CANNABIS FLOWER VERSUS CANNABIS EXTRACTS: WHAT SHOULD YOU CHOOSE?

Which is better: cannabis flower or cannabis extracts? It’s an age-old debate that ultimately depends on your tolerance and your consumption preferences.

For those exploring cannabis, flower offers an approachable way to learn about different strains and their unique characteristics. As familiarity with products increases, some may choose to explore concentrates like dabs, which feature a more refined and concentrated format.

Here’s some discussion about what makes both cannabis flower and concentrates (extracts) special, as well as some discussion about the pros and cons of both.

What makes cannabis flower special?

Cannabis flower refers to the buds you cut off of plant branches to be dried, cured, and sold in bags and jars. If you look at Headset data in any cannabis market, you will see flower as the highest-selling category. That’s due to the variety of strains, and also all of the products that come from it. 

What makes cannabis flower special? Everything. Using cannabis flower is the first step to developing your relationship with the plant. It allows you to learn the effects you desire, which flavors you love, the genetics of certain hybrid strains, and the types of concentrates you might want to try.

How do you buy cannabis flower?

To buy cannabis flower, you go to a legal cannabis dispensary. When there, purchase by quality. That means, not by price, but by the reputation of the brand that grows the flower. The better the brand, the more consistent their products will be, and the better your experience will be.

In choosing cannabis flower, shop by genetics and flavors. Shopping by genetics, you will focus on the parent strains of each hybrid, and use them to guess how the effects will be.

Some good examples of strains include Zkittlez x OG and Jealousy Pie. If you know how your body reacts to Zkittlez and OG Kush, then you’ll have a good idea of how a strain that comes from their lineage will smell, taste, and feel. Same thing for Jealousy Pie, which is most likely Jealousy crossed with Georgie Pie.

What makes cannabis extracts special?

Cannabis extracts are a type of processed cannabis oil that you can dab, vaporize or smoke in infused joints. They are called extracts due to them being created by extracting cannabis trichomes to concentrate them into the different hash and oil types, which is why they’re also called concentrates.

What makes cannabis concentrates special is how they help elevate your consumption experience. They are vaporized, versus smoked, which is better for your body and lungs. Additionally, because they are strictly composed of the molecules inside the trichomes, they have a much higher percentage of cannabinoids and terpenes.

There are many different types of cannabis concentrates including distillate, live resin, and live rosin. They are filtered under two categories: solvent-based extracts and solventless extracts.

Solvent-based extracts use solvents to separate the trichomes from the plant matter. The result is extracts like curated live resin and live resin diamonds. Solventless extracts use only ice and water to separate the trichomes from plant matter before processing them through various degrees of heat and pressure. The result is extracts like live rosin badder and live rosin jam. 

How do you buy cannabis concentrates? 

Buy your cannabis concentrates by quality and flavor, just like flower. Also, buy your cannabis concentrates depending on how you’ll use them.

If you’re dabbing, then literally any texture of hash will work, but you might want to focus on diamonds, jams, and badders. If you’re going to vaporize concentrates, then you’ll be choosing between distillate plus terpenes pods, live resin pods, and solventless live rosin pods.

If you’re going to roll an infuse joint, then you’ll be choosing between all of them. The concentrates are merely there to complement your flower. For hash holes, it’s best to use something thick and solid, like a live rosin badder. 

The pros and cons of cannabis flower and extracts

The debate between flower and concentrates depends on a multitude of factors including your feelings on smoking versus vaporizing, the type of ritual you like to enjoy, your cannabis tolerance, the devices you own, and the overall experience you want to enjoy.

Smoking flower versus vaporizing concentrates

If you’re concerned about the effects of smoke on your lungs, then consuming extracts wins out over flower every time. It’s combustion versus vaporizing. With cannabis flower, you essentially burn it to inhale smoke, which has potentially damaging effects in the long term. Vaporizing is just heating up the compounds until they turn to vapor, which reduces collateral damage.

The flower ritual versus the concentrates ritual

In terms of the ritual, rolling up is sacred for cannabis consumers. Rolling up is when you buy a nice premium bag or jar of good weed, sit back, break it down, twist up a perfect joint, and then smoke it to the face. It is peaceful and special. It’s cathartic, and it’s a great break from the world that you sometimes don’t get from how quickly a dabbing session takes place. Flower wins.

Diversity of cannabis strains

If you want the widest possible bank of cannabis strains to consume, then there will always be more flower strains available than extracts.

When creating extracts like live resin and live rosin, processors choose cannabis strains with a high trichome density. Not all strains of weed produce flowers covered in trichomes, however, all cannabis strains do produce flowers that can be smoked.

Your Cannabis Tolerance and Product Selection

Over time, frequent cannabis use may lead to increased familiarity with its compounds. As your tolerance develops, you might find yourself exploring more concentrated product formats to align with your evolving preferences.

Concentrates are known for their high cannabinoid content compared to traditional flower. While many flower cultivars contain a moderate percentage of THC, concentrates often deliver a more concentrated profile. This is one reason infused pre-rolls have become popular among experienced consumers who prefer smoking but are interested in a more robust option without using a dab rig.

Flower devices versus concentrates devices

The barrier to entry with smoking flower is much lower than that of consuming concentrates. With flower, you just need a pipe (or rolling paper) and a flame. With concentrates, you need a dab rig or a weed vape pen a torch or battery, and various accessories that optimize airflow and temperature control. 

The overall experience

The cannabis experience comes down to well-rounded flavors and highs. Extracts win the flavor battle 100% of the time. They have a higher concentration of terpenes without any of the background flavor of burnt cannabis plant material.

The quality of high depends on which types of extracts you’re using. Cannabis flower produces the entourage effect because it contains every plant compound. Only certain extracts, like live resin and live rosin, are able to mirror that. If you’re consuming weed pens with distillate and added terpenes, the entourage effect will be absent, so in this situation, flower wins.

In the end, the choice of which is better comes down to personal preference. Both cannabis flower and concentrates have their respective pros with very few cons.

If you're interested in exploring concentrated forms of cannabis, extracts offer a refined option with elevated cannabinoid and terpene content. For those curious about different cultivars and their lineage, smoking traditional flower remains a go-to method for experiencing a wide variety of genetics and aromas.

When buying either flower or concentrates, just make sure to only purchase from brands that can guarantee a safe, high-quality consumption experience, backed by premium cannabis products and a solid reputation.

At STIIIZY, we only use premium cannabis flower for all of our cannabis extracts. We also offer proprietary weed vape pods and a weed pen battery system.