UK vape tax starts 1 October: £2.20 duty per 10ml of e-liquid — what happens to prices

The charge is called Vaping Products Duty and is set at a flat £2.20 per 10ml of liquid — 22p per millilitre. The rate does not depend on strength: nicotine and nicotine-free liquids are both taxed, including shortfills and zero-nicotine bottles. Only registered medicinal products are exempt.

How much more will vape liquids cost?

If a shop passes the tax on in full, a 10ml bottle that cost £3.99 yesterday will cost about £6.60: £2.20 of duty plus 20% VAT on top adds £2.64. Bigger bottles are hit hardest: a 50ml shortfill goes up by £13.20 including VAT, a 100ml bottle by £26.40. A 2ml pod or cartridge adds around 53p. Light vapers will barely notice; DIY mixers buying large bottles will feel it most — base liquids are taxed too.

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Do cigarettes go up at the same time?

To stop the new tax making smoking relatively cheaper than vaping, the government is also applying a one-off tobacco duty rise from 1 October: an extra £2.20 per 100 cigarettes — 44p on a pack of 20, about 53p with VAT — and £2.20 per 50g of other tobacco, including rolling tobacco. This comes on top of the routine annual uprating applied in November 2025. The stated aim is to preserve the price gap that keeps switching from cigarettes to vaping financially worthwhile.

Why are there duty stamps and why do prices differ?

The duty arrives together with vaping duty stamps, similar to those on alcohol. From 1 October manufacturers and importers may only release stamped products, but retailers are allowed to sell through old unstamped stock until 31 March 2027. So for the coming months the same liquid may cost a couple of pounds more or less depending on whether a shop still has old stock. From 1 April 2027 selling unstamped bottles becomes illegal — after that date a suspiciously cheap bottle with no stamp is almost certainly illicit, with no guarantee of what is actually in it.

What does it mean for a buyer in practice?

Stocking up at old prices is only possible until the end of today; after that it is a matter of catching leftover old stock. HMRC expects the duty to raise more than £550 million a year by 2030-31, so the tax is here to stay and is unlikely to be touched in the Autumn Budget on 28 October. Even with the duty, vaping remains considerably cheaper than smoking — the government is deliberately keeping that gap. We have collected the full list of October changes — from the energy price cap to new workers' rights — in a separate guide.