Fragrance load basics for candles

Fragrance load is the share of fragrance oil in your candle, measured against the wax by weight. If you melt 500 g of wax and add 40 g of fragrance oil, you are at an 8% load. Weigh it, always. Volume measures drift with temperature and density, and "a capful per jar" is how inconsistent candles are born.

Typical ranges by wax

• Soy container waxes: most sit happily between 6 and 8%. Many are rated up to 10%, but few actually smell stronger there.
• Paraffin container blends: commonly rated to 10%, some to 12%.
• Coconut and coconut soy blends: often take 10 to 12% and carry scent well.
• Beeswax: a different animal. It resists added fragrance, 3 to 6% is typical, and plenty of makers leave it unscented on purpose.

The number that wins is the maximum load on your wax maker's spec sheet. It describes how much oil that wax can actually bind, and it varies more between waxes than between fragrance oils.

Why more is not better

Wax holds fragrance the way a sponge holds water: up to a point, then it gives it back. Push past what your wax can bind and the extra oil has nowhere to go. It sweats out as beads on the surface, pools at the bottom, greases the top of the candle, and can clog the wick as it burns. The flame gets bigger and sootier while the room, unfairly, smells weaker, because scent throw comes from an even burn, not from raw oil content.

A 7% candle with the right wick and a proper cure very often out-throws a 12% one. If your hot throw is weak, the levers are usually wick choice, cure time and jar diameter, not another spoon of oil.

Flash point, without the myth

Every fragrance oil has a flash point on its safety data sheet, often somewhere between 55 and 95°C. It is the temperature at which the oil's vapours could ignite if they met a spark. It is a safety and shipping number, and it matters when you store and post your oils.

What it is not: the temperature where fragrance "burns off" the moment your wax is warmer than it. Adding fragrance to very hot wax does cost you some of the light top notes through evaporation, which is a good reason to add at the temperature your wax maker recommends, typically somewhere between 60 and 85°C depending on the wax. But that is about evaporation, not about the flash point line.

Test burns, then notes

Every wax, fragrance and wick trio behaves differently, so the honest answer is always a test candle. Change one thing at a time, give soy a week or two of cure, and write down the combination: wax, load, wick, vessel, cure days, and what the burn did. The notes are the real recipe. The candle is just proof.