Disposable Vapes

A disposable vape is a vape pen that is not rechargeable and built for single-use – once it’s depleted, you simply throw it away, or post back to us for recycling. It has a the same components as a standard vaping kit, but is a little more convenient.

There’s no requirement to fill it with liquid, charge batteries or change coils. Just unpack it, and go. Disposable vapes come in many forms – back in the day, they looked similar to traditional cigarettes, and in some cases – still do. Vapour were at the forefront of disposable vapes in the early 2010s with the VL5 disposable e-cigarette, which we still sell to this day.

More modern devices have shunned the look of traditional cigarettes and are for the most part, a bright plastic device that matches the flavour to the colour of the device.

Disposable vapes are typically activated using an inhalation method, which makes them work and feel very similar to traditional cigarettes. Just unpack the device and take a draw from the top of the device as you would with a traditional cigarette.

Generally, as the vapour inhalation is much lower than larger vaping devices, disposables are made with a stronger concentrate of nicotine. Most are 20mg of nicotine salts, which produces a smoother, more discreet vaping experience than standard (freebase) liquid nicotine.

As disposable vape devices have matured, they’ve gotten much larger than the previous iterations of them. With our VL5 device, it’s as small as a regular cigarette, so we can only fit 0.8ml of e-liquid in them for about 250 puffs.

More modern disposables have up to 2ml of e-liquid, so last around 550-600 puffs, based on how long your puffs are. It’s worth noting that the EU laws on electronic cigarettes don’t allow for more than 2ml of e-liquid capacity, and thus, devices that contain more e-liquid may not be approved by the MHRA (the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency which governs the vaping industry) so we wouldn’t recommend purchasing a device that has more than 2ml of e-liquid capacity for this reason.

The most popular devices at the moment are definitely varieties of Elf Bar, whether that be the Elf Bar 600 or the Lost Mary. These devices were some of the first to market devices with a full 2ml capacity of e-liquid, and really took off. That’s why you can find them stocked in most retailers (though none offer free delivery, with no minimum spend like we do).

Given the amount of media coverage regarding a potential disposable vape ban, there’s an increasing chance that there’s going to be legislative changes brought into effect – what those changes look like at the moment, we don’t know. All we know at the moment is that TPD approved disposables with no more than 2ml of pre-filled liquid are currently still eligible for sale in the UK. Larger devices, such as the 3500 puff devices that often make their way into consumers hands aren’t eligible to be sold in the UK, likely won’t have gone through the testing required for TPD and could be unsafe to use.

Disposable vapes can most certainly be recycled. At Vapour, we partner with Valpak to responsibly recycle components used in disposable vapes – such as lithium batteries, and plastics used. Find out more about how to return your disposable vapes to Vapour in our WEEE recycle policy.