Wax pens started gaining real traction around 2012 and 2013, when the first portable concentrate vaporizers hit the consumer market. But their popularity didn’t peak overnight. The rise played out in waves over the following decade, shaped by cannabis legalization, celebrity endorsements, and a major public health scare that temporarily slowed momentum.
The First Wax Pens: 2012 to 2013
The technology behind vaporizing concentrates evolved from the broader e-cigarette movement. Chinese inventor Hon Lik is credited with creating the first workable portable vape pen around 2013, building on concepts that dated back to a 1963 patent by Herbert A. Gilbert. But wax-specific devices were already emerging by 2012, when Grenco Science launched and began engineering portable vaporizers designed specifically for cannabis concentrates. The G Pen, their flagship product, became one of the first wax pens to reach mainstream commercial success.
Before these devices existed, consuming cannabis concentrates meant using a torch, a glass rig, and a heated nail. It was effective but intimidating, messy, and impossible to do discreetly. Wax pens solved all three problems at once: they were small enough to fit in a pocket, required no open flame, and produced far less odor than smoking. That combination made concentrates accessible to people who never would have tried dabbing the traditional way.
Hip-Hop and Celebrity Culture Accelerated Adoption
By the mid-2010s, wax pens had moved well beyond the niche cannabis enthusiast market, and hip-hop culture played a significant role in that shift. Branded vape pens became as common as tour merchandise for many artists. Snoop Dogg co-founded the cannabis media platform Merry Jane in 2015 and invested in vape hardware startup Green Tank Technologies through his venture capital firm, Casa Verde Capital. California rapper Berner, best known for creating the Girl Scout Cookies strain, built the Cookies brand into a cannabis and accessories empire that included investments in vape pen manufacturers.
Other artists launched their own vape brands directly. Xzibit’s Brass Knuckles line became widely recognizable, though it ran into serious trouble in 2018 with a class-action lawsuit alleging pesticide contamination and misrepresented THC levels. These celebrity-driven brands, even the controversial ones, kept wax pens visible in popular culture and normalized concentrate use for a younger demographic that followed these artists closely.
State Legalization Fueled the Boom
The wave of recreational cannabis legalization that began with Colorado and Washington in 2012 created regulated markets where concentrate products could be sold openly. As more states followed through the mid-to-late 2010s, licensed dispensaries stocked shelves with pre-filled cartridges and wax pen hardware. California’s massive legal market, which launched recreational sales in 2018, was particularly influential. The convenience of walking into a store and buying a tested, labeled concentrate cartridge removed much of the friction that had kept casual users away from wax pens.
The 2018 Farm Bill added another layer. By legalizing the growth and sale of hemp, the law inadvertently opened the door for manufacturers to produce and sell hemp-derived cannabinoid products, including vape cartridges containing compounds like delta-8 THC, delta-10 THC, and hexahydrocannabinol. These products produce psychoactive effects similar to traditional THC and are sold as vape cartridges, concentrates, and edibles. As of recent counts, psychoactive hemp-derived cannabis products remain legal in 29 states and Washington, D.C. Notably, 23 of those 29 states have not legalized recreational cannabis, meaning hemp-derived vape products are most available in places where legal weed is not. Online sales further expanded access regardless of state-level restrictions.
The 2019 EVALI Crisis and Its Aftermath
Just as wax pen popularity was reaching its highest point, a public health emergency forced a sharp correction. In the summer of 2019, hundreds of people across the United States developed severe lung injuries after using vaping products. The CDC issued its first advisory on August 17, 2019, and the outbreak became known as EVALI (e-cigarette or vaping product use-associated lung injury). The cause was eventually traced to vitamin E acetate, an additive used as a cutting agent in some cannabis vaporizer products. Among reported cases, 78% of those who identified a product source had obtained their cartridges from informal sources like dealers or friends rather than licensed retailers.
The impact on the legal market was measurable and age-dependent. In California, cannabis vape product sales dropped immediately after the CDC advisory. Younger adults (ages 23 to 25) saw a brief dip in purchasing that lasted about three weeks before returning to normal levels. Older adults (over 25) responded differently: their market share for vape products dropped 20%, falling from about 29.5% to 23.6% of their total cannabis purchases. That decline persisted for 17 consecutive weeks, from late August through the end of December 2019. The data suggests that older consumers were more lastingly influenced by the health warnings, while younger buyers recovered their purchasing habits quickly, largely by shifting to products from licensed dispensaries.
The EVALI crisis didn’t kill wax pen popularity, but it permanently changed the conversation around them. Consumers became more aware of the risks associated with unregulated products, and the incident gave momentum to arguments for stricter testing and labeling requirements in legal cannabis markets.
Peak Popularity: Late 2010s Through Early 2020s
If you had to pick a single window when wax pens crossed from popular to ubiquitous, it would be roughly 2017 to 2020. By that point, the hardware had matured significantly. Devices like the Puffco Peak made dabbing concentrates nearly as simple as using a disposable vape cartridge, eliminating the learning curve that had kept many people from trying concentrates. Pre-filled 510-thread cartridges became the dominant format in many dispensaries, and some markets saw vape products account for nearly a third of all cannabis sales.
The COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 further boosted sales in states where dispensaries were classified as essential businesses. The discreet, odorless nature of wax pens made them especially appealing for people spending more time at home with family or roommates. By the early 2020s, concentrate vaporizers had become one of the most common methods of cannabis consumption in legal markets, rivaling traditional flower in some demographics.