Cloud Chasing vs. Flavor Chasing: What’s the Difference?
In the e-cigarette circle you will quickly hear three high-frequency words: cloud chasing、flavor chasing and vape subculture. Two factions of players, one focusing on cloud volume and the other sticking to taste details, have already developed a whole set of subcultural discourse around “taste vs. smoke”, which has also become popular with a bunch of coils, e-liquids, and equipment.
To put it simply, you can think of cloud chasing as extreme sports players who “pursue stage effects” use their equipment as smoke-blowing machines to chase large clouds that are visible to the naked eye. ； And flavor chasing is more like “taste enthusiasts” who try the same e-liquid back and forth with different coils and different powers just to dig out more layers. Both groups grew up in the same vape subculture but have completely different aesthetics, device preferences, and social circles.
Below I will use several key points mentioned by RiP Trippers in Cloud Chasing 101, combined with the discussion of power, resistance, and VG by players on the Planet of the Vapes forum to help you see the difference between cloud chasing and flavor chasing in a more systematic way and how you should choose.
| Contrast Dimensions | Cloud Chasing | Flavor Chasing |
|---|---|---|
| core goals | Maximizes smoke volume and visual impact for competition and show operations | Maximize the restoration of e-liquid details and highlight the sweetness, acidity and aftertaste levels |
| Typical equipment | Big smoke RDA/Okura RTA low resistance heating wire double or multiple structure | The taste is towards RTA / RDA single-shot structure, the cavity is smaller and more focused |
| Coil resistance | Mainly ultra-low resistance, such as 0.1–0.3 Ω, emphasizing instant bursts | Medium to high resistance is more common such as 0.6–1.2 Ω emphasizing stable heating and flavor |
| Power range | Medium and high power can even be fully adapted to thick coils and multi-hair structures. | Medium and low power mainly take care of delicate taste and comfort |
| E-liquid VG / PG ratio | High VG ratio is very common. Forum players recommend at least 80% VG. | A balanced ratio of 50/50 or 60/40 is common to emphasize the flavor. |
| Airflow design | Large area of lateral air/base air or even full opening is conducive to deep lung inhalation | Half-open, half-closed or fine pores enhance flow rate and flavor concentration. |
| Inhalation method | Direct lung suction (DTL) inhales with strong force and fast rhythm | Mouth breathing or restricted lung breathing (MTL/RDL) has a slower rhythm |
| Experience difficulty | Need to understand Ohm’s law, battery safety and airflow management. Higher entry barrier for newbies | The threshold for getting started is relatively low, but playing to the extreme requires more taste buds. |
| Represents player mentality | “I want the whole audience to see my cloud” which is more social, performance and competitive. | “I just want to drink this bottle of oil thoroughly” focuses on my own feelings and long-term daily use experience |
Below, a simplified bar progress bar is used to visually display the tendencies of cloud chasing and flavor chasing in several dimensions so that you can quickly judge which faction you are more suitable for. The numerical value is not laboratory data but “experience value” based on RiP Trippers video content and actual combat feedback from forum players.
In RiP Trippers’ Cloud Chasing 101, he broke down cloud chasing in detail, but the core points are: airflow、coil structure and E-liquid ratio . Real cloud chasing is not just about “turning on high power and it’s done” but you need to use a large area coil, add e-liquid with a high enough VG, and combine it with a large amount of direct airflow to push the amount of mist to the limit with every puff.
The experience of forum players also confirms this. They generally use 0.5 Ω or even lower coils to increase the power and then increase the VG to more than 80%, plus wide-mouth drip tips and large air inlets. So the kind of cloud you see that “swallows half the room in one bite” is not only expensive in equipment, but the entire system is optimized around the theme of cloud chasing.
Compared to the visual explosion of cloud chasing, flavor chasing is more like a slow-burning player who will switch to different resistance values, different wires and even different cotton brands for the same e-liquid just to find the “most comfortable” combination. You can understand that they are tuning: the same song sounds completely different on different headphones, and what the flavor chaser is doing is finding the “most suitable headphones.”
Players of this group will also use many special terms in the vape subculture, such as throat hit, steeping, sweetness stacking, etc. They are more concerned about the flavor carrying capacity brought by PG and will control the airflow to prevent the fog from being too scattered so that the flavor is more concentrated. You can’t see the exaggerated big cloud, but if you ask them what the difference is between 30W and 40W of the same e-liquid, they can talk about it for a long time.
One of the most common questions asked by newbies in discussions on Planet of the Vapes is “Does higher wattage produce larger clouds?” The answers given by old players are very consistent: Power is just a tool It’s the coil and airflow that really determine the experience . You can still produce good clouds by putting a 1.2 Ω Clapton at 30W, but if you switch to a thicker sub-ohm coil, you have to double the power to get a similar effect.
For brands, there is a key industry signal behind this: Users began to move from “heap parameters” to “talking about matching”” . In the future, brands that emphasize the “complete package” of equipment, atomizer cores and e-liquids will be more likely to win the long-term favor of both cloud chasing and flavor chasing players than brands that only shout power numbers.
In the past, cloud chasing and flavor chasing seemed like two parallel lines, but now more and more players are starting to take a hybrid route: using flavor to the device every day to keep the taste stable, and then switch to the extreme cloud chasing configuration when you need to shoot videos or participate in small events. This type of “hybrid players” have significantly higher requirements for equipment and hope that the same system can cover both gameplays.
For brands and content parties, this means that you no longer have to focus on one camp; your products and content can all revolve around one theme: How to experience the most gameplay with the least amount of equipment while being safe? . By grabbing this middle band, you can naturally connect the two groups of topics in the vape subculture.
Early KOLs like RiP Trippers built up the entire vape subculture with cloud chasing tutorials one after another. But now players’ focus has shifted from “single skill videos” to “systematic content.” Forum posts, tutorial collections and device reviews are becoming more and more like “knowledge portals” to help novices quickly determine whether they prefer cloud chasing or flavor chasing.
This is an important sign for anyone thinking about e-cigarette related content or branding: The market now needs a structured knowledge map rather than a fragmented collection of skills . If your content can clearly explain the difference between cloud chasing and flavor chasing and give practical configuration suggestions, you can gain a natural authoritative position in this segmented vape subculture.
If you like to shoot videos, participate in offline activities or simply enjoy the pleasure of “one puff and fog the whole place”, then it is obviously more suitable for the cloud chasing route. What you need to pay attention to is the low resistance coil, battery discharge capacity and high VG and high flow rate configuration under the premise of safety. If you care more about the daily taste, such as which e-liquid goes best with coffee, then you are more suitable to take the flavor chasing route. When selecting equipment, you can give priority to flavor RTA or MTL equipment.
But you don’t have to lock yourself into a certain school. You can start with flavor chasing first, and then gradually try cloud chasing after stably mastering power, resistance and suction resistance. All these decisions only need to be made around one problem: In this vape subculture, do you want to be seen or do you want to feel comfortable? . If you think about this clearly, your device routing and content routing will become very clear.
Whether you are a cloud or flavor fan, as long as you make a clear positioning around cloud chasing, flavor chasing and the entire vape subculture, you can tell your own story at the content and brand levels.
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