Convection vs Conduction Vapes: What's the Difference?

How Conduction Vapes Work

Conduction is the frying-pan method: your herb sits directly against heated chamber walls and cooks through contact. It's simple, cheap to manufacture and heats up fast — which is why most budget vapes like the PAX Plus and PAX Mini use it.

The downside is uneven cooking. Herb touching the walls overcooks while the centre of the pack stays green, so you need to stir halfway through. And because the chamber stays hot between draws, your herb keeps cooking while the vape sits in your hand — wasted vapour drifting into thin air.

How Convection Vapes Work

Convection is the oven method: a heater warms the air, and that hot air flows through your herb as you inhale, vaporising the active compounds on contact. Nothing cooks between draws — extraction only happens while air is moving — so every milligram goes toward actual vapour.

The result is cleaner flavour, visibly more even browning (no stirring needed), and better efficiency per gram. The trade-off used to be price, but the Xmax V3 Pro (£69) brought true on-demand convection under £70, and the Arizer Solo 3 (£236)pairs convection with an all-glass vapour path for some of the purest flavour we've tested.

What About Hybrid Heating?

Hybrid vapes do both: heated chamber walls pre-cook your herb (conduction) while hot airflow finishes the job as you draw (convection). You get faster heat-up than pure convection plus denser clouds than either method alone.

Every Storz & Bickel device — the Volcano Hybrid, Mighty+, Venty and Crafty+ — uses hybrid heating, and it's a big reason they top our best dry herb vaporisers UK roundup. If you want maximum cloud density with minimum technique, hybrid wins.

Which Should You Buy?

On a budget? See our best budget vaporisers UK guide for top picks under £130 across all three heating types. Want the full picture? Our first-vaporizer buyer's guide covers everything else that matters.