Can I dye my hair bright red without bleaching it?
The best alternative instead of bleaching your hair is getting the lightest blonde hair dye from a local store or hair salon and use it. The lighter it is, the more red your hair will turn out. Any kind of hair dye will damage your hair. Bleach drains your hair color out, so it’s more powerful than other hair dyes. Good luck.
After many years of dying my hair the red I want it to be, I eventually got there. I first off used XXL Live Colour in R43, which, as a medium brown myself came out ok but still a little dark. So I used blonde lightener (NOT bleach) and that lightened my hair a considerable bit. Then I re-dyed with the same stuff and my hair was VERY bright red! If you don’t want to go back to using XXL Colours then I’d recommend Manic Panic, they have some lovely red shades and they’re quite cheap for what you want, and the result is pretty much the same. But don’t bleach your hair, you might end up with orange or ginger hair when washing the red dye off.
