Styles Of Vaping, Are There Different Ways To Use An Electronic Cigarette?

What is Mouth To Lung Vaping?

Mouth to lung, otherwise known as MTL vaping, is a way of using an e-cig that is most similar to the act of smoking.

MTL vaping involves taking small amounts of vapour into the mouth then drawing that into the lungs before exhaling. The process means that smaller, discrete clouds of vapour are formed when you breathe out.

Most often, a person places a higher strength e-liquid into their tank to compensate for the smaller amount of vape inhaled. MTL vapers also tend to take fewer draws on their device as opposed to other styles of vaping as the higher strength e-liquid means the body registers a higher level of nicotine in the blood system.

E-cigarette devices built for MTL vaping tend to have smaller and fewer airholes than other options. This makes the draw tighter and more familiar to current and ex-tobacco users.

The high nicotine level in the e-liquid combined with the familiarity of the inhale/exhale makes this a common method that smokers use to quit smoking.

The MTL vaping style isn’t exclusive to people currently quitting tobacco use, many medium- to long-term vapers continue to mouth-to-lung as they find they prefer to vape that way.

Mouth to lung vaping is also the easiest method to use if you want to vape discretely. An MTL vaper will take a short inhale and hole it for a short while. When they exhale no vapour appears. This is commonly referred to as “stealth vaping”.

What is Direct To Lung Vaping?

Direct to lung, or DTL vaping, lies at the opposite end of the spectrum to MTL vaping and is something you may have noticed people doing in public due to the volume of cloud it produces.

DTL vaping involves taking long, deep inhales from the atomiser’s drip tip. When the user exhales large clouds are formed.

Due to the nature of DTL vaping, the user will be inhaling much more e-liquid. This means a DTL vaper will tend to use a much lower strength e-liquid – typically 3mg/ml or 6mg/ml of nicotine.

DTL vaping also involves more frequent draws on the device as the volume of nicotine they are taking in is much less than that experienced when MTL vaping. Ultimately, both styles of vaping will experience the user to similar overall nicotine levels.

Electronic cigarette atomisers built for direct-to-lung vaping will have more and larger airholes compared to MTL devices to enable the large inhale. They also tend to feature drip tips (the bit you put your mouth on) that have larger inner diameters than MTL drip tips.

People who choose to vape in a DTL style tend to do so because they enjoy the feeling of the inhale and find the clouds they produce rewarding. 

Some people start off with a DTL beginner kit when they try to quit smoking, but this isn’t a typical method.

Loose MTL/Restricted DTL

Some atomisers come with an adjustable airflow which means they can be used to fine tune the vaping experience.

What this means is that vapers can adjust the tightness of the draw so that a MTL vape can be looser or a DTL vape can be tighter. Sometimes the atomisers come set up for this already and are described as giving a loose MTL or restricted DTL experience.

Manabush provide a range of both MTL Eliquids and Liquids that Can be used for DTL or MTL Vaping.

Our Tobacco Eliquids are recommended for MTL tobacco lovers, and we do a range of Cola E-liquid that can be used for either MTL or DTL.

For Pure Sub Ohm DTL Enthusiasts we highly recommend the Likitless Range of E-liquids.