Ingredient database · linked sources
What are you really inhaling?
Burning a cigarette produces more than 7,000 substances. Here are the most important — with linked sources per substance.
Top 5 — most dangerous substances in smoke
2,3-Pentanedione
Marketed as a „diacetyl-free“ substitute — with near-identical lung risk.
Acrolein
Smells like burnt fat — acts like a chemical weapon.
Arsenic
Classic poison — today in every puff.
Benzene
Banned from gasoline — present in every puff.
![Benzo[a]pyrene](/images/ingredients/benzo-a-pyrene.webp)
Benzo[a]pyrene
The substance behind the first documented occupational cancer in medical history.
Cadmium
Heavy metal from the battery — heavy metal in the kidney.
Carbon Monoxide
The exhaust pipe gas. When you smoke, directly into your lungs.
Chromium(VI)
The Erin Brockovich substance — detectable from some vape coils in the aerosol.
Diacetyl
Butter flavour on microwave popcorn — lung scars in workers.
Hydrogen Cyanide (HCN)
Shuts down cellular respiration — even at minute doses.
Lead
Banned from gasoline — still in tobacco.
Methanol
10 ml of methanol is enough for permanent blindness — micrograms are in every cigarette.
Polonium-210
The radioactive element from the Litvinenko murder. Also in tobacco.
Tar
What's left behind when the smoke is gone.
Tobacco-Specific Nitrosamines (TSNAs)
Created by tobacco itself. Exist nowhere else.
Vitamin E Acetate
Vitamin sounds healthy. In 2019 in vape aerosols, it caused EVALI.
Acetaldehyde
The hangover compound from alcohol — and the silent addiction enhancer.
Catechol
Only moderately toxic alone — a co-carcinogen with benzo[a]pyrene.
Formaldehyde
Preserves corpses. Present in every puff.
Mercury
The same metal that used to be in fever thermometers — now a few nanograms per puff.
Naphthalene
The mothball substance — EU-banned as a consumer contact poison, present in every puff.
Nickel
The same metal that makes your watchback itch — present in many vape coils.
Nicotine
The addictive substance. Not what kills you — what keeps you.
Nitrogen Oxides (NOx)
Nitrogen oxides from diesel exhaust — and from every puff.
Nornicotine
The forgotten tobacco alkaloid — and a suspected contributor to the Alzheimer link.
Phenol
Medicine's first antiseptic — and a cancer promoter in smoke.
Acetoin
Used to dodge diacetyl bans — but converts to diacetyl in the body.
Acetone
Industrial solvent — from print shop floor to your lungs.
Ammonia
Sounds like cleaning fluid — acts as addiction enhancer. Added deliberately by manufacturers.
Cellulose Nitrate
Gunpowder's cousin — a combustion accelerator in cigarette paper.
Cinnamaldehyde
Cinnamon sounds healthy — as aerosol, it paralyses lung immune defence.
Hydroquinone
EU-banned in skin-whitening cosmetics — present in every cigarette.
Limonene
Smells like orange — as aerosol, it oxidises to allergenic follow-up products.
Pyridine
Sounds harmless — smells foul — clings to your sweater.
Toluene
The same substance glue-huffers seek out. Present in every puff.
Ammonium Phosphate
Sounds like fertiliser — actually an addiction enhancer in cigarette paper.
Ethyl Maltol
Calorie-free sweetener — but accelerates metal leaching from vape coils.
Propylene Glycol (PG)
Food-approved — but as an aerosol over years, a data gap.
Vanillin
Food-approved — but as aerosol, irritant pyrolysis products form.
Vegetable Glycerin (VG)
Skin cream, cough syrup — and acrolein when overheated.