A new type of tobacco product is finding growing numbers of users around the world, but there are still serious questions about how it affects human health.
Having smoked for nearly 30 years since the age of 13, IT consultant and freelance writer Ben Taylor was intrigued by the sound of heated tobacco products, reports the BBC.
Attempting to switch from cigarettes to vapes hadn't worked for Taylor. "Vaping liquids always left me wanting," he posted on his blog. So he decided to try IQOS, a sleek, pen-shaped electronic device that heats sticks of rolled tobacco, developed by the American multinational tobacco company Philip Morris International (PMI).
Rather than burning tobacco, these devices heat it to a temperature high enough to create a vapour but not smoke.
For Taylor, it didn't quite replicate the experience of smoking a cigarette, but it came much closer than vaping – the other popular cigarette alternative, which uses handheld pens to heat a flavoured nicotine-containing liquid. "You can tell you're consuming real tobacco," Taylor wrote. Over time, he says, he came to prefer IQOS due to the taste, and the lack of a lingering cigarette stench. He also says his previously near-permanent cough disappeared.
Tobacco manufacturers that sell heated tobacco devices market them as being a less harmful alternative to cigarettes. They point to industry-funded research that shows they produce lower levels of compounds known to be harmful to human health.
But there is growing concern in the medical community that these devices still pose a health risk to both the people who use them and those standing nearby. They also warn that as relatively new products, the long-term effects of using heated tobacco have still to be properly investigated.
Yet they are also becoming increasingly common, with next-generation heated tobacco products now available in more than 60 countries. They have experienced particularly notable growth in both Italy and Japan, where they have been present since 2014. And this growth is expected to continue as they start to penetrate the market in the US.
So, is heated tobacco really helping people enjoy nicotine in a less harmful way, or could it be a new public health crisis in the making?
IQOS and other devices like it are the latest iteration of a concept which the tobacco industry has been intermittently toying with for the past four decades. In 1988, an American tobacco company called RJ Reynolds attempted to commercialise the very first heated tobacco product, a device called Premier.
Designed to look similar to a conventional cigarette in shape and size, the Premier had a specifically designed carbon tip that users would light to heat the tobacco. But despite a reported $300m (roughly £180m at the time) in investment, Premier was removed from the market after just six months as users complained about its taste and smell.
After various reinventions, heated tobacco products have started to enjoy commercial success in the past decade with a new range of electronic devices that use several methods to vaporise their contents. Typically these involve encasing tobacco in either sticks, plugs, capsules or pods, which are then heated with an electronic element. As well as PMI's IQOS, leading brands include Ploom, made by Japan Tobacco International (JTI), and glo, made by British American Tobacco (BAT).
Employing sleek, appealing designs and backed by multi-million dollar marketing strategies – which have included everything from social media influencers to pop-up stores – these devices have been far more successful than the original incarnations.
Celebrities have backed heated tobacco products, with the musician Jamiroquai and actors Alberto Amman and Monica Cruz attending the IQOS 3 launch party in Madrid in 2019. Jamiroquai also performed at a 2018 launch event for IQOS 3 in Milan, while American dance music DJ Steve Aoki, whose name is attached to a limited edition version of an IQOS device, performed a concert at another event for the products in Barcelona in January 2025.
BAT have also employed similar marketing tactics, paying social media influencers, sponsoring boat parties and organising giveaways at Formula 1 races.
So far, heated tobacco products have had limited penetration in the US. While one survey of 40,000 US adults found that 8% were aware of them, only 0.5% had ever used one of the devices. But that could change. After first receiving a limited authorisation from the US Food and Drug Administration in 2019, IQOS is now re-entering the US market in Austin, Texas.
The tobacco industry promotes this new generation of heated tobacco products as a safer, smoke-free alternative, stressing that they only heat, not burn tobacco.
PMI's website, for example, states that they aim to remove "combustion of tobacco, the cause of most tobacco-related diseases", celebrating IQOS as "the next step in tobacco harm reduction". The company estimates that more than 22 million adults globally have quit smoking cigarettes and switched to its heated tobacco products.
PMI has said in the past that it intends to stop selling cigarettes and become a smoke-free company. It is investing heavily in products such as heated tobacco and hopes for at least two-thirds of its revenues to come from smoke-free products by 2030.
But independent researchers and public health experts argue that heated tobacco products are still harmful to human health and urge users to give up tobacco altogether.
They express concerns at some of the marketing strategies, saying that the use of influencers and glamorous launch parties could encourage heated tobacco use among young people, who are more likely not to have smoked before, which could make these products a gateway to cigarettes.
PMI, JTI and BAT all insist their products are aimed at adults only. PMI says it has a robust code of conduct that does not allow marketing that appeals to minors such as cartoons, youth-orientated celebrities or models who are or appear to be under the age of 25.
