The At-Home Keratin Treatment That Gave Me Noticeably Smoother, and Straighter Hair

If there is one thing you should know about my hair, it’s that I have a lot of it. Like, a lot. I would blame genetics, but as someone with an unreasonable number of Leo placements in her birth chart, I feel spiritually obligated to blame those instead.

My hair isn’t curly, and I wouldn’t even describe it as particularly wavy, but there is enough of a wave running through it that, left to its own devices, it can become fluffy, frizzy and approximately twice its intended size.

I love volume like any girlie pop does, but there’s a very fine line between “big, bouncy hair” and “humidity has personally victimised me,” which is why keratin treatments and I have history.

I’ve had professional keratin treatments done for years before I decided to stop and embrace my waves, and what I realised was my natural waves are easier to manage with a Keratin in it. Ironic hey? So when I discovered you could now buy an at-home version, obviously I needed to know: could I actually get that salon smooth effect in my own bathroom?

Keratin is a protein naturally found in our hair, and keratin-focused hair products are generally designed to help hair appear smoother, shinier and more manageable.

But it’s worth knowing that not everything with “keratin” on the label is the same thing.

You have your everyday keratin-infused masks, creams and oils that can support damaged or frizz prone hair, and then you have semi-permanent smoothing treatments designed to give you a longer lasting result. The latter is what people generally mean when they talk about getting “a keratin treatment”.

Rather than permanently straightening your hair, the goal is usually to smooth the hair, reduce frizz and make styling significantly easier while still allowing you to retain some natural movement and body. And that last part was particularly important to me because I just wanted less frizz without sacrificing my big hair in the process.

It’s also probably part of the reason at home alternatives have become so appealing.

Salon keratin treatments can be brilliant, but they require an appointment, a decent chunk of your day and, depending on your hair, a fairly significant financial commitment. So, being able to recreate some of those smoothing benefits at home is a very tempting proposition.

Enter the ANSWR At Home Keratin Treatment.

The semi permanent, formaldehyde-free (very important in the world of keratin) smoothing treatment is designed to make hair smoother, shinier and easier to manage, with results lasting for up to three months.

The formula includes glyoxylic acid, glyoxyloyl keratin amino acids and glyoxyloyl carbocysteine, alongside grape, pineapple and myrrh extracts.

And despite the fact that the process sounds slightly intimidating when you first read the instructions, I was genuinely surprised by how easy the actual application was.

You start with clean, completely dry hair, spray the treatment through until the hair is saturated, comb it through and leave it for an hour. Then you rinse thoroughly with water only, blow dry your hair completely and seal everything in using a straightener.

ANSWR recommends working in small sections at 180°C and passing over each section six times, which is exactly what I did. Because I still wanted movement and volume, I was a little more conservative around my bangs and face framing pieces (doing these at 4 times for 120°C) rather than repeatedly ironing them into submission.

The entire process obviously takes a little while (particularly when you have as much hair as I do) but there was nothing technically difficult about it. If you can section and straighten your own hair, you can do this.

Immediately afterwards, my hair was noticeably smoother, straighter and much less fluffy. But this is also where I learned an important lesson for anyone doing their first at home keratin treatment: be mindful of how close you apply it to your roots.

For roughly the first two weeks, the hair around the top of my head felt oilier than usual.

Considering the rest of my hair was completely fine, my suspicion is that I got a little trigger happy with the application and went too close to the scalp in that area.

Thankfully, now that I’m a few weeks in, it’s settled down and I like the result even more than I did initially. My hair feels smoother and more manageable, the frizz is significantly reduced and most importantly I haven’t lost all of my volume.

For me, the convenience is the real selling point and the fact that I can sleep in an extra half an hour in my electric blanket. In saying that, it’s worth noting that whilst I didn’t lose my volume, my beach waves have reduced.

So if you’re someone who has a 2A-B hair type, just know you’ll drop back down to a 1B-C hair type, which I don’t mind because a bouncy blowout is easier to do and retain with minimal frizz, than using a whole suite of wavy/curly gal products to try and achieve the waves I usually get in summer, without any humidity.

However, I know that keratin treatments aren’t for everyone, so here are a few of my favourite hair products that are guaranteed to leave your hair looking smoother, softer (and extending your keratin if you have one in) and feeling healthier throughout the year!

The Christophe Robin Regenerating Mask with Rare Prickly Pear Oil is amazing at targeting dryness, damage or frizz is they are your main concerns. The rich mask uses prickly pear seed oil to nourish hair and help it feel smoother, softer and shinier. I’d consider this the luxurious weekly maintenance option, particularly if your hair has been subjected to plenty of heat styling.

If you specifically want keratin in your maintenance routine, VIRTUE Restorative Treatment Mask contains the brand’s Alpha Keratin 60ku alongside ingredients including baobab seed oil and brown algae. It’s designed for dry, damaged or heat-stressed hair and helps with softness, hydration and shine. You only need to leave it on for two to three minutes, making it an easy weekly addition rather than an afternoon-long hair project.

For something you can incorporate into your everyday styling routine, Christophe Robin Regenerating Serum with Prickly Pear Oil is designed to smooth frizz, improve the appearance of split ends and protect the hair during heat styling. It’s a particularly nice option if you want something through the mid lengths and ends without weighing everything down because, as we’ve established, I am extremely protective of my volume.

For anyone whose hair senses humidity before the weather app does, VIRTUE Un-Frizz Cream is a leave-in treatment designed to smooth frizz and protect against humidity while conditioning the hair. It contains Alpha Keratin 60ku and can be applied to damp hair before either blow-drying or air-drying, making it particularly useful if frizz rather than damage is your main grievance.

Ultimately, there isn’t one universal “keratin treatment” that everybody needs. If you want longer-lasting smoothing and easier styling, an at-home treatment like ANSWR makes sense.

If you mostly want to tackle dryness, damage or day to day frizz, a supportive mask, cream or serum might be enough.

As for me? I’ll absolutely do the ANSWR treatment again. I’ll just keep the spray a little further away from my roots next time!