SKE 600 Pro Pod Kit

The pods are where the Crystal flavour lives. Each is a sealed 2ml prefilled pod with a mesh coil and 20mg SKE salt, the same flavour-true setup that made the Crystal bars popular, tuned for a smooth mouth-to-lung draw. A pod runs to about 600 puffs, and because the body is the see-through Crystal style you get a rough idea of the level as you go.

There are fifteen flavours in the range, spanning the cold fruits, the lemonades and the menthols SKE is known for, so you can rotate without buying a new device. Handily, the 600 Pro pods also fit the SKE Crystal Plus, so if you run either kit the pods cross over. When a set is spent you restock with fresh 600 Pro pods rather than a whole new kit.

This is the part that makes the switch worth it. The kit is £27.99 for five, about £5.60 each, and each kit covers a pod of roughly 600 puffs to start. After that you only buy pods, and a replacement 600 Pro pod works out far cheaper per puff than buying a fresh disposable Crystal every time, because you are paying for juice and a small pod rather than a whole battery.

Put rough numbers on it. If you currently get through a Crystal bar every day or two, the running cost of pods is a fraction of replacing the bar each time, and you throw away a great deal less plastic and lithium in the process. It is the same money-saving logic behind any refillable or replaceable pod kit, in the most familiar Crystal-bar shape going.

It is a low-maintenance kit, so most snags clear in seconds. Nearly all of them come down to a pod that has not soaked or seated, or a battery that wants charging.

Against a single-use Crystal bar it is the same vape with a plug and a swappable pod, so you keep the flavour and the feel while cutting the cost and the waste. If you liked the disposable Crystal, this is the obvious next step. Against the closed Elf Bar ELFA Pro it is a closer fight: both are simple prefilled pod systems, but the SKE keeps the slim bar shape and the magnetic pod, where the ELFA is a little chunkier with its own flavour list.

It is not the kit for you if you want big clouds, your own juice or a battery that lasts days between charges, in which case a refillable like the SKE Crystal 4-in-1 or a bigger pod mod suits better. As a cheap, familiar, low-waste way off disposable bars, though, the 600 Pro is one of the easiest kits to recommend, and it pairs with any of our nic salts once you move to a refillable later.