How many grafts would I need?
Clinics quote in grafts, so it is the one number worth knowing before you ask anyone for a price. Pick the stage that matches your hairline and adjust the four things that change the answer.
Based on the figures our surgeons plan sessions with- Capped by what your donor area can actually give
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Grafts by stage
What each stage typically takes, before any of the adjustments above. Use it to sanity-check a quote you have been given.
| Stage | Grafts | Sessions | Usual technique |
|---|---|---|---|
| Norwood 2 | 500 – 1,000 | 1 | Greffe de cheveux DHI, Greffe de cheveux FUE Saphir |
| Norwood 3 | 1,200 – 1,800 | 1 | Greffe de cheveux DHI, Greffe de cheveux FUE Saphir |
| Norwood 3 Vertex | 1,800 – 2,600 | 1 | Greffe de cheveux FUE Saphir, Greffe de cheveux hybride |
| Norwood 4 | 2,400 – 3,200 | 1 | Greffe de cheveux FUE Saphir, Greffe de cheveux hybride |
| Norwood 5 | 3,000 – 4,000 | 1 | Greffe de cheveux FUE Saphir, Greffe de cheveux hybride |
| Norwood 6 | 3,800 – 5,000 | 2 | Greffe de cheveux hybride, Greffe de cheveux FUE Saphir |
| Norwood 7 | 4,500 – 6,500 | 2 | Greffe de cheveux hybride |
| Ludwig I | 0 – 1,200 | 1 | Thérapie PRP, Mésothérapie, Thérapie par exosomes |
| Ludwig II | 1,200 – 2,200 | 1 | Greffe de cheveux DHI, Thérapie PRP, Thérapie par exosomes |
| Ludwig III | 2,200 – 3,500 | 2 | Greffe de cheveux DHI, Greffe de cheveux hybride, Thérapie par exosomes |
What moves the number
The stage you are at
This sets the base range, because it describes how much area has to be covered. Everything else adjusts it.
How thick each hair is
A coarse hair covers noticeably more scalp than a fine one, so the same area needs fewer grafts. This is why two people at the same Norwood stage can be quoted 500 grafts apart and both quotes be right.
Your donor area
This is the ceiling, and the only figure in the calculation that cannot be worked around. A lifetime donor supply is roughly 6,000 to 7,000 grafts for a dense donor area, and considerably less if the back and sides are thinning too. Any estimate above that cap is a sales figure rather than a surgical one.
What you want covered
Framing the face — a hairline and the front third — uses around a third fewer grafts than covering the crown as well, and in day-to-day life it is what people notice. Starting at the front is almost always the right order.
Your age
Hair loss does not stop because you have had surgery. A plan made at 25 has to leave grafts in reserve for loss that has not happened yet, which is why the estimate is deliberately conservative under 30. The alternative — using everything now — is how people end up with an island of transplanted hair in front of a bald area ten years later.
