently have very few resources written for their middle-state hair: too damaged to follow native-curl routines, too curly for straight-hair routines.
If you are building products, content, or tools for the curly-hair market, the highest-leverage intervention is not another product. It is clarity. Tell people what their routine should be. Acknowledge that their hair has multiple textures. Frame frizz as the universal language. Speak directly to people whose hair is not in the state it used to be in.
A note on porosity
Porosity does not appear in this report because it is not part of the current Scrunchie onboarding. We chose to keep the diagnostic light at signup, then introduce porosity inside the app via a separate quiz.
That decision shapes this report. We can describe what users see (frizz, dryness, undefined curls) and what they want (definition, simplicity), but we cannot yet say how those behaviors map onto cuticle behavior. Future versions of this report will include porosity once we have enough completed in-app diagnostics to publish responsibly.
Cite as: Scrunchie Curl Report (April 15, 2026). scrunchie.app/data/curl-report.
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