Three brands dominate heat-not-burn hardware in most of Europe and Asia right now: Glo from British American Tobacco, Lil from KT&G, and the IQOS family from Philip Morris. Each took a genuinely different engineering route, and each has locked its customers into a different stick ecosystem. Understanding those three routes is the fastest way to understand what you are actually buying — and why a fourth option, the HEATX range, keeps coming up in the same buying conversations.
This is a practical comparison. Not a brand ranking — a breakdown of the heating architecture, the stick lock-in, the per-session cost implications, and where each platform is genuinely strong.
The Three Heating Architectures, Explained
Almost every difference between these platforms traces back to how heat reaches the tobacco. Three approaches exist today.
Blade heating (Glo). A metal blade pushes into the tobacco column and heats from the centre out. It produces fast, consistent first puffs, and the blade geometry is well understood after a decade of iteration. The trade-off is physical: the blade accumulates residue, so the device needs cleaning, and repeated use plus the cleaning cycle eventually wears the blade itself.
Induction heating (IQOS ILUMA, Lil Solid). The stick carries a metal element, and the device heats it with an induction coil. No blade touches the tobacco, so there is no cleaning routine and no blade wear. The temperature profile is fixed in firmware for the specific stick family, which keeps performance consistent — and also means the device is tuned to exactly one ecosystem.
Circumferential resistance heating (HEATX). The tobacco sits inside a chamber that is wrapped with heating around its full circumference instead of being heated from a single internal point. Heat arrives evenly around the stick rather than through it, and because the chamber is outside the tobacco mass, there is no blade contact in the stick.
Stick Lock-In: The Hidden Cost Line
Every one of these platforms sells hardware in the classic razor-and-blade pattern. The device is priced near the cost of a couple of packs of sticks, and the profit lives in the consumables. That means the device you buy determines which sticks you can buy — and every platform names that compatibility deliberately.
| Platform | Dominant stick ecosystem | Hardware price posture | Consumable flexibility |
|---|---|---|---|
| Glo (BAT) | Neo sticks and Neo-compatible lines | Mid-market, frequent promotions | Single-brand ecosystem |
| Lil (KT&G, mainly Korea and Japan) | Fiit and Lil-compatible sticks | Mid-market, carrier-bundled | Single-brand ecosystem |
| IQOS (PMI) | TEREA (blade-free) and HEETS (blade) | Premium, flagship pushed upmarket | Two sub-ecosystems, brand-locked |
| HEATX | TEREA-compatible stick range | Mid-market, positioned under flagship | Compatible across the TEREA family |
The nuance worth noticing is in the last column. Blade platforms and induction platforms both constrain you by brand, but induction sticks are not blade sticks — you cannot move a TEREA stick into a blade device. Compatibility is not a software question here; it is a mechanical one.
What Each Platform Does Well
An honest comparison has to credit the leaders.
- Glo is the most accessible entry point in many markets, with aggressive device pricing and a mature Neo flavour range. If you want the lowest barrier to trying heat-not-burn, Glo usually wins on price.
- Lil is extremely well packaged for daily use in its home markets, where carrier bundling and compact all-in-one bodies make it a natural commuter device. Its Solid line moved to blade-free induction, which removed the cleaning routine.
- IQOS ILUMA has the deepest ecosystem — the broadest stick range, the most retail support, and the highest brand trust. It also has the best-known no-cleaning story of the three.
Where all three converge is the assumption that the device is not where you optimize. Their firmware fixes one temperature curve, their sticks are consumed once, and their value proposition rests on reliability rather than flexibility.
Where a Fourth Option Fits: Sessions per Stick
The single most useful number for a heavy user is sessions per stick. It converts directly into annual cost, and it is the one metric the three majors do not compete on, because the model does not need them to.
Circumferential heating changes that calculation. When heat wraps the full outer surface of the tobacco column, the mass heats through evenly rather than from one point, and the stick is not exhausted after a single pass. In the HEATX range this shows up as genuine second-use capability: a stick can be heated again for a second session.
| Model | Battery | Session length | Stick re-use | Body |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| HEATX GEN 5.0 | 2000mAh | 270 seconds | Yes, two sessions | Single piece, 64 g |
| HEATX GEN2.0 | Integrated, Type-C | 240 seconds + 30s preheat | Yes, two sessions | 92.5 × 34.8 × 20.6 mm |
| HEATX GEN 6.0 | 2600mAh | Dual temperature modes | Yes, two sessions | 21.5 × 30 × 105 mm anodised |
| HEATX-3 | 3200mAh | 320 seconds active | Yes, two sessions | Flagship, 360° chamber |
For a user working through two packs of sticks a week, a device that reliably extracts two sessions from a stick effectively halves the consumable line. That is not a marketing claim; it is arithmetic, and it is the reason buyers who otherwise default to a major brand still ask about the alternative.
Compatibility and the TEREA Question
The most practical objection to choosing a non-major device is stick supply. If your city sells TEREA everywhere and nothing else, the device must take TEREA.
The HEATX GEN 5.0, GEN 6.0 and GEN2.0 accept the TEREA stick family, which matters for two reasons. First, you keep the retail convenience you already have. Second, because circumferential heating does not depend on a metal element inside the stick being actuated by a matched coil, the device is more tolerant of the natural variation between stick batches.
Blade devices and induction devices are the opposite: they require sticks built for their specific mechanism. That is a design decision, not a defect — but it is the reason a Glo user cannot simply buy Lil sticks, and vice versa.
The Buying Checklist
If you are comparing Glo, Lil, IQOS and an alternative in the same afternoon, ask these five questions in order:
- Does the device touch the tobacco with a blade? If yes, budget time for cleaning and eventual blade wear.
- Which stick family does it accept, and is that family available where I live? Compatibility beats specifications.
- How many sessions can I get from one stick? Multiply that by your weekly stick count before comparing device prices.
- Is it one piece or a holder plus case? Two objects means two things to carry and charge.
- How long is a full session, and is output stable at the end of the charge? A short session pushes users into a second stick, which erases the saving.
Compare the full HEATX range and its specifications at heatxlab.com/products, or talk to the HEATX team about compatibility and wholesale supply.
