HEATX GEN2.0 vs Pulze 3.0: Imperial Brands' Inline Heater Against a 360 Degree Element

The Pulze is the one I keep recommending to people who want a device that does one job and gets out of the way. It is small, it is light, it heats up fast and it runs a five minute session. There is a five segment LED on the side, two temperature settings and not much else. I like it. It is a well-judged piece of engineering and it costs very little.

The problem I keep running into when I recommend it is the third thing. After the session ends, the stick is done. You pull it out, you bin it, and the tobacco in the far end of it never got properly heated. For most people that is fine. For people who think about what they are paying per puff, it starts to bother them.

That is the gap the HEATX GEN2.0 sits in, and I want to look at it properly rather than just declaring a winner.

GEN2.0 figures come from our specification sheet. Pulze and Imperial Brands figures come from their published specifications.

Two heaters, two philosophies

The Pulze 3.0 uses a built-in ceramic heating rod, which their documentation describes as inside-out. The rod sits inside the stick and heats outward, into the tobacco. It is an elegant arrangement, and it is fast: roughly 20 seconds of preheat.

The GEN2.0 does the opposite. A 360 degree circumferential resistive element wraps around the outside of the stick and heats inward, across a range up to 320 °C. Thirty seconds of preheat on our side.

So we have an inline heater going outward through the stick at 20 seconds, and a wrap-around element going inward across the whole stick at 30 seconds. The Pulze gets you going first. The GEN2.0's advantage is that it has reached every side of the tobacco rather than driving heat along one axis.

There is a consequence to circumferential heating that shows up in the numbers, and it is the number I would look at first. Because the element wraps the stick, a stick that has already been heated once can go straight back in for a second pass. No rotating it. No pulling it out and pushing it back in at a different angle. Just insert and start. Sixteen puffs first time, thirteen the second time, 29 in total from a single stick.

The Pulze runs a five minute session with no fixed puff limit, and it does iD and iSENZIA sticks, including the tea-based nicotine-free ones. The GEN2.0 runs 240 seconds and does ILUMA and TEREA format sticks.

The side by side

Battery is the one line where the Pulze genuinely edges it, and the gap is not what people expect. 1850 mAh against 1800 mAh is nothing. The difference that matters is sticks per charge, where the Pulze's published figure is 25+ against the GEN2.0's 18. The Pulze will run longer between charges than the GEN2.0 will.

That is worth saying plainly because it is the strongest argument for the Imperial Brands product and I would rather you had it from me than find it on a shop page.

Where the session length question gets interesting

Two hundred and forty seconds against five minutes. On paper the Pulze wins, and in one specific way it does.

A five minute session with no fixed puff cap means the device gets out of your way completely. You can take it at whatever pace you want and it will not cut out on a schedule. That is genuinely better than a device that stops at a fixed mark, and for anyone who has had a session end early while they were still going, the Pulze's approach is more generous.

The GEN2.0's counter-argument is the second pass. A 240 second session plus 13 more puffs from the same stick, and the second pass needs nothing from you. So the comparison is not 240 seconds against 300 seconds. It is 240 seconds plus a genuine second heating of the tobacco against 300 seconds and then an empty stick.

Which one is better depends on whether you see the stick as something you consume or something you finish. Most people in the category treat it as something you consume. People who have read our documentation treat it as something you finish.

Temperature control, and what it is actually for

The Pulze offers Intense and Mild. Two settings, chosen with a button, done.

The GEN2.0 runs a temperature range up to 320 °C, with a screen showing battery, a live puff count split into the 16 and 13 segments, and a preheat status indicator. Heating shows a rotating ripple icon, charging shows the Type-C symbol, and an abnormal state such as over-temperature protection raises a warning icon. Below 20% battery you get a reminder.

Now, I want to be careful here, because a bigger number on a spec sheet is not automatically a better feature. I have no published figure for how precisely the GEN2.0 holds a set temperature across the range, and I am not going to invent one. What I can say is what the range is for in practice: it lets you run a hotter session when you want one and a gentler one when you want it, within one device, without swapping hardware.

If you want a screen, the Pulze has no screen at all. It has five LED segments for battery, which is all you need to know, and nothing else. If you want to know how many puffs are left in the current stick and which pass you are on, the GEN2.0 tells you. That is a real advantage, and it is also the reason the device is 69 g instead of 57 g.

Weight, which is closer than I expected

The Pulze is about 57 g. The GEN2.0 is 69 g. Twelve grams. On the scale it is nothing, and I was ready to write this section saying the Pulze feels noticeably lighter, which would have been a lie.

Where the difference shows up is length. The Pulze is about 126 mm long and 16 mm thick, so it is a long thin stick of a device. The GEN2.0 is 92.5 mm and 20.6 mm, so it is a short, flat, wide-ish one. Both fit a pocket, but they fit differently. The Pulze slides into a shirt pocket in a way the GEN2.0 does not, and the GEN2.0 sits flat against a leg in a way the Pulze does not.

Where the GEN2.0 is the wrong choice

The Pulze wins on endurance, 25+ sticks per charge against 18, and if you are the kind of user who charges a device once and then leaves it alone for two days, that is the deciding factor and nothing else matters.

The Pulze also has a faster preheat at about 20 seconds against 30 seconds, and it takes iSENZIA sticks, which are tea-based and nicotine-free. If you have moved toward nicotine-free options, that closes the question entirely, because the GEN2.0 does not do them.

Neither device has an app, Bluetooth or firmware. That is a wash and I would not use it as an argument either way.

And the GEN2.0's second pass is not a free second stick. It is the same stick heated again. If you prefer a fresh stick every time, the Pulze's model is simpler and there is nothing wrong with it.

What I would buy

Buy the Pulze if you want the fastest start, the longest battery life in this pair, and the option of nicotine-free tea-based sticks. It is 12 g lighter, it is well made, and 25+ sticks per charge is a real advantage over 18.

Buy the GEN2.0 if your sticks are ILUMA or TEREA format, if you want 29 puffs out of one stick, if you want to see your puff count and your pass on a screen, and if you would like a device that finishes the tobacco rather than leaving part of it behind. Specs and photos are on chillmistvape.com.

Health, law and where to buy

Heated tobacco is not harmless. Avoiding combustion reduces exposure to a number of the toxicants in cigarette smoke, but nicotine is still delivered and nicotine is addictive. Nothing here is medical advice and nothing in this article claims either device is safe.

If you do not already use tobacco or nicotine, there is no reason to start. Age limits and tax rules differ by country and change; check where you live. Buy from licensed sellers only. The Pulze and Imperial Brands figures come from the manufacturer's published specifications, and the GEN2.0 figures come from our own specification sheet. Compare them, then decide which device fits how you actually use a heated tobacco device.