How Long Does a Soy Candle Last?

A 150 g soy candle should burn for roughly 35 to 40 hours. That's the figure for every Philotree candle, and it's in line with what a well-made soy candle of that size should give you. In practice, plenty of candles burn out much sooner, and it's usually down to how they're lit rather than how they're made.

The short answer

As a rough guide, a good soy candle burns somewhere around 4 to 5 grams of wax an hour. So:

Candle size	Expected burn time
150 g	35 to 40 hours
4 × 150 g (Discovery Set)	140+ hours in total

If you light a candle for two hours most evenings, a 150 g candle lasts about three weeks.

Why soy lasts longer than paraffin

Soy wax has a lower melting point and burns cooler than paraffin, so it's used up more slowly. It also melts more evenly across the jar, which means less wasted wax down the sides. We go into this in more detail in soy wax vs paraffin.

What makes a candle burn out early

1. A short first burn. If the first burn doesn't melt the wax all the way to the edge, the candle starts to tunnel and leaves a ring of wax it never uses.
2. A long wick. An untrimmed wick gives a bigger, hotter flame that eats through the wax faster and can make soot.
3. Draughts. Fans, open windows and air conditioning make the flame flicker and burn unevenly.
4. Very long sessions. Burning for more than four hours at a time can overheat the jar and the wax.

How to get the full burn time

• Let the first burn run for two to three hours, until the wax melts to the edge.
• Trim the wick to about 5 mm before every burn.
• Burn for one to four hours at a time.
• Keep it away from fans and open windows.
• Stop when about 1 cm of wax is left at the bottom.

Our candle care guide covers each of these in more detail.

When it's finished

Once the candle is done, don't throw away the jar. Here's how to clean a candle jar so you can use it again.

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