You have probably heard the claim that vaping is less harmful than smoking. In November 2025, Indonesia’s own national research agency BRIN published a study testing 60 e-liquid samples from the Indonesian market against three types of conventional cigarettes. The finding that got repeated everywhere was that vape toxicant levels were up to 6,500 times lower than cigarettes across the nine priority compounds identified by the World Health Organization.
That is a significant number. But what does it actually mean? Where does the difference come from, and does it hold for every e-liquid on the market?
This article answers those questions properly.
Why Cigarettes Produce So Many Toxic Compounds
A cigarette contains around 600 ingredients. When those ingredients are burned, combustion produces over 7,000 distinct chemical compounds. Of those, at least 250 are known to be harmful to human health. At least 69 are confirmed carcinogens.
The key word is combustion. Burning tobacco at temperatures between 600 and 900 degrees Celsius does not simply release what is already in the leaf. It creates entirely new compounds through a process of thermal decomposition and chemical recombination. Many of the most dangerous substances in cigarette smoke do not exist in the unburned tobacco at all. They are created by the burning process itself.
The compounds produced include the following categories.
Carbon monoxide is a colorless, odorless gas that binds to hemoglobin in the blood more effectively than oxygen, reducing the blood’s ability to carry oxygen to organs and tissues. Every cigarette produces it in significant quantities.
Tar is not a single compound. It is a sticky mixture of thousands of particles that condenses in the airways and lung tissue. Tar carries many of the carcinogens from smoke deep into the lung, where they deposit and remain. Between 58% and 76% of cigarette smoke by weight consists of these minor constituents trapped in tar.
Tobacco-specific nitrosamines, known as TSNAs, including NNK and NNN, are formed during the curing and burning of tobacco and are among the most potent carcinogens known. They are directly linked to lung cancer, oral cancer, and pancreatic cancer.
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs, including benzo[a]pyrene, are produced by the incomplete combustion of any organic material. In cigarette smoke they are present in significant concentrations and are strongly linked to cancer.
Volatile organic compounds including benzene, 1,3-butadiene, toluene, and styrene are released during combustion. Benzene is a confirmed human carcinogen linked to leukemia. 1,3-butadiene is classified as a probable human carcinogen.
Formaldehyde and acrolein are reactive aldehydes produced by combustion that cause direct damage to the cells lining the airways. Formaldehyde is a confirmed carcinogen. Acrolein is a potent airway irritant that damages the cilia responsible for clearing the lungs.
Heavy metals including cadmium, lead, arsenic, and even traces of radioactive polonium-210 enter cigarette smoke from the tobacco leaf itself, which absorbs these elements from the soil and fertilizers used in cultivation.
Hydrogen cyanide and ammonia are gases released during combustion that damage the mucociliary system and increase nicotine absorption.
None of these compounds are added intentionally to cigarettes. Most of them are created by the act of burning.
What Vaping Produces Instead
An e-cigarette does not burn anything. It heats a liquid to between 150 and 250 degrees Celsius, which is enough to create an aerosol but not enough to trigger the combustion chemistry that produces the compounds listed above.
The base of a quality e-liquid is propylene glycol and vegetable glycerin, two pharmaceutical-grade carrier compounds. Research published in peer-reviewed journals has found that between 89% and 99% of the e-cigarette aerosol by weight is composed of glycerol, propylene glycol, water, and nicotine. The remaining fraction, around 1% to 11%, consists of flavor compounds and trace degradation products.
A 2021 peer-reviewed study comparing the chemical complexity of e-cigarette aerosol with cigarette smoke found that e-cigarette aerosol contained between 94 and 139 compounds in flavored versions and 72 to 79 in unflavored versions. Cigarette smoke, by comparison, contains compounds that are one to two orders of magnitude more numerous. Levels of the nine WHO priority toxicants in e-cigarette aerosols were more than 99% lower than in cigarette smoke under standard testing conditions.
The BRIN study’s finding of up to 6,500 times lower toxicant levels is consistent with the international research base. Carbon monoxide, benzene, and 1,3-butadiene, three of the most dangerous combustion byproducts in cigarette smoke, were not detected in the e-cigarette vapor samples tested. These compounds are produced by burning. Without burning, they are not produced.
A 2025 review of empirical data published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found that concentrations of harmful and potentially harmful constituents in e-cigarette aerosol were reduced by 91% to 98% compared to conventional cigarettes.
Why the Comparison Is Not Just About Nicotine
A common misunderstanding is that the health debate between cigarettes and vaping is primarily about nicotine. It is not.
Nicotine is present in both products at broadly similar levels and is the compound responsible for addiction in both cases. Nicotine itself, at the concentrations found in consumer products, is not the primary driver of the diseases caused by smoking. The primary drivers are the combustion byproducts listed above. Lung cancer, COPD, cardiovascular disease, and the other major tobacco-related diseases are caused overwhelmingly by the toxic chemistry of smoke, not by nicotine itself.
This is why the WHO’s nine priority toxicants for reduction in tobacco products are not nicotine. They are acrolein, 4-aminobiphenyl, benzene, benzo[a]pyrene, 1,3-butadiene, carbon monoxide, formaldehyde, NNK, and NNN. These are the combustion-derived compounds that the BRIN study specifically tested for. These are the compounds that were found at up to 6,500 times lower levels in e-cigarette aerosol.
When someone switches from cigarettes to vaping they do not eliminate nicotine intake. What they eliminate, or very substantially reduce, is their exposure to the toxic chemistry produced by burning tobacco.
Where the Numbers Come From and What Affects Them
The reduction in toxicant exposure is real and well-documented across multiple independent research institutions. But it is not automatic or guaranteed. Several factors determine whether a specific e-liquid product delivers the profile that the research describes.
The first factor is the base materials. Pharmaceutical-grade propylene glycol and vegetable glycerin heat cleanly within the temperature range of standard vaping devices. Impure base materials or the use of non-standard carrier substances can introduce contamination or produce additional degradation compounds during heating.
The second factor is the device temperature. At normal operating temperatures, PG and VG do not decompose into significant quantities of harmful compounds. At very high temperatures, such as those reached by high-powered sub-ohm devices at maximum settings, thermal degradation increases. Aldehydes including formaldehyde and acetaldehyde can form when PG and VG are heated at temperatures significantly above the standard range. Reputable device manufacturers and liquid producers account for this in their formulations.
The third factor is the flavor compounds. This is where the comparison between a compliant, tested e-liquid and an undocumented one diverges most significantly.
The aerosol from an unflavored e-liquid contains 72 to 79 compounds. A flavored e-liquid adds flavor molecules to that base, increasing the compound count to between 94 and 139 in the research cited above. Flavor compounds are the primary variable that distinguishes one e-liquid’s aerosol profile from another.
Some flavor compounds are entirely stable at vaping temperatures and produce no concerning aerosol constituents. Others decompose under heat and produce compounds that do not exist in the original liquid. Some flavor compounds that are safe to ingest behave differently when inhaled repeatedly over time. And some flavor concentrates used in the market contain compounds that are classified as carcinogenic, mutagenic, or reprotoxic under the same EU REACH framework that the international research community uses as its chemical safety reference.
When a study finds that e-cigarette aerosol is 6,500 times lower in toxicants than cigarettes, that finding applies to the tested samples. It does not automatically apply to every e-liquid on the market, particularly those formulated without verified, documented ingredients.
What the BRIN Study Actually Recommended
It is worth reading what the BRIN researchers themselves said alongside their headline finding. Prof. Bambang Prasetya and lead researcher Biatna Dulbert Tampubolon stated explicitly that while vaping potentially poses a lower risk than smoking, the industry still requires robust quality control, accurate product labeling, and standardized testing protocols aligned with international standards.
The study’s main recommendation was twofold: build the scientific foundation for evidence-based tobacco policy, and ensure that the quality control and testing infrastructure exists to maintain the safety profile that the research documented.
The 6,500 times figure is a measurement of what tested Indonesian e-liquids produced. It is not a guarantee of what every Indonesian e-liquid produces. The difference between the two is formulation quality and verification.
What This Means for Producers
The science is on the side of properly formulated, tested e-liquid as a substantially lower-risk alternative to combustible cigarettes. That is a significant position to hold in a country with 75 million smokers and a healthcare system paying the price of the damage conventional cigarettes have done for decades.
But the credibility of that position depends entirely on the quality of the product behind it. An e-liquid that contains CMR-classified flavor compounds, undocumented ingredients, or unstable flavor systems that decompose under heat does not carry the same profile as the products tested in peer-reviewed research. It does not earn the comparison to cigarettes that the science supports.
Producers who can demonstrate through GC-MS testing and complete ingredient documentation that their formulas are clean and compliant are the ones who can make this argument with confidence. Those who cannot are making a claim they cannot back up.
The gap between 7,000 toxic compounds from combustion and the clean aerosol profile of a well-made e-liquid is real. It was documented by Indonesian researchers using Indonesian products. Keeping that gap as wide as possible is the responsibility of every producer in this market, and it starts with knowing exactly what is in the formula.
We are based in Bandung and work with a certified R&D laboratory in France. If you want to know whether your current formulas support the comparison the science makes possible, we can help you find out.
