Mo Salah Hair: What Public Photos Suggest

What Happened to Mo Salah's Hair, According to the Photos

Put Salah's press photos from 2014 to 2025 side by side, and one thing jumps out: his hairline didn't stay the same. The change crept in gradually, but anyone who regularly watched match broadcasts could track it easily. I've spent enough hours comparing game footage to know the shift slips past you until the images sit next to each other. In his Basel and Chelsea years, roughly 2013 to 2015, images show a dense, low hairline that sat almost straight across his forehead. Temple gaps are minimal. By the 2018 World Cup, Egypt fans could see the hairline had pulled back at the corners. That classic M-shape was starting to form, and liverpool's 2017-2019 seasons offer the clearest evidence. High-definition broadcast cameras caught the recession from every angle: his forehead's corners moving back slowly, the front line thinning. Nothing extreme. For a player photographed weekly, the progression was easy to follow. Press-conference shots from 2021 showed the hairline sitting noticeably farther back than in his early twenties. Then the photos took a turn. Around 2021-2022, he started appearing with a fuller-looking hairline again. Fans noticed, and so did the tabs. This is where the mo salah hair conversation picked up. A handful of observers argued he had a hair transplant, citing the restored density. Another group pointed to scalp micropigmentation, or just a new styling routine. Such a transplant fits the visual timeline, but Salah has never confirmed one, and neither has his camp. Public photos can't settle the question. Lighting, gel, concealer, camera angle, all of these can flatter or flatten a hairline.

The photo timeline at a glance

Period What photos show 2013-2015 (Basel, Chelsea) Dense, low hairline, minimal temple gaps 2017-2019 (Liverpool peak) Temples pull back, M-shape forms 2021-2022 Hairline looks fuller and lower again 2023-2025 Hairline stable in match photos

What the photos do show is a clear arc: the hairline recedes, then appears to come back. That arc is exactly what public photos reveal about Mo Salah's hair: an unexplained but visible restoration. Whether a surgeon was involved is something the pictures can hint at, not prove.

Mo Salah's Hair Transformation: Before-and-After Seasons

The clearest way to track Mo Salah's hair is to line up public photos season by season. He moved to Chelsea in 2014 with a full head of dark curls, the dense sort of crop that hides the hairline completely. Basel match photos from 2013 look the same, as do his Roma appearances from 2016-17. His hair stayed thick from his first Champions League nights right through his final Serie A games.

Then compare that with Liverpool training pictures. From around 2019 onward, Salah has kept his hair much shorter, usually a low fade with a modest amount on top. This cut does two things at once. It fits the squad's trim aesthetic, and makes the hairline harder to judge. A short cut masks temple recession. Long curls, though, flatter a strong hairline, making it look even stronger.

What the photos actually show

• Between 2013-2015 (Basel, Chelsea): , the hairline sat low and full. His curls are thick and dense.
• During 2016-2017 (Roma): , his hair is shorter but still covers the forehead. The temples show no obvious recession.
• In May 2018 (Champions League final week): Salah trims his curls before the Kyiv final. After the match, he's seen with a near-buzzed look.
• From 2019-2024 (Liverpool): it's a short crop with faded sides. Close-ups from his record-breaking goals show temple corners sitting a touch higher than in 2017.

For before-and-after photos, the 2018 final is the clearest reference point. On May 26, 2018, Salah walked out against Real Madrid in Kyiv with freshly cut hair, visibly tighter around the ears and crown than his usual style. Press photos from that night show the hairline in full view. At the temples, it sits roughly where it did during the Roma years, maybe a hair further back. That's normal for a man in his late twenties.

Here's what hasn't changed. Close-ups from the 2023-24 season still show a full hairline across the front. No bald patch. Nor any thinning at the crown. So what people call 'Mo Salah's hair transformation' is a styling shift, not a physical one. 2017's Salah with long curls and 2022's with a low fade look like two different players.

Why Did Mo Salah Shave His Head?

Salah has never publicly explained the shave. That's the honest starting point, he hasn't addressed it in any interview. It also his social feeds stay silent. Beyond that, it's all inference from match photos and training footage. For anyone tracking mo salah hair through the years, the transition happened fast. The photo timeline tells a clear story. At his Liverpool unveiling in June 2017, he had a full head of dark hair. By the 2018-19 season, images from Anfield show the temples receding and the crown thinning. In the weeks before the Champions League final in Madrid on June 1, 2019, he was already wearing it cropped close. Within months, it was gone entirely. He's kept the clean shave since, and it's now part of his look, as recognizable as his arms-out celebration. Why would a player make that call? Practical reasons subsist, though Salah has never confirmed any of them: Zero upkeep. Training twice a day plus matches means a shaved head needs nothing. Managing thinning hair is another reason, and a bare scalp looks chosen. When a hairline recedes, it just looks like that. Plenty of men in their late 20s make the same call. It keeps the image consistent.

Every stadium, every season, the shaved head photographs identically.

Speculation ran ahead of the facts. Once the hair vanished, cosmetic clinics ran ads implying the Mo Salah hair change pointed to a transplant. That's marketing, not evidence. No credible before-and-after set has ever publicly documented a procedure on him. What the public photos show is the outcome, not the motive. He decided privately, and the visible record starts there.

Did Mo Salah Have a Hair Transplant? What the Evidence Shows

The question of whether Mo Salah had a hair transplant pops up on fan forums every transfer window. Short answer: the public photos don't really support it. Across his entire Liverpool career, Salah's hairline has stayed remarkably stable, and that consistency is the strongest evidence you can get without asking him directly. These are the signs to look for. Done well, a hair transplant changes the hairline in a predictable way. The hairline either settles lower or the temples get refilled, and both changes become obvious when photos from different years are lined up. Salah's hairline in 2017, his first season at Anfield, looks essentially the same as it did in 2024. Its shape is the same. Temple corners match, too. Density along the front hasn't changed.

Comparing the photos, year by year

In the table below, the public images are laid out point by point.

Season Hairline What to notice 2017-18 Mature, slightly recessed at the temples Distinct angles at the corners, no thinning at the crown 2019-20 Same recessed temples, no lowering Forehead height unchanged in post-match photos 2022-23 Still consistent, plus the beard fills in Hairline recedes and recovers with beard grooming, not with surgery 2024-25 Same mature shape, a bit more gray No scar, no density shift along the front edge

That last point matters. At the front, a transplant can leave a strip scar with the old FUT method, or tiny dot-like grafts with FUE. Either route leaves the hairline sharper and denser than it was a year earlier. None of that appears in Salah's photos.

Why there could be a transplant anyway

Let's be fair here. An elite athlete with access to top clinics could have chosen a very conservative procedure. Instead of lowering it, a conservative procedure keeps the natural mature hairline. A fair number of players do exactly that, hoping to stop the loss before it goes further. If Salah went through a small session of around 1,000 to 1,500 grafts just to fill the corners, it would be tough to spot in matchday photos. Lighting, sweat, hair gel, and all of it masks the subtle details. But the timing doesn't add up. Transplants are gotten by Most players in their late 20s or early 30s once the receding becomes obvious. At 32, Salah simply hasn't receded much. Photos from 2017 onward show a hairline that could belong to a fit 25-year-old. So the evidence favors the 'no transplant' reading.

What Is the Salah Haircut Called?

Mo Salah's haircut for most of his Liverpool career has no official name. People are surprised by that. Walk into any barbershop in Liverpool, ask for 'the Salah,' and most barbers will know exactly what you mean. It's shorthand, not a technical term, and the style itself is a curly textured crop . Short back and sides, kept clean, with enough length on top to show his natural wave pattern. Curly hair works best with this kind of cut because the curls hold their shape without much product. Depending on how long he lets it grow between trims, the fringe usually sits just above the eyebrow or grazes it. What complicates the name: salah has cycled through distinct phases. From 2017 to 2018 he wore tight braids, often cornrows, which had outlets running "new look" headlines every few weeks. Around the 2019-2020 season he dropped the braids and went back to the loose curls fans recognize now. During the 2021-2022 campaign he kept the crop tighter, close to a buzz on the sides, with extra growth on top.

The phases at a glance

• 2017-2018: cornrows and tight braids
• 2019-2021: loose natural curls with a medium fringe
• 2021-2022: shorter crop, tighter sides, more top length
• 2023-present: curls again, worn slightly longer

For anyone tracking mo salah hair through public photos, the label matters less than the pattern. Search mo salah hair online and you get the same timeline replayed across eight seasons of matchday images. The braids go, the curls return, the sides get tighter, and then the curls come back. That cycle is the real signature. It also makes hairline comparisons easier, since the crop's side part and fringe position stay consistent enough to judge in photos. A few barbers and clinics have tried to productize the name. Turkish and UK hair clinics now list a "Salah style" in their portfolios, which says more about search traffic than barbering. If you want the cut yourself, bring a photo to your barber. That photo, that's the only name that matters.

Photo of Mohamed Salah: Bryan Berlin — Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0. Used under licence; the photographer does not endorse this page, and the image is not evidence of any procedure.