Always take short and slow puffs from your vaporizer. Taking hard, long draws can introduce cold air into the heating section, reducing the temperature inside the device.

Smoking weed is the most common way to enjoy cannabis, but there is a better way to inhale — vaping. Vaping and heat-not-burn devices avoid some of the issues related to smoking, such as carcinogens created by combustion.

Additionally, vapes are more efficient. A California NORML study revealed that vaporizers could deliver 46% of the THC in a cannabis sample. A joint of cannabis delivers only around 25% of the THC. The rest is lost to destruction by heat and side-stream smoke. 

To vape weed, you must heat the cannabis flower to release the terpenes and cannabinoids as vapor. But you’ll need a few things to get started.

• Quality herb: extremely dry or overly moist flower won’t give you a great vaping experience. Make sure your flower is properly cured and contains a normal moisture level.
• Vaporizer: you will need a vaporizer to vape weed. Vaporizers range from small handheld devices to medical-grade devices that sit on your tabletop.
• Grinder: some convection vaporizers let you use full buds, but vaping is best done with ground flower, particularly if you have a conduction vaporizer. Grinding your cannabis will help increase the surface area, allowing for even heating and a better vaping experience.
• Accessories: some vaporizers come with cleaning accessories such as brushes, cotton swabs, alcohol, pipe cleaners, and stir tools.

Once you have gathered the required tools to load your vaporizer, follow these steps:

1. Charge or plug in your vaporizer
2. Place your weed in your vaporizer’s oven.
3. With your finger or a tool, remove excess weed from the top to make the surface relatively flat. Don’t stuff the vaporizer with too much weed. Allow airflow.
4. Turn on the device. A useful rule of thumb is to set the device around 356-410°F. But once you get used to using the device, select your preferred temperature.
5. As the cannabis begins to heat up, inhale.

Always take short and slow puffs from your vaporizer. Taking hard, long draws can introduce cold air into the heating section, reducing the temperature inside the device.

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After vaping, check the device to examine the weed’s color. If what’s left looks brown with a touch of green, then it is an Already Vaped Bud (AVB). You can use the AVB for edibles and recipes like cannabutter and brownies.

Now you know how to vape weed. The first device most opt for is the vape pen, which is a vaporizer for cannabis concentrates.

How to Use a Vape Pen

A vape pen is a cylindrical tool that is roughly the size of a standard ball-point pen. This device often comes with a battery attached to a cartridge, which contains between .3g – 1g of cannabis concentrate or rosin.

Although the parts of a vape pen depend on the model, most vape pens have similar core components. They include:

• Vape battery – The battery makes vaping achievable. Some batteries come with a button that lets the user change heat settings or switch the pen on and off.
• Vape cartridge – the cartridge is attached to the vape battery. You will also see your desired vaping substance and an atomizer in the vape cartridge.
• Mouthpiece – You inhale the vapor through the mouthpiece.

Here’s how to use it:

1. First, turn on the vape pen by touching the power button 5 times. Once it lights up, you have powered it on successfully.
2. Click and hold the power button to transmit power to the atomizer.
3. The atomizer will heat up the oil nearly instantly, producing vapor. Inhale slowly and gently and take small puffs. Some vape pens can get too hot if you inhale hard.

Please note that vaporizers should not get hot enough to burn your oil or flower. However, some vape pens are more like portable smoking devices than true vaporizers. If the heating element in your vape pen gets hot enough to combust the oil, try to set your device to the low-heat setting to ensure you are vaporizing your oil and not combusting it.

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Vape pens are easy and convenient. It is best to store your vape pen upright to avoid unexpected oil leaks from the cartridge.

Note: Skip any stage that involves a button if you’re using a draw-fire vape. Instead, just take a draw and the pen will produce vapor. Once you’ve finished, the vape pen will go off on its own.

Get Started on Your Cannabis Wellness Journey

Have you started your cannabis wellness journey? Jointly is a new cannabis wellness app that helps you discover purposeful cannabis consumption so you can achieve your wellness goals with cannabis and CBD. On the Jointly app, you can find new cannabis products, rate products based on how well they helped you achieve your goals, and track and optimize 15 factors that can impact your cannabis experience. These 15 factors include your dose, the environment in which you consume cannabis, who you are with when you ingest, how hydrated you are, the quality of your diet, how much sleep you got last night, and more. Download the Jointly app on the App Store or the Google Play Store to get started on your cannabis wellness journey.

Sam Anderson is the Content Director at Jointly, a cannabis wellness company powered by a proprietary data platform to help people reach their full potential. The company was created on the premise that purposeful cannabis consumption is the key to unlocking a better you. This article originally appeared on Jointly and has been reposted with permission.