# Flavour concentrate percentage: getting it right > Working out a flavour concentrate percentage: the formula, drops against millilitres, mixing by weight and the ranges to expect by family. The same bottle can give you a flat mix or a sickly one, and a single parameter decides which. Two drops over and the fruit turns bitter, two drops under and the taste vanishes behind the base. Plenty of newcomers give up on mixing at exactly that step, convinced they picked a bad bottle. The problem almost always lies elsewhere, in the **flavour concentrate percentage** they never actually calculated. Here is how to take control of it. ## How to work out a flavour concentrate percentage A **flavour concentrate percentage** is a share of the total volume of the preparation, not a number of drops thrown in by eye. The usual span runs from 5 to 20 per cent, and UK guidance tends to sit high inside it: Vampire Vape recommends 15 to 20 per cent for its own range, while a widely used rule of thumb treats 5 per cent as light, 10 per cent as medium and 15 per cent as strong. In practice, 10 per cent means the flavour occupies one tenth of the finished volume. For a 30 ml batch that is 3 ml of concentrate, with the rest shared between base and any nicotine shot. Reasoning in percentages rather than drops is what makes a recipe repeatable from one bottle to the next. It also lets you scale a 10 ml test up to 100 ml without redoing any of the thinking. ## The volume calculation, without a calculator Online calculators are useful, but understanding the sum stops you depending on one and copying an error without seeing it. The formula fits on a single line. Flavour volume equals total volume multiplied by the target share. For a 50 ml bottle at 12 per cent, multiply 50 by 0.12, which gives 6 ml of concentrate. You then top up with base, and with a nicotine shot if you use one, until you reach the 50 ml mark. The order of pouring matters more than people expect. Put the concentrate and the nicotine shot in first, then bring the bottle up to volume with base, so you never overshoot the total you planned. If you are working from a nicotine-free short fill rather than mixing a base yourself, the same logic holds. The nicotine shot occupies part of the finished volume, so it has to be counted before you decide how much room is left for anything else. ## Drops or millilitres: converting without slipping Many bottles pour by the drop, while the sum is reasoned in millilitres. That gap is the most frequent source of error at the bench, and it catches careful people as often as careless ones. There is no universal conversion, because a drop depends on the dropper tip, the viscosity of the liquid and the angle of your hand. Around thirty drops to the millilitre is the order of magnitude often quoted, but it stays approximate and shifts from one bottle to another. For anything you intend to reproduce, a graduated syringe beats counting drops outright. Drops are fine for a first exploratory 10 ml, and stop being fine the moment you want the same result twice. Whichever method you use, write the figure down at the moment you pour it. A recipe notebook with the family, the share and the date turns a scattering of attempts into something you can actually learn from. ## Adapting the flavour concentrate percentage by family A number only means something against the aromatic family it applies to. Applying one share to everything produces uneven results, and that is what throws most beginners early on. Single fruit notes usually speak clearly in the lower half of the span, since their dominant molecule is already sharp at modest doses. Blended desserts and complex fruits ask for more so that each layer registers, which is why UK sellers of pre-blended one shots such as DarkStar quote 15 to 25 per cent for that format. Tobacco profiles sit in a similar bracket but depend far more on resting time than on the number itself. Menthol is the exception in the other direction: too high a share flattens everything around it, and a few per cent is often plenty. Brands complicate the picture further, and not in a way you can average out. Some houses formulate deliberately high, as our look at the [Le French Liquide concentrates](/uk/le-french-liquide-concentrates/) shows, where the stated shares run to 20 per cent on several references. One technical point gets forgotten constantly. Judging a **flavour concentrate percentage** before [steeping e-liquid](/uk/steeping-e-liquid/) has run its course leads people to push up recipes that only needed patience. ## Weighing instead of measuring: precision to the gram Regular mixers often end up abandoning the syringe for a set of scales. The method gets less coverage in beginner guides, yet it brings a real gain in precision on any **flavour concentrate percentage** you want to reproduce exactly. The principle is to stand the bottle on a precision balance and pour each ingredient by weight rather than by volume. Because base, concentrate and nicotine shot do not share the same density, you use their conversion values to turn a share into grams. The advantage is double. You avoid the losses of transferring through a syringe, and you get a consistency that drop counting simply cannot reach. It asks for scales reading to a hundredth of a gram and a little method at the start, but it transforms how repeatable your recipes become. For anyone who wants the same profile twice running, weighing remains the most dependable tool on the bench. Whatever the method, keep the handling sensible. Wear gloves when you decant concentrates or nicotine, keep every bottle out of reach of children and pets, and store the finished mixes away from light with the caps closed. ## Common questions about mixing percentages ### What if my e-liquid is over-flavoured? Add base to dilute the whole batch, which lowers the share. You then have to recalculate the new total volume and let it rest again before judging the result. ### Does the share change with nicotine? No, the flavour share is calculated independently of nicotine. The shot takes up its own volume without altering the proportion of flavour you were aiming for. ### Can several concentrates go into one recipe? Yes, but the shares add up. Two flavours at 8 per cent each make 16 per cent of the total volume, which is worth watching so the base does not end up saturated. ### Why does a mix seem right, then too strong the next day? Perception moves during steeping. A flavour that seems restrained at the bench can climb after a few days of rest, which is why waiting before correcting pays off. ### Should you go higher on a very VG base? A base rich in vegetable glycerine rounds flavours off and can read as under-dosed. Mixers often add a point or two, without going further than that. ## Mixing to a repeatable standard A **flavour concentrate percentage** is neither intuition nor luck: it is a short sum, a share matched to the family, and enough patience to let the bottle settle before you judge it. A graduated syringe, a notebook and respect for the maker's stated range turn scattered attempts into a method. That discipline of proportion is what separates a wasted batch from a mix you would happily make again, and it applies just as much to a first bottle as it does to a shelf of them. The wider context sits in our guide to the [flavour concentrate](/uk/flavour-concentrate-guide/) itself, and the troubleshooting side in our piece on a [DIY e-liquid with no flavour](/uk/diy-e-liquid-no-flavour/). Editorial content for adult readers only. Vaping products usually contain nicotine, a substance that causes addiction. Not for sale to under-18s in the United Kingdom. This article is not a buying recommendation.