If your roots are full-on gray and the rest of your hair is chocolate brown, you're going to need to treat the roots and ends differently. "When your hair has been colored previously, it's important to focus your touch-up on regrowth only," says Corbett. This is the time to turn to a root touch-up kit -- not a regular box of color. Corbett recommends Clairol Root Touch-Up, $6.99, which covers regrowth and grays for up to three weeks. Anderson's pick is dpHue At-Home Root Touch Up Kit, $30, which he says provides multidimentional color and is extremely gentle on the hair.
"Hair color, Netflix and chill" is not the ideal combination. You want to be careful to rinse when the time is up (which is different for different types of color -- remember what we said about reading the directions?). So set a timer, and pay attention. If you leave the hair color on too long, you'll end up with flat, over-processed color and fried hair warns Anderson.