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"Sophie! Your hair! It looks just like starlight. It's beautiful!"
In Real Life, white hair indicates either age (very young or very old), bleach, or albinism. Not so in fiction, where white hair can occur naturally on women of any age. For a given value of "natural", that is: white locks mark their owner as special in some way. Maybe her hair is indicative of some spiritual (or outright magical) qualities, or maybe it's a hint of a nonhuman background. At the most mundane, it suggests wisdom beyond her years. It is a common mark of a Mysterious Waif.
Often, this is treated like a variation on blond hair—"platinum blond”—with the character having blue eyes to match. Unless she has red eyes, which would suggest she's an albino. Or she's a Dark-Skinned Blonde, in which case, it's probably a good idea to book it, fast.
The popularity of this trope probably stems from its status as a borderline-natural hair color: white hair on a young person strikes that delicate balance of being unusual but not blatantly unrealistic. The color also lends itself well towards symbolism (purity or death, take your pick).
Her male counterpart, White Hair, Black Heart, is more strongly associated with Japanese media. He lacks the magical connotations and is more likely to be an antagonist or outright evil.
It bears repeating that these are young (or at least young- looking) characters, and their hair color is not indicative of age. For White Haired Pretty Old Ladies (assuming their hair wasn't white when they were young), see Grandma, What Massive Hotness You Have.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
- In Pandora Hearts, the Intention of the Abyss, who is the twin of the Bloody Black Rabbit. She seems gentle and kind, but is actually quite mentally unstable. practically a Generation Xerox of her mother, Lacie Baskerville.
- In X1999, Princess Hinoto has white hair and is one of the most powerful magical beings in that world.
- Also by CLAMP, in Clover, Suu has white hair and is the most powerful magical being in that world.
- The first Reinforce from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's, the physical incarnation of a powerful Weapon Of Mass Destruction. Ditto for Reinforce Zwei, her successor/daughter.
- Momo from Ballad Of A Shinigami is a white haired Shinigami.
- In Kurohime the titular character is a white haired gunslinging witch.
- Rozen Maiden: Suigintou, Barasuishou and Kirakishou all have white hair. All three are dolls brought to life.
- Zazie Rainyday from Mahou Sensei Negima!, one of the more mysterious characters, is a Dark-Skinned Blond with white hair.
- There are some implications that Setsuna is one as well and merely dyes her hair because she considers her albinism to be a point of shame.
- Azmaria in Chrono Crusade, a young girl with white hair and the power to heal people when she sings.
- Tessa from Full Metal Panic has white hair and additionally comes with an Aloof Big Brother. Guess which hair color and alignment he sports...
- Though one novel describes their hair as "ash blonde", it is commonly depicted as white.
- Like the above example, Felli Loss from Chrome Shelled Regios has silver hair and also has an Aloof Big Brother sporting the same hair color.
- In Iriya No Sora UFO No Natsu, Iriya's hair gets dyed white against her will.
- Towa Kannagi from Mermaid Saga hair turned white after her sister, in an attempt to save her life, fed her mermaid blood.
- The sensual shot and Dark Action Girl Hibari Ginza from Speed Grapher has silver hair.
- Jiang Lihua aka Empress Tianzi is a white haired Heroic Albino from Code Geass, also a Moe Moe Chinese Girl.
- Rally Cheyenne from Silent Möbius, at least, in flashbacks, since she's pushing 40 by the time of the main body of the series. (She's still good-looking.)
- Kisara of Yu-Gi-Oh!. Unfortunately, her white hair and pale skin led to discrimination and loathing by the people of ancient Egypt.
- Mobile Suit Gundam 00 has a couple of examples in HRL Super Soldier Soma Peires a.k.a. Marie Parfacy, and Celestial Being's Fereshte member Chall Acoustica. For the latter, her hair was naturally brown, until a reactor overload in her Gundam caused it to turn white (in addition to scarring her face and killing all her comrades).
- The original Queen Serenity in Sailor Moon. Sailor Moon herself was originally supposed to be white haired when transformed and blonde as Usagi. This was vetoed by Naoko's editor Osa-P. In the manga, she does have white hair as Princess Serenity and Neo Queen Serenity, but not in the anime.
- In the anime adaptation of Howl's Moving Castle, Sophie ends up with grey hair once her curse is broken and she has come into her latent magical abilities.
- In Ah! My Goddess! Hild, a demon, and Urd, her half-demon half-goddess daughter, are dark skinned blonds with white hair.
- Chii from Chobits.
- Though note that Chii's white hair is not a biologically occurring natural hair color in her world.
- The hair of all Claymores turns white during their hybridization process.
- Well...many, but not quite all. First off, there's Clarice, who's hybridisation was a failure and whose hair is still dark enough to count as brunette, but even the manga's colour illustrations show some Claymore, like Miria, to have darker blonde hair, while the anime turns a few, like Helen, into outright golden blondes.
- Sylvie Lumiere from Baccano, although it doesn't seem to be held as any indication of unusual abilities apart from the most common one in the series.
- Jo from Burst Angel has silver hair and is later revealed to be a genetically engineered Super Soldier.
- Hanekawa Tsubasa from Bakemonogatari becomes one when possessed by a white-haired bakeneko.
- Nico Robin's mother in One Piece, Nico Olivia, had pure white hair. It's unknown how old she was when she died, but she didn't appear too old, and Robin herself was only 8.
- Sylia Stingray of Bubblegum Crisis 2040, if you can overlook drinking and/or drug problems and a few general mental issues.
- Yumi from Ulysses 31 belongs to a race of blue skinned, white haired human looking aliens called the Zotrians. The Zotrians are also known for their exceptional beauty.
- An interesting variation occurs in the Slayers series: protagonist Lina has reddish colored hair, but when she casts a particular high-level spell, her hair turns white. This occurs once in the Light Novel series, and twice in the anime.
- A straighter example is Millina, a white haired female mercenary and Lina's ally from the second half of the novels. However, she herself subverts this trope in that she is a rather average-leveled mage and swordswoman, and is a bit of a grump.
- The titular heroine of Canaan. Justified Trope in that it actually turned white as a side effect of her exposure to the Ua virus.
- Horrifyingly subverted when Liang Qi tries to give herself synesthesia and swallows capsules containing the Ua virus. Her originally dark hair turns white...and then she suffers a truly horrible Rasputinian Death.
- Mirajane of Fairy Tail has pure white hair and blue eyes. Apparently, though, it's hereditary and has nothing to do with her age, personality, or magic, since both Elfman and their dead little sister, Lisana, have (had, in Lisana's case) white hair.
- Saiki from Ghost Talkers Daydream is albino.
- Gretel from Black Lagoon is a young girl with white hair, and her brother Hansel was the male counterpart of this trope...sometimes...we think.
- Togame from Katanagatari has epically long white hair - long enough for Shichika to wrap around himself several times.
- Fujiko from Zettai Karen Children is a white haired vampire
- Astaroshe Asran from Trinity Blood has white hair (except a single red forelock) in the original novels. She was changed to a natural blonde in the anime.
- Alex from Nightschool has white hair that used to be brown. She was Locked into Strangeness when she was cursed.
- Shiro from Deadman Wonderland is a Heroic Albino (well, when her evil side doesn't takeover) with white hair and red eyes. The word "Shiro" in Japanese literally translates to White in English.
- Princess Romina from Ninja Senshi Tobikage is a human looking alien with silvery-lavender hair.
- Matsuri from Strawberry Marshmallow is a rare non-magical, realistic example, where her hair has started graying early. It's entirely mundane, but is also a subject of some debate early on in the manga. Not quite white, but give her a few years...
- The eponymous Index from A Certain Magical Index has silvery-white hair.
- Victorique from Gosick becomes one in the final episode. Her hair was previously golden blonde. The reason for the sudden change is left unexplained in the series, but due to the events that took place shortly before said change, it's most likely a case of Disease Bleach.
- Like Setsuna, Himari of Omamori Himari dyes her hair because she thinks her master prefers brunettes.
- Sakurako Saiki from Sakura Gari is albino with white hair and red eyes.
- Belarus in Axis Powers Hetalia has platinum blonde hair, though not in the anime where it's dark blonde. This fits, as the country's name means "White Russia". She is an Elegant Gothic Lolita, as well as a Strange Girl and most notably, a Yandere.
- Koko Hekmatyar in Jormungand is a white-haired blue-eyed Onee-sama.
- Meiko "Menma" Honma from Ano Hana The Flower We Saw That Day while not hot, is regarded as being very pretty and cute. The symbolism also works both ways, as after dying as a child, she has grown, but her demeamor remains the same, so she's a ghost but also innocent.
- Tenshi/Angel from Angel Beats! has long white hair to emphasise her eeriness and emotionlessness.
- Princess Kikuri from Arata Kangatari has long, white Rapunzel Hair. Subverted, as Kikuri only looks like a young girl; her youth is maintained with her powers, and she's actually even older than the color of her hair would normally suggest.
Comic Books
- Marvel Comics:
- X-Men's Ororo "Storm" Munroe is a Dark-Skinned Blond(-ish) with, yes, blue eyes. This was eventually explained as a property she got from her mother's inherent magic. Her mother was an Egyptian princess.
- Rogue from the X-Men has white streaks in the front of her hair. In the first X-Men film, this happens to Rogue after her power is drained by Magneto.
- Spider-Man's Classy Cat Burglar Felicia "Black Cat" Hardy. The recognizable white hair is part of her costume, in some versions.
- Silver Sable originally had brown hair but it turned white after she witnessed the death of her mother by terrorists.
- Doctor Strange's disciple/lover/wife Clea, half-Faltinian princess of the Dark Dimension. She has a touch of Anime Hair as well.
- CaptainMarvel's Phyla-Vell a.k.a. Quasar, who's Titanian. Titanese? (With a few alien genes thrown in.)
- An extremely fictionalised is depicted with d 1602.
- Songbird of the Thunderbolts. Though that's not her real hair color (just about all of the Thunderbolts had their faces altered to fit their scheme) and it has a red streak through it.
- The X-Men villain Spiral, although she was originally a brunette before her genes were messed with.
- Alpha Flight's Walter Langkowski, aka Sasquatch, once became a woman after returning from the dead (long story). Going by the name Wanda, she was young and pretty, and had snow-white hair in both her human and Sasquatch forms.
- DC Comics:
- Teen Titans's Rose "Ravager" Wilson, who's been called platinum blonde at least once in a recent issue. Oddly enough, this is supposedly because her father, Deathstroke, also has white hair due to the experiment that gave him his powers, which brings up another trope.
- Ice (Tora Olafsdotter). White hair, blue eyes, and she's the princess of a magical northern tribe.
- The first female Dove, Dawn Granger, in DC's Hawk And Dove. In her earlier appearances, only her Dove superhero form had white hair, while Dawn was a blonde. In more recent appearances pre-New 52, she was shown with white hair in both identities — most likely because it made it easier to differentiate her from the other two major blonde female characters in Birds Of Prey when she joined that team. In her appearances in the New 52 reboot, colorists went back to only coloring her hair white as Dove.
- Dream Girl / Dreamer, Princess Projectra and White Witch from the Legion Of Super-Heroes. The latter is (usually) a Heroic Albino.
- Hippolyta (Lyta) Hall, the second Fury, who featured prominently in The Sandman. It's not entirely clear whether this is actually blonde hair drawn as white (since a younger Lyta is shown as a blonde, and one character refers to her as a blonde as an adult), or if it really is white.
- Abby Holland (née Abigail Arcane), Swamp Thing's wife, has snow-white hair with two black streaks running through it.
- Dolphin, frequently seen in Aquaman comics.
- When the Metal Men had to assume human identities (due to humanity turning against them and believing them to be dead), Platnium became a fashion model named Tina Platt. Fittingly, she's a platnium blonde.
- Essence from Red Hood and the Outlaws.
- Jennifer Morgan, Travis Morgan's daughter and the sorceress supreme of Skartaris in The Warlord. She was originally blonde, but her hair turns white as she gains sorcerous power.
- CrossGen's The First had both white-haired Ingra and Wyture, neither of them human. Negation had Khlystek, the Lizard Lady, a reptilian alien with white hair.
- Gabrielle from Spawn is an angel who has pure white hair.
- Glory, Probe, and Suprema all have white hair, as drawn by Rob Liefeld, who, being a fan of the look, also applied it for Dawn Granger, mentioned above.
- In Suprema's case, like Supreme, the white hair is a side effect of exposure to Supremium, the source of their powers.
- The comics version of Sabrina the Teenage Witch used to have Platinum Blonde hair but recent version of her tend to have regular blonde hair.
- Lady Death is a white haired, white skin goddess.
- Zia, a character from Wet Moon, claims to have gained white hair after surviving a car accident that took her arm.
- All of the Metabarons have long white hair, if they have any. For some reason, even the women they bring into the family from other clans have long white hair.
- There's Wolf Gal, a white haired woman Raised by Wolves, from Lil Abner.
Film
- Princess Nuala from Hellboy II has long silvery hair, a common trait among elves.
- Kim Obrist of Scanners is prematurely grey.
- Ni Chan, also know as the White-Haired Witch, from The Forbidden Kingdom.
- Mirana, the White Queen from Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. She is one of the most powerful people in the country, matched only by her sister, the Red Queen.
- The eponymous character (Anne Schuyler) in Platinum Blonde. In fact, Jean Harlow in most of her film roles.
- Mirage from The Incredibles has snow-white hair that certainly makes her stick out since most of the cast have plausible hair colors.
- Aisling from The Secret of Kells has white hair. She's a fairy.
- Kida from Disney's Atlantis: The Lost Empire. White hair seems to be a racial trait of all the Atlanteans, suggestive of their longevity (but not their age—the children have white hair, too).
- Lady Amalthea, the human form of the titular unicorn in The Last Unicorn long flowing white hair.
- Taarna from Heavy Metal. Also, the girl at the end develops white hair after she's revealed as Taarna's reincarnation.
- Susan/Ginormica from Monsters vs. Aliens hair was originally brown but after getting hit by Magic Meteor her hair turns white and she grows into a giant fifty foot woman.
- Emily Browning as Babydoll in Sucker Punch combined with Girlish Pigtails. Co-star Abbie Cornish has the same hair briefly when she's wearing a wig pretending to be Babydoll.
Literature
- The Childlike Empress has white hair in The Neverending Story.
- In The Stand, Nadine's hair supernaturally turns white due to contact with Randall Flagg.
- The Star Wars Expanded Universe has a few white haired characters: Winter Celchu, Leia's aide (first appearance in Timothy Zahn's Thrawn trilogy, though she also featured in the X-Wing Series comics), Brianna, the Last Handmaiden, and Atris, the Jedi historian (from Knights of the Old Republic II). They seem mature, though not yet old.
- Though white hair and silver eyes are the most common hair/eye colors among the Echani.
- In Winter's case it's definitely not a sign of age: she's canonically established as having white hair at the age of 17 and an ambiguously canon comic shows her with it as a child.
- Lisbeth in Old Yeller, in an easy-to-miss line.
- Winter from Leven Thumps And The Gateway To Foo is from Foo and thus has ice powers even as a human.
- There was a young woman in Thomas M. Disch's The Prisoner novel with white hair. She didn't have any magic powers.
- Yvaine from Stardust is white-haired.
- The protagonist of Andre Norton's Forerunner: The Second Venture. Dark skin, aquiline features, and white hair.
- In Mercedes Lackey's Heralds of Valdemar books, using Adept-level magic bleaches your hair, so any young female Adepts eventually become examples of this trope.
- In Lackey's The Black Swan, Odile von Rothbart has white hair. She suspects her mage father may have changed its color.
- Ramandu's platinum blonde haired daughter from Chronicles of Narnia, who is actually a star.
- The Faerie Queens and Ladies in The Dresden Files are described as beyond gorgeous and white-haired (although the Winter Lady streaks hers with dye.) And the hair of Thomas Raith's girlfriend, Justine, turned white after Thomas fed on her so deeply that she should have died. And a demon girl named Tessa has white hair in her rather cute human form.
- The entire Marat race in Jim Butcher's other series, Codex Alera, tend to have white hair so a lot of them qualify as either this or White Hair, Black Heart. Kitai is the most prominent example, though there are several much less significant female Marat who are also this trope.
- The protagonist of the wuxia novel The Bride with White Hair by Liang Yusheng. There is a Film of the Book too.
- Susan Sto-Helit has this, with one black streak; she's also a Magical Nanny and the granddaughter of Death.
- In Anne McCaffrey's The Rowan, the titular character has white hair, which is also inherited by her descendants of both sexes as a white streak.
- Also in her Acorna Series, the title character has white hair and is a human-unicorn hybrid, with healing and other magical powers through her horn, though the whiteness of her hair stems for her people's tendency to go white after spending large amounts of time in space.
- Daenerys Targaryen of A Song of Ice and Fire. Targeryens tend to have silver-blonde hair as well as violet eyes due to their Valyrian blood, which has been maintained through the centuries with massive inbreeding.
- Morgaine in C.J. Cherryh's Morgaine Cycle is white-haired and beautiful due to belonging to a half-blooded ancient race.
- Gwerath in The Seven Citadels has silver hair, as did Kerish's late mother, Taana.
- President Eloise Pritchart in the Honor Harrington series is frequently described as having "platinum" hair.
- The Black Cat in Spider-Man: The Darkest Hours has silver hair.
- Lady High Priestess Evelyn
 from White Star and the other novels in the series by Elizabeth Vaughan has white hair with a matching white dress.
- Lucretia from Bystander has silver hair.
- Nyarko from Haiyore! Nyarko-san in her human form has silver hair.
- Miranda in L. Jagi Lamplighter's Prospero's Daughter trilogy. In the Back Story, her brother Eramus had turned it to an old woman's hair in anger; she had been able to restore its health, but not its color. When Eramus restores its original black, she doesn't like it, even though she recognizes the intent of generosity.
- Kiki in the Kiki Strike series. It wasn't really much of a plot point, but it was used to show how unusual she was.
- Jenna, from Jane Yolen's Great Alta Saga, has pure white hair and black eyes, a sign of her status as a messianic figure; she is a heroine of legend who is reincarnated every few hundred years, always with white hair from birth.
- Ash March in Sword Of Shadows has very pale blonde hair, putting her right between this and hair of gold, depending on the lighting.
- The Last Unicorn's Lady Amalthea has white hair, which makes sense, given that she's actually a unicorn that was turned into a human.
- In Patricia A. McKillip's "Oak Hill", Elaine's dye, she claims, will find its color on Maris's hair. What it does is turn it white, like a spider web.
Live-Action TV
- Two of the Super Sentai main villainess, Queen Ahames and Steerwoman Shelinda have white hair. Their character archtype however, don't match very well with the trope (their sexiness do though).
- Willow briefly had white hair in the finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, due to using powerful good magic to connect to every potential Slayer on the planet.
- Abby has white hair in Primeval, but that's bleach and her only power is turning on fanboys.
- Number Six from Battlestar Galactica (though there are brunette and sandy blonde versions as well).
- Chiana in Farscape. A feature of her species, apparently - the women have white hair and the men have black hair.
- Yuki from the live-action version of Cutey Honey had white hair when she "flashed" into her battle form.
- Daenerys Targaryen (natural brunette Emilia Clarke in a white wig) in Game of Thrones, who has silver-blonde hair due to her Targaryen ancestry.
- Young Danish actress, Kaya Fjeldsted, who plays Emilie in series 3 of Forbrydelsen (The Killing) has naturally platinum-blonde hair so fair that it looks white.
- Zev (not Xev) Bellringer from Lexx starts out as a dirty blonde, but 790 is shown selecting white hair (for both head and pubis) as part of her transformation. Furthermore, in the uncut version of "Supernova", you can see that the makeup department kept continuity with this color scheme.
Music
Professional Wrestling
- Angelina Love and Madison Rayne of The Beautiful People in TNA. Averted with team members Velvet Sky - who was two-toned - and Lacey Von Erich - who was honey blonde.
- The appropriately named Norwegian-Canadian indie wrestler Silvie Silver "Silver-Star".
Tabletop Games
- Avacyn from Magic: The Gathering's Innistrad pack is a white haired angel. Helps with the Dark Is Not Evil motiff since she wears all black.
- Many Sisters of Battle from Warhammer 40000 have white hair, though this is heavily implied to be the result of dyeing. Whether they're actually pretty varies from artist to artist, with some casting them as your standard pretty Amazon Brigade, and others sit down and think about how a life of fighting (often without a helmet) would actually make them look like.
- Considering the Crapsack World they live in, it's entirely possible it's white due to stress.
- Or even age - the elite of humanity often receive treatments to keep them fighting for hundreds of years. Old Space Marines usually seem to opt for Bald of Awesome instead.
- Legend of the Five Rings: Some members of the Crane clan, both male and females, dye their hair white in honor of their ancestors.
- Dark elves, or drow, also count as Dark-Skinned Blonde (despite living underground for thousands of years, which you'd think would have the opposite effect; though, at least in one gameworld, they're described as being cursed into that form so none would mistake them). And since they're elves, they tend to be very good-looking (drow are even described as being more attractive on average than other elves, on top of looking exotic). They took this to massive race-wide Ms. Fanservice levels. The good ones took to dancing naked in the moonlight. The evil ones considered wearing armor admission of fear and weakness before rival houses. The females would often wander their cities nude or nearly so, flaying alive anyone who was Distracted by the Sexy with whips made of snakes, unless they decided the male would make a worthy addition to their harem and let him audition for the role of pleasure slave. Pretty is not nice at all.
- The Whites in Cthulhu Tech are completely white (skin, eyes, and hair), on the average more attractive than either humans or Nazzadi, AND all natural para-psychics.
- Pathfinder: Feiya the iconic witch, Merisiel the iconic Rogue, and Seoni the iconic sorceress all have white hair (and are pretty). And Seltyiel, the iconic Magus who has White Hair, Black Heart, so apparently Paizo is fond of this trope.
- Arianna from Exalted. There are others, but Arianna is the only one on the cover of the primary rulebook.
- Nobilis has the Excrucian Iolithae Septimian, a Consummate Liar who is able to deceive reality itself.
Theater
- In some theatrical adaptations of A Christmas Carol, such as the one by Seattle's A Contemporary Theatre, the Ghost of Christmas Past is depicted with white or light blonde hair.
Video Games
- The heroine of the Nintendo DS game Another Code: Two Memories (Trace Memory across the pond) has white hair. This is a little strange considering her father has blonde hair and mother has black hair.
- Knights of the Old Republic II had Jedi Master Atris has white hair despite being human.
- And Handmaiden/Brianna, with her whole race, the Echani pretty much look human but they all have white hair and silver eyes.
- Nu Wa from Warriors Orochi 2 is a white haired goddess.
- Sierra Mikain from Suikoden II fits every aspect of this trope to a T, from the beautiful white hair to the mysterious personality.
- Gwendonlyn from Odin Sphere has white hair. Seems to be a common trait for Valkyries.
- The Viera from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance (and, later, Final Fantasy XII and Final Fantasy Tactics A 2), who regard it as a blessing from the gods. Also, Ritz, subverted in that she hates it (because she gets teased about it constantly, and resents the misery it causes her and her mother), and therefore has it dyed red up to the epilogue.
- Actually, it's the viera spirits, not the gods. Shara regards white hair as the best gift a human could have.
- And Adelle from Final Fantasy Tactics A 2 has white hair.
- Amoretta of Grim Grimoire, the Homunculus with the soul of an angel.
- Zelda's lady-in-waiting, Impa (the 30-something Amazonian Beauty from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time has grey hair, natch, not the old lady from the other installments).
- Sapphire from Disgaea 3 has white hair. More of a dirty white than pure white, though.
- Raine Sage of Tales Of Symphonia like her little brother is a white haired elf (she's really half elf).
- The current page image: Micaiah of Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn. She's called the Silver-Haired Maiden, and yes, that's a plot point. Several plot points.
- For that matter, there's also Ninian the Dancer from Fire Emblem Elibe, and the shaman Diadora and her daughter Julia in Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War. Not quite white in these cases, but close enough. Similarly, Ishtar from the same game is either portrayed with whiteish-pink or silver hair. Also Idoun of Sealed Sword.
- In Neverwinter Nights this trope is rather common among female Aasimar and other celestials in Faerun. The half-celestials Melissa from the Trials of the Academy module and Kaelyn the Dove from Neverwinter Nights 2 Mask of the Betrayer both also have white hair.
- Seolla Schweizer and Calvina Coulange from Super Robot Wars. Granted, it's dark silver for Calvina, but otherwise, it fits.
- Avril Vent Fleur from Wild ARMs 5 has silver hair, as part of her persona of Mysterious Waif.
- Ultima, the fallen angel, the final boss of Final Fantasy Tactics has white hair.
- Touhou has several such characters. Eirin Yagokoro and Fujiwara no Mokou have white hair and are probably the result of being immortal, though that raises the question of why Kaguya Houraisan has black hair. Sakuya Izayoi, despite supposedly being a normal human, has silver hair as well, which has lead many fans to speculate that she may not, in fact, be human at all. Letty Whiterock is a yuki-onna. Youmu Konpaku is a silver haired half-ghost (we don't know how that works either), and a straight up albino if you go by the fighting games' art. Momiji Inubashiri is a white wolf tengu. Then there's all the characters with very pale but still coloured hair...
- Rune Factory 2: A Fantasy Harvest Moon has several pale-grey-haired women of varying ages. One of them is the mother of a fairly young boy, so she could possibly have come by the color in the usual way, but two of the bachelorettes, who are probably under 25, have the same coloring.
- Rune Factory Frontier has Stella, who, in her usual appearance, is an old woman, making the white hair seem plausible. But an appearance by a ghost of her younger self reveals it was always that white.
- In Harvest Moon, there's The Witch from Animal Parade, who lives deep in Fugu Forest and has silver hair.
- A New Beginning brings us Olivia. It seems to be suggested that silvery hair, combined with dark skin, is how most people look in the Harvest Moon version of the Middle East—the vaguely Middle-Eastern-seeming Amir and Sanjay, along with the Wizard from Animal Parade, all have white hair.
- High Inquisitor Whitemane, one of the last bosses of the Scarlet Monastery dungeon in the World of Warcraft, has white hair.
- Following Tides of War, Jaina Proudmoore has silver-white hair with one blonde streak.
- Lucia from Luminous Arc has white hair and is a witch that specializes in light magic
- Lieselotte of Arcana Heart combines this with Elegant Gothic Lolita and Red Eyes, Take Warning to make one Creepy Child.
- The sequel adds Zenia, who kinda fits this trope in that her origin is completely shrouded in mystery.
- The sequel's final boss, Parace L'sia, also has white hair while in her human form. It changes to pink when she turns into her near-naked-elf-in-a-bathing-towel form though.
- Vanessa Lewis from the 4th Virtua Fighter game is a Dark-Skinned Blond with white hair.
- Valkyria Chronicles has Selvaria Bles, with long white hair, a general at the ripe old age of 22. Alicia's hair goes white only when she's "powered up", oddly, but it wouldn't be much of a surprise otherwise. Edy Nelson also has white hair, but she's normal.
- Aliasse from Valkyria Chronicles II. Silver hair and red eyes seems to be the mark of a Valkyria, either all the time or when a girl turns into one.
- Riela from Valkyria Chronicles III is a strange case; her normal hair is red at the top and turns silver midway, but when she goes into Valkyria form, her hair become entirely silver.
- Lenneth in Valkyrie Profile is a silver haired Valkyrie.
- Alice Elliot from Shadow Hearts is a platinum blonde haired exorcist that specializes in light magic and healing .
- The Idol Master was bound to fall into this trope sooner or later, and Takane is what came of it. And that's not necessarily a bad thing.
- Fiona Belli from Haunting Ground has platinum blonde hair.
- Nami, one of the heroines of Aoi Shiro. Kohaku also counts, although you'd be forgiven for thinking she's a Pretty Boy at first.
- Swan of City of Heroes and Ghost Widow of City of Villains both have white hair and both got their powers from magical sources.
- The White Dragon of Dreamfall has pure white hair in her human form
- Capcom Fighting Jam/Evolution and one of the Street Fighter Alpha 3 portable versions had Ingrid. She was going to appear in the cancelled Capcom Fighting All-Stars, and was revealed to have made an appearance on Tatsunoko vs. Capcom. (In which version is still a mystery, though it could have been Ultimate All-Stars, judging by a scan.)
- In SFA 3, she takes the Psycho Drive from Bison in her ending. Also, Rose can't figure out what her future looks like.
- Juno Eclipse from The Force Unleashed is the platinum blond haired Love Interest of the main character.
- Jazz from Jet Set Radio Future is a Dark-Skinned Blond with short white hair.
- A Witch's Tale has Anne, the silver haired little girl whom Liddell befriends in the second playthrough. Unfortunately, she grows up to become the Eld Witch.
- Shih-Na, Agent Lang's whited haired subordinate in Miles Edgeworth Ace Attorney Investigations. She turns out to be a recurring baddie in disguise.
- Ojou in Suika has silver hair. People just assume she's a foreigner and overlook it, apparently.
- Izanami from Persona 4 has gray hair. Considering she looks essentially like a Gender-flipped version of the PC, it's not surprising.
- Yonah and Kainé from Nie R are white haired artificial humans. Well, Kainé's case is debatable...
- Jeanne from Bayonetta has platinum blonde hair and like the raven haired Bayonetta, is a gunslinging witch.
- Mystica, the Magical Girl Warrior, from the Fading Hearts Visual Novel. While her hair is described as silver from game dialogue, it is actually a combination of white and silver.
- Tomoki in Canvas 2. It looks more blue than white on occasion, though.
- Naomi Kimishima from Trauma Team has silver hair
- Isabella/Catelia and her "sisters" from Advance Wars: Days of Ruin has white hair (although their hair has a greenish tint to it).
- Freudia from Rosenkreuzstilette has white hair and [[specializes in ice magic.
- Riven in League of Legends has white hair. Considering her story involves her turning her back on her home city after seeing them abandon their principles of Social Darwinism, she's probably closer to the wise-beyond-her-years variant than anything else.
- In Final Fantasy XI the playable female Elvaan, Tarutaru, and Mithra have white hair as an available option, the female Humes, however, do not.
- Noire and Uni from Neptunia, at least when they activate HDD.
- Lady Calista in The Last Story. White hair, and a powerful magic user—in fact, her magic is so powerful, it can temporarily make people invincible! But she's not the only one—many magic users in The Last Story have pale or silvery hair (from party member Yurick, who has silvery hair, to the random NPC magicians, who have shocking white hair), so it seems to be implied that magic frequently has that effect on hair.
Visual Novels
- The Nasuverse seems to love this trope, and it often indicates that the character in question isn't human:
- Ilyasviel von Einzbern from Fate/stay night, as well as her mother Irisviel. In their case it's genetic, since Einzbern homunculi are descendants (or, more appropriately, clones) of Lizleihi Justica von Einzbern, who had the same white hair and red eyes. They also carry parts of her personality and even memories.
- Dark Sakura also has white hair and red eyes as part of her Evil Makeover.
- Caren Ortensia from Fate Hollow Ataraxia, as well as her deceased mother, Claudia.
- White Len from the Melty Blood games has light grey hair, as well as Riesbyfe Stridberg.
- Chou from Ballad Of An Evening Butterfly has white hair. It probably has to do with her albinism, the fact she’s from a unusual species and her mysterious powers.
- Kud of Little Busters has soft grey/yellow flaxen hair that is treated by the game as a platinum blonde colour.
- Clair Vauxof Bernard and Virgilia from Umineko: When They Cry, though Virgilia's leans more towards silver and Clair's hair has a very pale green tint. On the human side, there's Kyrie Ushiromiya and her sister Kasumi Sumadera.
Webcomics
- Tea is the secondary narrator of Gunnerkrigg Court has white hair. Stranger still, she has brown eyes.
- Bell in Powerpuff Girls Doujinshi is a villainous girl in white with white hair and eyes.
- Lily white in Atland is a white haired priestess.
- Zoophobia's Penelope, who also wears white, is one.
- Ping from Megatokyo had white hair early on, before her body started changing in response to her character development.
- Lei'ella from Inverloch, which marks her as one of the Severed, mortal elves with silver hair and golden eyes.
- Velma in I Was Kidnapped by Lesbian Pirates from Outer Space!!! has white hair. Most likely does not mean anything magical, though.
- Kili Stormcrow, a shaman of The Dragon Doctors, has bleach-white hair due to an incident as a child—Kili developed spiritual vision so strong that Kili's perception was trapped in the spirit world. Kili's hair has become permanently white. Of course, she wasn't always a girl...well, at least on the outside.
- Zenobia in Hazard's Wake has white hair, possibly related to her (most likely) being a demon.
- Mariko from PHD, a white haired minor recurring character and a former Japanese exchange grad student who quit her PhD to start her own company.
- Joyce is prematurely grey, even though, Alien Abduction aside, there's nothing especially magical about her, although she does develop into The Messiah (our definition, not Messianic Archetype, which is closer to Walkerton) over the course of It's Walky!
- Homestuck: Rose and Roxy both have white hair like Dave and Dirk and have shown an interest in magic, with Roxy being a big fan of wizards and Rose dual wielding magic wands as her Weapon of Choice.
- Calliope except that it's a white wig, and she's actually bald. She wears it to cosplay as her Trollsona who bears a striking resembalance to Calmasis, a character in Post-Scratch Rose's books.
Web Original
- Cielle, the clairvoyant magic shop owner from Broken Saints, has white hair, courtesy of albinism.
- Nasha of SPAZ has white Rapunzel Hair, and while she's not magical, she's definitely a little strange
- Iriana Estchell of Ilivais X has this, due to her alteration for piloting a Phonos Weapon, removing most normal bodily functions, including pigmentation.
- Lilette Einmell from Tales Of Hetalia has white hair, signaling she is a demon. In fact, this series runs on this trope, considering all demons have white hair.
Western Animation
- Avatar The Last Airbender: Princess Yue's hair color was a plot point. She was actually born (or rather still-born) with dark hair like everyone else in the water-tribe (and pretty much everyone in the four nations). When the moon-spirit saved her infant life, her hair turned pure white and remained that way all her life.
- Charmcaster from Ben 10 is a silver haired sorceress.
- Delilah from Gargoyles has white hair despite being a clone of Demona, who has red hair. This is from the discolouration that occurs with flawed cloning.
- Agent K from The Replacements has platinum blonde hair.
- Drew Saturday from The Secret Saturdays has white hair. This seems to be a genetic trait, since her 11-year old son has black hair with a white Skunk Stripe (or whatever the equivalent is for the spiky crazy anime hair Zack has).
- In flashbacks, Drew's mom had white hair, too, so it is certainly genetic.
- Evil-Lyn from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe has white hair, though she rarely takes off her helmet to display it.
- Dani from Danny Phantom, although only when in ghost form...
- Nefertina from ''Mummies Alive!' had white hair and pale gray skin in her undead mummy form. There was some inconsistency in her coloring throughout the series. In some of the flashback scenes where she was still alive, sometimes, she was shown with black hair, and sometimes, she was shown with white hair. And yes, she, too, was voiced by Cree Summer (guess which other character Cree voiced that Nefertina resembled!).
- "The Great and Powerful" Trixie has this sort of hair, though with shades of light blue.
- Queen La from The Legend Of Tarzan has white hair. Serves as a Mythology Gag to the original Edgar Rice Burroughs stories describing the city of Opar as an Atlantean colony city, hence the design reference to Atlantis: The Lost Empire.
- The Ice Queen (The Ice King's Distaff Counterpart) from Adventure Time has blue skin and white hair.
- Judy Jetson from The Jetsons has white hair. May have something to do with being from the future.
- Brunhilde from Thor Tales Of Asgard has white hair which make her stand out the rest of the valkyries whom she leads that have blonde hair.
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