Vaporesso XROS 3 Mini Pod Kit

The whole idea of the 3 Mini is keeping it easy. It is powered by Vaporesso's AXON chip running a constant-voltage output up to around 11W, which it sets itself to suit the pod, so there is nothing to adjust. There is no fire button either: it is draw-activated, so you just inhale like a disposable. That makes it about as gentle a move off bars as there is, because almost nothing about the way you vape changes.

It is still a proper refillable, though. The 2ml pod is empty when you get it and you top-fill it: pull the mouthpiece off, drip your juice into the port and push it back on, no prising the pod out. That keeps the running cost far below a prefilled or disposable, since you buy juice rather than whole pods or bars. You fill it with any nic salt to suit the coil.

There is almost nothing to it, which is the appeal. Fill the pod, let it soak, set the airflow and vape. The only habit worth keeping is giving a fresh pod a couple of minutes before the first proper pull, so the coil wicks and you avoid a burnt taste.

At £10.99 it is one of the cheapest ways into a refillable, and after that you only buy juice and the odd pod. A 10ml bottle of nic salt is a few pounds and refills a 2ml pod five times over, so your day-to-day cost drops to pennies a fill once the kit is paid for. Against a disposable every couple of days, the 3 Mini pays for itself within a week or so and keeps saving after that.

The Corex pod stretches it further, since one pod handles a good run of bottles before the coil needs swapping. Add the rechargeable battery and the only thing you ever throw away is a small pod now and then, never a whole device. For a budget first refillable it is hard to beat on price, the same money-saving logic as any refillable pod kit.

It is about as simple as a pod kit gets, but a refillable asks slightly more than a prefilled bar. Most snags trace to a coil that has not soaked, the airflow, or a juice that does not suit the pod.

Within the XROS line the 3 Mini is the simplest and oldest of the small kits. It is draw-only with the original Corex mesh pods, where the newer XROS 4 Mini adds the upgraded Corex 2.0 pods and the choice of firing on a button or the inhale. If you want the latest pods and that bit more flexibility, the 4 Mini is worth the small step up; if you just want the cheapest, simplest draw-activated refillable, the 3 Mini still does the job for less.

Against a disposable it is no contest on cost or waste: you buy the device once for around eleven pounds and then only pay for juice, where a bar gets binned every couple of days. It is not built for big sub-ohm clouds, but for a genuinely cheap, dead-simple first refillable it is a sensible pick, a clear step up from a closed system like the Elf Bar ELFX, and it shares pods with the rest of the XROS range.