Electronic cigarettes vs Regular Cigarettes

E-cigarettes are at their core simple devices, you can complicate it with modifications but they are, at their simplest, machines that heat up a liquid with nicotine in to make vapour you inhale. This is important because when people make decisions about what e-cigarette starter kit to get, a lot of the time they focus on the machine. New starts should look into what is actually just as important, the liquid inside.

To be more precise the nicotine level is the vital part, and how much of it is in the liquid. It is more complicated, then, comparing how much nicotine was in your cigarettes and finding a similar e-liquid. Actually comparing the nicotine of a cigarette and an e-cigarette is one of the worst things you can do! To explain why though and how you should choose your strength we will need to delve into the science (we promise to make it as painless as possible).

*2022 Update - New generation vape devices use improved technology and are able to increase the amount of nicotine you absorb from E-Cigarette aerosol. Check out the SMOKO VAPE POD, the newest addition to the SMOKO range that delivers everything our customers expect - great-tasting UK-made liquids in a pre-filled POD vape that is discreet, stylish and easy-to-use! 

The Science of Smoking and E-Cigarettes

When you take a puff on a cigarette all the ingredients in the cigarette are burnt and jumbled together to make the smoke. Inside the smoke the nicotine molecules bond to just about any of the 4000 chemicals that are in cigarettes, and then they start to make their way into your body.

Some of the nicotine is absorbed by your mouth and nose but the vast majority of the smoke works its way down to your lungs.

Once in the lungs they enter into the alveoli, millions of tiny air sacs that make up the lungs, which normally carry oxygen from your lungs to your blood. From there the nicotine makes its way to your brain. All of this is supercharged when you add chemicals like ammonia and tar, which speeds up the process of getting nicotine to your brain by helping it slip straight through your lungs into your blood.

Vapour from e-cigarettes is different, the most common theory (because e-cigarettes are still relatively new there is no consensus yet) is that when you take a puff on your e-cig the nicotine bonds to the water as there is nothing else to bond to. After all e-cigarettes don’t have all the chemicals like tar and ammonia. This makes the nicotine almost 10x bigger than the nicotine in smoke, as water is one of the bigger molecules around.

The problem with this is that when the nicotine mixed with water makes its way to the lungs, it can’t be absorbed as quickly.

The alveoli in the lungs are really tiny and so some of the nicotine/water molecules can't fit, and can't get into the bloodstream.  That means you are left with a less nicotine in your blood. Add to this the fact that vapour doesn't have any of the tar or ammonia the nicotine absorption is much slower than from a cigarette.

This means that cigarettes are more effective at getting the nicotine (and all those carcinogenic chemicals in cigarettes) into your bloodstream. As you can see in the graph below, nicotine from cigarettes rockets up (the green line) while nicotine from e-cigarettes (the blue line) takes much longer and nowhere near as much nicotine works its way into your blood (the red line is from the more complicated vapourisers which actually push the vapour into your lungs).

What does that mean for smokers switching to vaping?

What this means is that you can't directly compare the amount of nicotine in a cigarette to the amount in an e-cigarette. In real terms a cigarette will give you much more nicotine then an e-cigarette. So what we have done is give a rough guide using the most common types of cigarettes. Unfortunately as there are over 1200 different types of cigarettes with a range from 0.2% to 4.2% we couldn’t add any brands in here.  We have also added the amount of cigarettes you use each day to make it a bit clearer.

*2022 Update - The legal maximum strength for e-liquids for retail sale is now set at 2.0% according to updated regulation here in the UK. You can use nic shots and shortfills to make a liquid stronger than 2.0%

What we would suggest is you err on the side of caution and choose the higher e-cigarette strength from the two options. For example, if you smoke light cigarettes but have 25 a day it would be better to start on the 2.0% as that will make it much less likely for you to go back to cigarettes and you can then move down the e-cigarette strengths if you wish.

This is guideline as the amount of nicotine that is absorbed from smoking or vaping can change for a whole host of reasons.  Things like how hot your atomiser is getting all the way to how stressed you are feeling at that moment can affect it!

Nicotine strengths then are not as cut and dried as people realise, the best advice we can give when trying to pick strength is to go a bit higher than you think you will need when you first start. It is those first few days with the e-cigarette which are all important and if it isn’t strong enough it won’t be anywhere near as effective. The chance of you falling back into smoking if you start with a weak strength is much higher.

That is why we have our 2.0% as standard in our starter packs, as it is normally the best choice for a beginner and makes sure you have the best chance of making the switch to a healthier lifestyle. 

*2022 Update - You can now try a SMOKO E-Cigarette for FREE when you purchase one pack of E-Cigarette refills!