I'm Making My First Fragrance Test Candles — Should Every Test Use the Exact Same Jar and Wick So I Can Compare Fragrance Performance Fairly?
Aktie
Amber Shiny Glass Jar ₹47.20 each · stated 6 cm diameter Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 ₹650 / kg Stocked in India · ships nationwide
CSI beginner guides · fair fragrance comparison
A fragrance comparison is only a fragrance comparison if the jar, the wick and the wax weight never move. One of them moves and you are testing the jar.
★★★★★
"all the materials are high quality and ultimate fragrance range"
Arminder KaurVerified buyer · Mar 2026
Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468
★★★★☆
"Hey, the fragrance is so nice. Can’t wait to use in my candles!! A must buy item!!"
S.A.Jun 2024
Jasmine Fragrance Oil
★★★★★
"Nice glass jars, they look cute. I like the packaging as well."
AshwiniSep 2025
Matte glass candle jars
★★★★★
"Very good"
Tina Lynette Lazaro MogantiVerified buyer · Dec 2025
Matte glass candle jars
★★★★★
"This bamboo wick holder doesn’t exert any pressure on the wicks… and it is a very useful product 👌🏻👌🏻.."
Lalitha JaganAug 2024
Bamboo Wick Holder
★★★★★
"all the materials are high quality and ultimate fragrance range"
Arminder KaurVerified buyer · Mar 2026
Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468
★★★★☆
"Hey, the fragrance is so nice. Can’t wait to use in my candles!! A must buy item!!"
S.A.Jun 2024
Jasmine Fragrance Oil
★★★★★
"Nice glass jars, they look cute. I like the packaging as well."
AshwiniSep 2025
Matte glass candle jars
★★★★★
"Very good"
Tina Lynette Lazaro MogantiVerified buyer · Dec 2025
Matte glass candle jars
★★★★★
"This bamboo wick holder doesn’t exert any pressure on the wicks… and it is a very useful product 👌🏻👌🏻.."
Lalitha JaganAug 2024
Bamboo Wick Holder
Reviews collected and published through Judge.me on candlemakingsuppliesindia.store. Wording is unedited.
✓ Stated jar capacities and diameters quoted from product pages ✓ Matching jars sold in packs of 5 ✓ Bulk pricing & GST invoicing on WhatsApp
Candle Business Guides · Fair Fragrance Comparison
Yes, and more than that: eight things have to be identical, not two. Fix them all around one jar — the 120 gm Amber jar states a 6 cm diameter — and a four-scent comparison becomes readable. Then, once a scent wins, the identical wick has to go, because that is a scaffold and not a result.
6 cm
one stated jar diameter, frozen across all twelve test candles · 8 controls, 1 variable · 12 jars for ₹3,012.30 of materials · CSI live pricing, September 2026
Quick answers — read this first
Same jar and same wick — yes or no? Yes, and the same SKU, not merely the same size. Wall thickness and internal diameter decide how the melt pool forms, so "another 120 g jar" is not the same jar. The Amber jar's page states 120 gm capacity and 6 cm diameter, which is exactly why it is easy to hold constant.What else has to be identical? Wax, load, fill weight, add temperature and stir time, pour temperature, cure length, and the burn protocol — trim, duration and room. That is eight controls. The oil is the ninth thing, and the only one allowed to move.
Does that mean the winning wick is the right wick? No. Fragrance oils change how a wick burns, so the shared wick is a fair yardstick, not a finished formula. Once a scent wins, re-bracket the wick at that scent's load before you sell it.
What does a fair four-scent test cost? ₹3,012.30 for twelve jars: 1.5 kg of Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 ₹975, fifteen Amber jars ₹708, four 50 gm oils ₹1,111.30, twenty Eco Candle Wicks ₹118, stickers ₹100.
The short answer
Buy one jar in a pack, not four pretty jars: a pack of five identical jars is what makes a comparison possible at all. Mixed jars turn a fragrance test into a container test you did not intend to run.
Three jars per scent, not one: one for a day-7 burn, one for a day-14 burn, one spare. A single candle per scent cannot be repeated, so it cannot be believed.
Write the eight controls down before you melt: a control you did not record is a control you did not have. The log is the experiment; the candles are just evidence.
In this guide
Each row is one oil and each block is one jar; the outlined block is the spare. Everything in the strip below the line is held identical across all twelve candles — that strip, not the candles, is what makes the comparison mean anything.
Stated 120 gm · 6 cm diameter
Amber Shiny Glass Jar · 5 for ₹236
Stated up to 13% · pour 58–60°C
Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 · 1 kg ₹650
Which jar to standardise on?
Ask on WhatsApp
Straight answer
Does every fragrance test candle have to use the same jar and the same wick?
Yes — and it has to be the same product, not just the same nominal size, because internal diameter and wall thickness decide how the melt pool forms and the pool is what carries scent into a room. Standardise on one vessel with a published diameter: the Amber Shiny Glass Jar with Black Lid states 120 gm capacity, 6 cm diameter and 6.5 cm height, and comes in packs of five at ₹236, so twelve matching jars are easy to obtain. Then freeze seven more things alongside the jar and wick: the wax, the load, the fill weight, the add temperature and stir time, the pour temperature, the cure length, and the burn protocol. With Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 at an 8% load that means 110.4 g of wax and 9.6 g of oil in every jar — 1,324.8 g of wax and 115.2 g of oil across twelve. Four oils at three jars each gives you a day-7 burn, a day-14 burn and a spare per scent, for ₹3,012.30 of materials, or about ₹169.02 per jar. The important qualification is at the end rather than the beginning: the shared wick makes the comparison fair, but it is a yardstick, not a formula. Oils genuinely alter how a wick burns, so the scent that wins still has to be re-wicked at its own load before it becomes a product. Holding the wick constant is how you learn which oil to develop; it is not how you finish the candle.
One line: freeze eight things and change only the oil — then, once one oil wins, unfreeze the wick and test it properly for that oil alone.
The identical-jar starter: Amber Shiny Glass Jar with Black Lid, 5 for ₹236 (stated 120 gm, 6 cm diameter), Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 1 kg ₹650 and Eco Candle Wicks Thin (C1), 20 for ₹118. Three packs of jars gives you fifteen identical vessels.
Shop containers
Why the jar and the wick, specifically
Fragrance leaves a candle from the surface of melted wax. Change the jar and you have changed the surface.
The reason these two controls matter more than the others is mechanical. A burning candle evaporates fragrance from the top of its melt pool, so the area of that pool is part of the result, and the pool's diameter is set by the jar. The wick then decides how much heat is delivered into the wax, which decides whether the pool reaches the wall at all and how deep it gets. Between them, the jar and the wick determine the evaporating surface — and no fragrance oil can out-perform a surface that is too small.
Put a number on it. The Amber jar states a 6 cm diameter. The Clear Glass Jar with Golden Lid states a 7 cm outer diameter with a base diameter of approximately 6.5 cm. Substitute one for the other mid-test and the pool's surface area changes by roughly 17%, because area rises with the square of the radius: (6.5 ÷ 6)² = 1.17. A 17% change in evaporating surface is not a rounding error. It is easily the size of difference you were hoping to detect between two oils — so a jar substitution can invent a winner, or hide one.
The mistake: "they're both 120 g jars, so it's fine." Capacity in grams tells you how much wax fits, not how wide the surface is. A tall narrow 120 g jar and a short wide 120 g jar hold the same wax and burn completely differently, and they need different wicks. Worse, many CSI jars state their capacity in millilitres rather than grams — several matte and frosted jars state a "fill weight of 200 ml" — so two vessels can look comparable on a listing and not be. The fix is unglamorous: standardise on one product handle, buy enough of it in one order, and weigh one filled jar yourself to confirm the real fill. When you do need to change jars, treat it as a new test rather than a continuation, exactly as set out in choosing a wick by diameter.
The wick argument runs the same way but is easier to get wrong, because wick sizes sound like small differences. CSI's Eco Candle Wicks are listed as Thin (C1) and Thick (C2), and the page states no diameter guidance for either — so if half your test candles have C1 and half have C2, you have not run a fragrance comparison at all. You have run a wick comparison with four different oils in it, which is unreadable in both directions. Whether a small wick is suppressing your throw is a separate, well-defined question: see wrong wick size is killing your hot throw.
The eight controls, and what each one does if it slips
Here is the full control list for a fragrance comparison, with the consequence of letting each one move. Read the right-hand column as a list of wrong conclusions you can reach by accident.
Controls for a fair fragrance comparison
What to freeze, the value used in this test, and how the result lies if it slips
| # | Control | Value in this test | If it moves, the result looks like… |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jar — same product handle | Amber Shiny Glass Jar, stated 120 gm, 6 cm diameter | A scent difference. A 0.5 cm wider base is ~17% more melt-pool surface. |
| 2 | Wick — same size and type | Eco Candle Wicks Thin (C1), one per jar | A throw difference. A bigger wick delivers more heat and a bigger pool. |
| 3 | Wax — same wax, ideally same pack | Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 | Anything at all. Waxes differ in set, adhesion and how they hold oil. |
| 4 | Load — same percentage, same convention | 8% of finished candle weight | A strong oil and a weak one, when you actually poured 8% and 9%. |
| 5 | Fill weight — same grams per jar | 110.4 g wax + 9.6 g oil = 120 g | A cure difference. More wax means a deeper candle and a slower pool. |
| 6 | Add temperature and stir time | Page-stated temperature, stirred two minutes, counted | Weak throw. Under-stirred oil is the most common false negative in candle testing. |
| 7 | Pour temperature and pour day | One session, one thermometer reading, one room temperature | Rough tops and wet spots read as an oil fault, when it was cooling speed. |
| 8 | Cure length and burn protocol | Day 7 and day 14; trim to ~5 mm; 3-hour burn; same closed room | A ranking that reflects how long each candle sat, not what is in it. |
| — | The one variable | The fragrance oil | This is the only difference you are entitled to interpret. |
Control number 6 is the one that quietly ruins first tests
Under-stirring produces exactly the symptom people blame on the oil: a candle that smells fine cold and disappointing hot. The Eco Soy CSI 400 page is unusually specific about it — add fragrance at 80–90°C and stir for two minutes — and that two-minute count is worth borrowing for any soy. Count it on a clock, in all twelve jars, with the same implement. A bamboo stirring stick at ₹23.60 each in the pack of five is cheap enough that every batch can get a clean one.One more note on control 3, because the choice of wax interacts with the oils in this test. Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 states a melting point of 50–53°C and a pour temperature of 58–60°C, markedly lower than the 80–90°C stated for most CSI soy waxes. That low working temperature is useful when a comparison set includes oils whose pages publish a lower flash point — the Palo Santo page states a flash point of 93°C, comfortably above a 60°C pour but much closer to an 85°C one. Where an oil's page states no flash point at all, do not assume a figure from a similar scent; ask for the SDS.
What is allowed to differ
Rigour is not the same as superstition, and a test you cannot actually execute is worse than a slightly imperfect one. The table separates what genuinely must match from what beginners worry about needlessly.
Must match · may differ · must not be compared at all
Where to be strict, where to relax, and where to stop
| Item | Verdict | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Jar colour and finish within the same model | May differ, but prefer not to | Opacity does not change diameter, but it does change what you can see — a clear jar shows the pool touching the wall and shows wet spots. |
| Lid on or off during cure | Must match | Whatever you choose, choose it for all twelve. Cure conditions are control 8. |
| Which shelf the jars cure on | May differ within one room | Keep them out of direct light and away from a heat source; small position differences in one room are acceptable drift. |
| Who does the smelling | May differ — and ideally does | A second nose that does not know which jar is which is the cheapest improvement available to a home test. |
| Dye or colour in the wax | Must match, or omit entirely | For a first fragrance comparison, pour all twelve undyed. One less thing in the wax is one less explanation to rule out. |
| Different jar sizes across scents | Do not compare | Different diameter, different wick requirement, different pool. This is a new test, not a continuation. |
| Oils bought in different bottle sizes | May differ | A 15 gm bottle and a 50 gm bottle of the same oil are the same oil. Only the grams in the jar matter. |
Don't run a blind test you cannot label afterwards. There is a real tension here: knowing which jar is which biases your nose, but unlabelled jars are useless data. The workable version is to mark the base of each jar with a code and have someone else present them to you in a random order, so the burn is blind and the record is not. Do write everything down before the first burn — jar code, scent, grams, temperatures, pour date — because by day 14 you will not remember which was which, and a comparison you cannot reconstruct has to be poured again. The full score-sheet approach is in how to compare two fragrance oils using a controlled burn test.
The twelve-jar layout in grams
Four oils, three jars each. Every jar is the same 120 g fill at the same 8% load, so the only line that changes between rows is which bottle the 9.6 g came from — and what those 28.8 g cost.
Four-scent comparison · 120 gm Amber jars at 8% · CSI live pricing, September 2026
Grams per scent, stated page facts, and the oil cost of each row
| Oil | Jars | Oil used | 50 gm price | Per gram | Oil cost for 3 jars | What the page states |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jasmine Fragrance Oil | 3 | 28.8 g | ₹230 | ₹4.60 | ₹132.48 | Up to 10% for soy, cure 48–72 h; flash point 185°C |
| Mango Coconut Fragrance Oil | 3 | 28.8 g | ₹250 | ₹5 | ₹144 | No fragrance load stated — hold it at 8% |
| Palo Santo Fragrance Oil | 3 | 28.8 g | ₹300.90 | ₹6.02 | ₹173.32 | Up to 10% for soy, up to 6% paraffin; flash point 93°C; eco or wooden wicks suggested |
| Verbena Fragrance Oil | 3 | 28.8 g | ₹330.40 | ₹6.61 | ₹190.31 | Up to 10% for soy, up to 6% paraffin; flash point 200°C |
| Total | 12 | 115.2 g | ₹1,111.30 | — | ₹640.11 consumed | Four oils, one jar, one wick |
Worked out above: each jar is 120 g × 0.92 = 110.4 g of wax and 120 g × 0.08 = 9.6 g of oil; three jars per scent = 28.8 g of oil. Per gram = 50 gm price ÷ 50. Oil cost per row = per gram × 28.8. Twelve jars need 12 × 110.4 = 1,324.8 g of wax, which is a 1 kg pack plus a 500 g pack of CSI 468 (₹650 + ₹325 = ₹975, or ₹0.65 per gram) with 175.2 g spare. Wax consumed = 1,324.8 × ₹0.65 = ₹861.12. A single Jasmine jar therefore costs ₹71.76 of wax + ₹44.16 of oil + ₹5.90 for a C1 wick + ₹47.20 for the jar = ₹169.02.
Two honest observations from that table. First, the oils are not equally priced, and it would be easy to let cost decide the test — but at three jars each the whole spread between the cheapest and dearest row is ₹57.83. That is not enough to leave a candidate out. Second, one of the four pages states no fragrance load at all. That is information, not an oversight to be papered over: an oil with no published ceiling stays at 8% until you have burned a cured jar, and it never leads a pushed-load experiment.
What to buy to keep it identical
Three products carry the controls. Notice that all three are chosen for being repeatable rather than for being interesting — that is the whole design brief for test materials.
1
Control 1 · the jar with a published diameter
Amber Shiny Glass Jar with Black Lid
The reason to standardise on this jar is that its page publishes the number a wick decision needs: capacity 120 gm, 6 cm diameter, 6.5 cm height. Very few jars in any catalogue state a diameter, and a stated diameter is what lets you keep a test honest across several orders. It is sold as a single at ₹47.20 and in a pack of five at ₹236 — the same ₹47.20 per jar either way, so buy three packs for fifteen: twelve poured, three held back for a re-pour. One caution from the page itself: the body text describes a black jar with a golden lid, which is copy from a sibling product. Judge the jar from the title, the images and the stated dimensions.
| Size | Price | Per piece | Jars per pack |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pack of 1 | ₹47.20 | ₹47.20 | ≈1 |
| Pack of 5 | ₹236 | ₹47.20 | ≈5 |
₹47.20 per jar at either listed pack size Buy Amber glass jars
2
Control 3 · a wax with published working temperatures
Premium Coconut Soy Wax CSI 468 (Flakes Form)
Chosen here because its page states the numbers you have to hold constant: a fragrance load of up to 13%, a melting point of 50–53°C and a pour temperature of 58–60°C, for single-pour container applications. A low, tightly stated pour window is genuinely easier to reproduce twelve times than a wide one, and it gives extra headroom over the published flash points of the oils in this set. Twelve jars need 1,324.8 g, so buy the 1 kg pack at ₹650 plus the 500 g at ₹325. This is one of the few CSI waxes whose listed price per kilo steps down with size — ₹650 at 1 kg against ₹637 at 5 kg and 10 kg — but that ₹13 is a reason to buy 5 kg after a scent has won, not before.
| Size | Price | Per kg | 120g jars @ 8% |
|---|---|---|---|
| 500 g | ₹325 | ₹650 | ≈4 |
| 1 kg | ₹650 | ₹650 | ≈9 |
| 5 kg | ₹3,185 | ₹637 | ≈45 |
| 10 kg | ₹6,370 | ₹637 | ≈90 |
₹71.76 of wax per 120 g jar at 1 kg pricing Buy CSI 468
3
Control 2 · one wick size, twelve times
Eco Candle Wicks · Thin (C1), pack of 20
Twenty wicks for ₹118 — twelve for the test and eight spare, at ₹5.90 each, which is the same price per wick at every listed pack size from 10 to 1,000. The page states these wicks "pair perfectly with soy wax, beeswax, and other eco-friendly waxes" and gives no jar-diameter range, so C1 in a 6 cm jar is a starting assumption you should already have checked in a short wick round before this comparison begins. Buying the 20-pack rather than the 10-pack matters for a reason that is not about price: running out of the same wick halfway through a twelve-jar pour is one of the commonest ways a control gets broken.
| Size | Price | Per piece | Wicks per pack |
|---|---|---|---|
| Thin (C1) / 10 Wicks | ₹59 | ₹5.90 | ≈10 |
| Thick (C2) / 10 Wicks (sold out) | ₹94.40 | ₹9.44 | ≈10 |
| Thin (C1) / 20 Wicks | ₹118 | ₹5.90 | ≈20 |
| Thick (C2) / 20 Wicks | ₹188.80 | ₹9.44 | ≈20 |
| Thin (C1) / 50 Wicks | ₹295 | ₹5.90 | ≈50 |
| Thick (C2) / 50 Wicks | ₹472 | ₹9.44 | ≈50 |
| Thin (C1) / 100 Wicks | ₹590 | ₹5.90 | ≈100 |
| Thick (C2) / 100 Wicks | ₹944 | ₹9.44 | ≈100 |
| Thin (C1) / 500 Wicks | ₹2,950 | ₹5.90 | ≈500 |
| Thick (C2) / 500 Wicks | ₹4,720 | ₹9.44 | ≈500 |
| Thin (C1) / 1000 Wicks | ₹5,900 | ₹5.90 | ≈1,000 |
| Thick (C2) / 1000 Wicks | ₹9,440 | ₹9.44 | ≈1,000 |
₹5.90 per C1 wick · ₹70.80 for the twelve this test uses Buy Eco Candle Wicks
Two ₹100-class accessories that protect your controls
A sheet of 40 candle wick stickers at ₹100 keeps each wick where you put it, and a Bamboo Wick Holder, set of 5 for ₹118 keeps it upright while the wax sets — one reviewer notes it "doesn't exert any pressure on the wicks". Both exist to defend control 2. A wick that leans toward one wall produces an off-centre pool, and an off-centre pool in one jar out of twelve is a result you will misread as a fragrance effect. Keeping the wick straight has its own guide: how to keep the wick straight when making candles.The CSI principle
A comparison is defined by what you refuse to change.
Everyone remembers to change the thing they are testing. What separates a test from a batch of candles is the written list of things that were not allowed to move — and the discipline to throw out a jar that broke the list rather than quietly including it.
When the shared wick has to go
The identical wick made the comparison fair. It does not make the winner finished.
This is the part that most "use the same wick" advice leaves out, and skipping it is how a beginner ends up with a good scent in a badly wicked candle. Fragrance oil is not inert in a burn: it changes the fuel. Oils differ in how readily they travel up a wick and how they behave in the flame, which is why several CSI oil pages carry a line such as "wick testing is recommended based on container size" — the Palo Santo page suggests eco or wooden wicks for an even, clean burn and still tells you to test. So the sequence has two stages, and both are necessary.
Stage one versus stage two
What each stage holds fixed, what it changes, and what it entitles you to conclude
| Stage | Candles | Fixed | Changed | Conclusion you may draw |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 · Fragrance comparison | 12 (4 oils × 3) | Jar, wick, wax, load, fill, temperatures, cure, burn protocol | The oil only | Which oil to develop — a ranking, on one shared yardstick |
| 2 · Wick qualification for the winner | 3–4 (1 oil × wick candidates) | Jar, wax, load, fill, temperatures, cure, burn protocol, and the oil | The wick only | Which wick this specific oil needs at this load in this jar |
| 3 · Reproduce | 2–3 of the finished formula | Everything, including the wick | Nothing — a second pour date | Whether the formula is repeatable enough to sell |
Stage two is small: three or four more jars, 331.2 to 441.6 g of wax and 28.8 to 38.4 g of the winning oil — comfortably inside the 175.2 g of wax spare plus a second 500 g pack. What it buys is the difference between "Verbena scored best of four" and "this is a candle I can sell". If stage one's shared wick happens to be right for the winner, stage two confirms it in a week. If it is not, you find out now rather than from a customer.
Don't re-rank the scents after changing the wick. A tempting error: the winner gets a bigger wick, performs better still, and you conclude the ranking would have been different with bigger wicks throughout. Maybe — but you cannot know that from this data, and re-testing all four at the new wick is a fresh twelve-jar comparison, not an adjustment. Decide in advance how many rounds you are willing to run, and accept a ranking from the yardstick you chose. Endless re-ranking is its own failure mode, and knowing when to stop is a real skill; the wick-first-or-load-first version of the same dilemma is in weak hot throw: load or wick first?
Stage two needs a wick bracket, not more scents: Eco Candle Wicks Thick (C2), 20 for ₹188.80 alongside the C1s you already own, plus Performance Wooden Wicks, 10 for ₹590 if your winner's page suggests wooden. Bulk pricing, GST invoicing and SDS or IFRA documentation are handled on WhatsApp.
Shop candle wicks
Running the comparison
One pour session, four batches, twelve jars. The sequence below is written so that every control is set before any wax melts — which is the only time you can set them.
1
Write the control sheet first, then label twelve jarsAt the top of one page: jar handle and stated diameter (6 cm), wick size, wax, load and which convention you are using, fill weight (110.4 g + 9.6 g), the add and pour temperatures you intend, cure length, and the burn protocol. Then code the base of each jar — J1–J3, M1–M3, P1–P3, V1–V3 — and fit a wick to each with a wick sticker while the glass is clean.
2
Melt all 1,324.8 g of wax in one go, then split itOne melt is a stronger control than four, because it removes any batch-to-batch difference in the wax itself. Divide it into four portions of 331.2 g and dose each portion with 28.8 g of its oil. Weigh the portions on the scale rather than pouring by eye — a portion that is 10 g light will fill three jars short.
3
Add each oil at the same temperature and stir each for the same counted two minutesWork within the stated window for your wax — CSI 468's page states melt 50–53°C and pour 58–60°C. Record the reading you actually used for each of the four portions and keep them within a degree or two of each other. If one portion cooled while you were labelling, reheat it to the same reading rather than pouring it cooler.
4
Pour all twelve to exactly 120 g on the scale, same room, same hourZero the scale with the empty jar on it and fill to 120 g. Leave all twelve undisturbed on the same surface. Record the room temperature. Rough tops, wet spots and frosting are cosmetic outcomes of cooling, not verdicts on the oil — see why soy wax frosts before you blame a fragrance for a surface.
5
Burn one jar per scent at day 7 and one at day 14Cold-sniff every jar before lighting and score it. Then trim to about 5 mm, burn for up to three hours in the same closed room with no competing scent, and score throw at 30 and 120 minutes on the same 1–5 scale. Record minutes to a full melt pool, flame height, soot and mushrooming. Never leave a burning candle unattended, and stop any candle whose flame is clearly too tall — that is a hazard, not a data point. The scoring method is expanded in how to test hot throw before launching a fragrance.
6
Rank, then immediately stop comparing and start qualifyingPick the oil that is still recognisable at 120 minutes on both burn dates. Then move to stage two with the third jar of that scent and two or three fresh ones: same everything, wick bracketed. If two oils tie, keep both and let stage two decide — a scent that needs an easier wick is often the better commercial choice. If all four were faint, do not buy four more oils. Repeat the round with a different wick, because a shared wick that was too small suppressed all four equally.
Identical jars and one wick will not tell you which candle to sell. They will tell you which oil deserves the next four jars.
— CandleMakingSuppliesIndia
Why trust this guide
CANDLEMAKINGSUPPLIESINDIA supplies raw materials, not finished candles. A supplier optimising for today's basket would encourage you to buy four different beautiful jars, because four jars sell better than three packs of one. We are telling you to buy fifteen of the same jar, because a maker who can read their own test comes back for the 5 kg wax and the 100-jar pack, and a maker who compares four oils in four different vessels concludes that candle making is unpredictable and stops.
Every price, pack size and specification here comes from live CSI stock in September 2026 and links to the product page, where current pricing always takes precedence. Stated figures are quoted only where the page states them: the 120 gm capacity, 6 cm diameter and 6.5 cm height are from the Amber Shiny Glass Jar page; up to 13%, melt 50–53°C and pour 58–60°C are from the CSI 468 page; the 150 g jar's 7 cm outer and ~6.5 cm base diameters are from its own page; the up-to-10% soy loads, 48–72 hour cures and the 185°C, 93°C and 200°C flash points are from the Jasmine, Palo Santo and Verbena pages respectively, and the Mango Coconut page states no fragrance load at all. The Eco Candle Wicks page states no diameter guidance. Where a page states nothing, we say so rather than filling the gap, and no CSI page states a shelf life or storage specification for fragrance oil. Loads are formulation limits, not regulatory limits.
For help choosing one jar to standardise on, bulk pricing once a scent has won, GST invoicing, or MSDS and IFRA documentation for a specific oil, message us on WhatsApp at +91 7397976926.
Frequently asked questions
Do fragrance test candles have to be in the same jar?
Yes — the same product, not merely the same capacity. The melt pool's diameter is set by the jar, and the pool's surface is what carries scent into a room, so a wider jar can look like a stronger oil. Moving from a stated 6 cm diameter to a ~6.5 cm base changes pool surface by about 17%, since area scales with the square of the radius. Standardise on one handle, buy a pack of five or more, and weigh one filled jar to confirm the real fill.
Can I use different wick sizes when comparing fragrance oils?
Not within one comparison. A larger wick delivers more heat, produces a bigger pool and therefore more throw regardless of the oil, so mixed wicks make the test unreadable in both directions. Use one wick size in all the candles — twelve Eco Candle Wicks Thin (C1) cost ₹70.80 — and treat wick choice as a separate round once a scent has won. Oils do change wick behaviour, which is exactly why it needs its own test rather than being bundled in.
How many candles do I need per fragrance to compare fairly?
Three is the practical minimum: one burned at day 7, one at day 14, one spare for a re-pour or a second opinion. Two works if budget is tight; one does not, because a single candle cannot be repeated and cannot separate "weak oil" from "not yet cured". For four oils at three jars each in a 120 g jar, that is twelve jars, 1,324.8 g of wax and 115.2 g of oil — about ₹169.02 per jar of materials.
Should all test candles have the same fragrance load?
Yes, and calculated the same way. Use 8% of finished candle weight for all of them — 9.6 g of oil in a 120 g jar — and state in your log which convention you used, because some pages express a load as a share of total wax weight instead. Mixing conventions mid-test shifts a jar by a few tenths of a gram, which looks identical to a mis-weighing. Testing load itself is a separate experiment with its own arithmetic.
Does jar colour affect a fragrance test?
Colour and finish do not change the internal diameter, so within one jar model they are an acceptable variation — but a clear or light jar is genuinely more useful for a test, because you can see the melt pool reach the wall and you can see wet spots and frosting as they happen. Keep opaque and decorative vessels for the product, and reserve one transparent model as your permanent test jar so results stay comparable across months.
My four test candles all smelled weak. Is that the oils?
Probably not — a shared cause is far more likely than four independent ones. Check the controls in order: was the wick too small for the jar, so no candle reached a full pool? Was the oil stirred for a full two minutes at the temperature the wax page states? Were they burned before cure? The correct next move is to repeat the round with a different wick, not to buy four different oils. Diagnosing a suppressed pool starts with why a candle tunnels even with the correct wick.
One jar. One wick. Four scents.
Freeze eight controls, change one oil, and your first comparison will actually mean something.
Amber Shiny Glass Jar with Black Lid at ₹47.20 each with a stated 120 gm capacity and 6 cm diameter, Premium Coconut Soy CSI 468 1 kg ₹650 with a stated 58–60°C pour, Eco Candle Wicks Thin (C1) 20 for ₹118, four 50 gm fragrance oils from ₹230, wick stickers ₹100 and a Bamboo Wick Holder set of 5 at ₹118. Twelve-jar comparison: ₹3,012.30 of materials, about ₹169.02 a jar. Message us for bulk pricing, GST invoicing and documentation once a scent wins.
Shop containers Ask on WhatsApp
Continue the read
- One kilo and three oils: three scents, or three rounds?
- Five samples, three wick sizes — do you need every combination?
- How to compare two fragrance oils using a controlled burn test
- How to test hot throw before launching a candle fragrance
- Best wick for candle making: complete guide by diameter
- Which fragrance families perform best in coconut-soy wax?
- How to keep the wick straight when making candles
Editorial standards & sources
About this guide: Written by the CANDLEMAKINGSUPPLIESINDIA team. Product recommendations reflect the CSI range; the eight-control list, the melt-pool area arithmetic and the two-stage sequence apply whoever you buy from.Customer reviews: The five reviews at the top of this page are genuine, published Judge.me reviews left by CSI customers on their product pages. Names, star ratings, dates and products are as recorded by Judge.me; wording is unedited.
Figures verified September 2026: Amber Shiny Glass Jar with Black Lid, stated "Capacity: 120 gm" and "6 cm diameter, 6.5 cm height" — Pack of 1 ₹47.20, Pack of 5 ₹236 (₹47.20 each); the page's body text describes a black jar with a golden lid, which is copy from a sibling listing. Clear Glass Jar with Golden Lid (150 gram), stated "150g fill capacity", "Height 8cm, outer diameter 7cm", "Base diameter Approximately 6.5 cm" and "Safe for hot pour up to 85°C" — Pack of 10 ₹944, Pack of 20 ₹1,888. Premium Coconut Soy Wax CSI 468 (Flakes Form) 500 g ₹325, 1 kg ₹650, 5 kg ₹3,185 (₹637/kg), 10 kg ₹6,370 — page states a fragrance load of up to 13%, melting point 50–53°C, pour temperature 58–60°C, for single-pour container applications. Eco Candle Wicks Thin (C1) 10 ₹59, 20 ₹118, 50 ₹295, 100 ₹590 (₹5.90 each at every listed pack); Thick (C2) 20 ₹188.80; no jar-diameter guidance stated for either size. Performance Wooden Wicks (Imported) Pack of 10 ₹590. Fragrance oils at 50 gm: Jasmine ₹230 (page states up to 10% for soy with a 48–72 hour cure, up to 6% for paraffin, flash point 185°C), Mango Coconut ₹250 (page states no fragrance load), Palo Santo ₹300.90 (page states up to 10% for soy, up to 6% for paraffin, cure 48–72 hours for soy, flash point 93°C, and suggests eco or wooden wicks with wick testing based on container size), Verbena ₹330.40 (page states up to 10% for soy, up to 6% for paraffin, flash point 200°C). Candle Wick Stickers 1 sheet of 40 ₹100 (stated 10 mm diameter), Bamboo Wick Holder Set of 5 ₹118, Bamboo Stirring Sticks Pack of 5 ₹118 (₹23.60 each), Pack of 50 ₹1,062, Pack of 100 ₹1,888, Eco Soy CSI 400 1 kg ₹399 (page states add fragrance at 80–90°C / 85°C and stir 2 minutes). Arithmetic: 120 g jar at 8% = 110.4 g wax + 9.6 g oil; twelve jars = 1,324.8 g wax + 115.2 g oil; wax bought as 1 kg + 500 g of CSI 468 = ₹975, or ₹0.65 per gram, leaving 175.2 g spare; per-jar materials at the Jasmine rate = ₹71.76 + ₹44.16 + ₹5.90 + ₹47.20 = ₹169.02. Melt-pool surface comparison = (6.5 ÷ 6)² = 1.17, i.e. about 17% more area. Assumptions, stated as assumptions: fragrance load is calculated as a share of finished candle weight, this series' convention; a 14–21 day cure for soy containers is general practice rather than a published specification, and day 7 / day 14 burns are a testing judgement; the ~5 mm trim and the three-hour burn are standard practice; one wick per single-wick candle. Prices and availability change — the linked product pages are always authoritative.