Is Prince Harry Balding? Harry’s Hair Loss Journey (2023)

Prince Harry is one of the most talked-about people in the entire world, but recently the chatter has turned to his hairline rather than his personal life.

And while most of the chatter surrounding his life focuses on his relationship with the Royal Family and his marriage to Meghan Markle, some people just want to know more about his hair loss, and whether he’s going bald like his bigger brother.

If you want to know all about Prince Harry’s hair, then read on.

Prince Harry is losing his hair – primarily from his crown, ironically.

He has a bald patch that is growing, and while he does partially cover it due to having longer hair, that hair is now thinning. Depending on the photograph, he often appears to have only very thin hair remaining.

Of course, as his hair is lighter, it allows more light to reach his scalp, which can make the hair loss look worse than it is. The light can more easily reflect off his head, shining more light back through the gaps in his hair.

Why did Prince Harry go bald?

Prince Harry is showing signs of Male Pattern Baldness, meaning that he was always likely to go bald just due to his genetics. Baldness can be exacerbated by external factors including stress and mental health concerns – two things which we know Prince Harry has suffered from.

Despite being a member of the Royal Family, Prince Harry is still just a regular guy in terms of his genetic makeup, so he’s as susceptible to going bald as any other man may be. 

And male pattern baldness definitely has some genetic links, so as soon as Prince William started showing signs of baldness (at a much earlier age than Harry), there was always a high likelihood that Harry’s hairline would catch up with his brother’s.

Prince Harry is talked about a lot, especially over in the UK where he is often pilloried by the media. This has led to strong opinions about him across social media, both positive and negative, and by association, his wife Meghan Markle too.

So there are some people who claim that Meghan is the cause of Prince Harry’s baldness and that he’s only started to go bald since marrying her.

This speculation isn’t helpful, and while it could be that the stress of a marriage gone wrong is causing Harry’s hair to fall out faster, what we know for sure is he’s been under a lot of pressure in recent years.

But men do go bald as they get older, so while his hair loss does coincide with married life, it’s also true that he’s only been balding since he turned 34 years old.

Harry’s hair over the years

Prince Harry’s hair has always been talked about, although much less than it is now. But even as a child, his striking red hair was the topic of many discussions in the media.

Indeed, it led to a long period of speculation that King Charles wasn’t actually Harry’s father, but instead the red-head James Hewitt was. Hewitt was an army officer who had an affair with Princess Diana, though both claimed it was after Harry was born. Diana attributed Harry’s red hair to her side of the family.

As a child and teenager, Prince Harry always had quite a wild mop of hair – it was always thick and often looked unruly.

He claims that his head was shaved by his contemporaries while he was studying at Eton, and he did enter young adulthood with a much more controlled hairstyle, though still never extremely short.

Even as he entered the British Army to serve, he didn’t shave his head, keeping some length to it although ensuring it was a lot neater than it was in his youth.

As he has aged into his 30s, his hair has grown a little longer again. In the mid-2010s he added a beard to his look, which he has kept since.

Apparently, Prince William ordered Prince Harry to shave his beard for his wedding, according to Harry himself. According to Harry’s account, William had been forced to shave before his wedding, and so ordered Harry to do the same. 

However, Harry appealed to The Queen herself to keep his beard as it felt like a part of the ‘new Harry’. She agreed he could keep it, although William kept arguing with his brother over it.

I’ve always said that bald men look better with a beard, so if Harry decides to keep the beard as he loses more of his hair, it’ll probably work well for him.

Do you think Harry should keep the beard, and would it be a good idea for him to get ahead of the hair loss by shaving his head? Let me know in the comments.

Since the late 2010s, Harry’s crown has started to be noticeably thin, and since he relocated to the US in 2020 with his family, the bald spot is starting to become more prominent.

As of 2023, hair experts have been quoted as saying that Harry does still have enough hair to get a transplant, if he wanted to keep his full head of hair, provided he acted before the end of 2024. This isn’t the case for his brother Prince William whose hair is too far gone.

Does baldness run in the Royal Family?

Baldness does run in the Royal Family – there is a clear genetic link between the men in the family and Male Pattern Baldness.

All you need to do is look at Prince William’s hair loss to know that there’s something in the DNA of the royals that is causing the hair loss. Prince William’s hair started disappearing a lot faster, too – people often remark that Harry’s hair loss at 36 resembles that of his older brother at 26.

Their father, King Charles III, has not had the same problems as his sons when it comes to hair loss. In recent years his hairline has started to recede, but even when he was 50, the at-the-time Prince Charles’ hair was thick and not showing any signs of a bald spot.

But baldness doesn’t always skip a generation. Prince Edward, the uncle of Prince Harry and Prince William, is an example of someone in Charles’ generation who has suffered from Male Pattern Baldness.

And their grandfather, Prince Phillip, was another who had a receding hairline at a relatively young age. It was always on the cards for the princes to be at risk of hair loss.

In case you’re wondering, on their mother’s side there was also evidence of receding hair and hair loss, though not necessarily at the young age that the princes have started losing theirs.

Their uncle, Charles Spencer, has had thinning blonde-white hair for some time, while their grandfather John Spencer also suffered from hair loss. He passed away in 1992 when the princes were both children.

Prince Harry has discussed Prince William’s hair. He made a comment about it in his autobiography Spare, where he said that it was “alarming” how fast William’s hairline had changed, and how quickly it was progressing. He also compares it to his own, saying that William’s hair loss was much more “advanced”.

But if you think that sounds like something Harry shouldn’t be publishing in a book, it’s also worth noting that Harry has writers and royal commentators talking about the potential for Meghan to leave him because he’s going bald.

Summary

Harry is clearly losing the battle with Male Pattern Baldness, and should take action in the near future. As we always say, own it, before it owns you, Harry.

Whether that’s shaving it all off, or trying a hair treatment option, is up to him. Now that he no longer has royal duties, he probably has more freedom to choose what works best for him.

Of course, whatever choice he makes, someone will probably criticize him for it.If you want to see more famous cases of hair loss, check out this list of bald celebrities before and after they lost their hair.