The Ultimate Guide To Essential Oil Diffusers

// by Jenn W

You are probably familiar with essential oils. You may even make use of them in some way. Perhaps you burn incense infused with some essential oil. Maybe you sometimes place a few drops of oils into your bath for a special soothing, relaxing treat. You may even use essential oils for particular medicinal uses. But do you know exactly what essential oils are?
Essential oils are the distilled volatile oils of flowers, herbs, and assorted plants. These essences contain the most aromatic compounds of these plants. Some prized plant ingredients do not lend themselves to distillation, and thus have their aromatic ingredients either mechanically expressed, cold-pressed, or chemically extracted.
Many people utilize essential oils because they smell so heavenly, but not everyone is aware of just how beneficially healthful essential oils can be. They can be used to heal in all sorts of ways: to relieve stress and enhance the mind, lungs, skin, circulation, blood sugar, muscular strains and spasms; to disinfect, normalize, and balance; and much more.

Benefits of Diffusing Essential Oils

Using essential oil diffusers greatly enhances the viability of the oils for doing their healing work. Diffusers—especially nebulizers—distribute the oils as a fine mist, which means that the oils can thus be most readily assimilated into the lungs and through the skin. Those diffusers which atomize the oils—especially nebulizers—break up the oily compounds into such a fine mist—truly molecular particles, hence the term atomizer—that they can penetrate virtually any physical barrier.
Knowledgeable people use essential oils for their healing and preventive medicinal properties. Most of the in-crowd use one oil at a time, because that is how they think. But the wisest of the wise know how to combine two or more essential oils in intricate ways, which allow the oils to help each other work more healing magic than they would by themselves. This is one of the greatest secrets of the ancient magi—how to use nature in its most potent form. Blends of just a few essential oils can quickly restore the health of gums and teeth, stop colds and flus in their tracks, and restore sanity to the delusional.
Various hospitals in Europe, South America and elsewhere—even at times in the United States—have taken advantage of the amazing effects of diffused essential oils to disinfect and sanitize medical spaces. Particularly useful in these cases have been citrus oils, such as lemon, lime and orange. In the case of the hospitals that have used diffused essential oils instead of chemical antibiotics and disinfectants, the incidence of infection has been significantly lowered. It is no wonder, since Nature knows what it is doing, and even Scientific American warned against the use of antibiotics in disinfecting hospitals as long ago as 1997, to deaf ears.

Types of Oil Diffusers

There are many varieties of essential oil diffusers, but there are essentially four major types: nebulizing diffusers, ultrasonic diffusers, heat diffusers, and evaporative diffusers. In this overview, we will look at these four types, including two types of heat diffusers: oil-burning diffusers and electric heat diffusers; and two different kinds of evaporative diffusers: reed diffusers and terracotta and sandstone diffusers. We will also review fan diffusers.

Ultrasonic Diffusers

Ultrasonic diffusers also put out a fine, atomized mist of oils into the air, but not as fine as nebulizers do. Ultrasonic diffusers use electric current to vibrate a disk, which agitates the oil, and a fan blows this through an atomizer. The difference is that ultrasonic diffusers use water and essential oils (hence the disk) to form a mist of oil(s) and water in the air, via the fan. This makes them double as humidifiers, which can come in handy, but because of this, they don’t put out as strong of a concentration of essential oils into the air. They may also have timers. Citrus oils are not recommended for this kind of diffuser, as they may eat away at the parts. Because of the use of water, they need to be cleaned from time to time, unlike nebulizers. Also, some oils, such as cinnamon and cassia, do not float on water. Also, because of the water content, ultrasonic diffusers can add to the level of mold and mildew in a space.

Nebulizing Diffusers

Nebulizers are the most potent form of diffusers. They are often thought of by experts as the best kind of essential oil diffuser. They work by using a small motor to atomize the oil and blow it about their surrounding spaces in a continuous stream of microscopic particles. No water or set-up is required to start the process. There are timers for run-time and rest-time, which allow you to control how long the nebulizer runs. This makes it perfect for overnight use, if desired. The tininess of the droplets allows them to be readily absorbed in the lungs and through the skin. These factors are part of the reason the nebulizer is the best diffuser for essential oils to use for medicinal purposes.
Nebulizers force oils through a tiny pinhole at high pressure. This creates a micro-fine vapor, without disturbing the natural balance of the components of the oils. This process also energizes the oils, increasing the level of oxygen carried by the oils, which raises their healing potential. This makes nebulizers the most effective diffusers at healing living things, and also at removing toxic substances—such as mold and mildew—from living and working spaces.

Oil-Burning Diffusers

Oil-burning diffusers normally operate by putting the oil into a ceramic dish or metal tray, with or without water, and placing a candle or other heat source below this to vaporize the oil. They tend to look nice because of the warm glow, but the heat from the candle will damage the oil. Also, the more volatile compounds within the oil will vaporize first, and the heavier ones later, which upsets the natural balance of the oily compounds, and lessens or removes any therapeutic benefit. Some of the less expensive oils are diluted with methanol or propanol, which means they can actually catch fire with this type of diffuser.

Electric Heat Diffusers

Electric heat diffusers, not surprisingly, use electric heat to spread essential oils about a space. They are good for fragrancing large areas and for dispersing heavy oils such as sandalwood and patchouli. But like other heat diffusers, they may damage the more sensitive compounds in essential oils.

Reed Diffusers

This is a passive, evaporative type of diffuser. In a glass or ceramic jar, reeds of rattan (bamboo can be used but doesn’t work as well) are placed in a mixture of carrier oil and essential oil. The oil wicks up the reeds and disperses into the air. It is best to invert the reeds after about an hour for optimal dispersion. This method is good for aroma purposes.

Terracotta and Sandstone Diffusers

Terracotta and sandstone diffusers are passive, evaporative methods of diffusing essential oils. The terracotta clay and sandstone are quite porous, which allows the oils to waft through their walls and into the room. The oil is poured into a hole in the pottery, which is then stoppered. The smell is strongest at first, and then dissipates. These diffusers come in a wide range of attractive shapes and colors. They are mainly used for the smell only, as they are not very efficient for any other purpose.

Fan Diffusers

Fan diffusers work simply by fanning oil into a space. Essential oil is placed onto a disposable absorbent pad or tray, and then the fan blows over this. These diffusers come in a wide variety of sizes and costs. Some can only fragrance small areas, some large ones. They also are good for spreading aroma, but not efficient for any kind of medicinal purposes.

How To Use Your Essential Oil Diffuser

Making the most of your essential oil diffuser—whatever type you may have—depends upon what you want out of it. If you want it mainly for the aroma, again, this depends upon how much you like the smell of whatever aroma you have diffusing. Heavier essential oils will present intense smells quickly, and thus you will probably wish to restrict them to relatively brief diffusions. Lighter oils may be kept diffusing for relatively long periods without becoming too much to handle. If you are using your essential oil or oil mix for medicinal purposes, how long you have it or the mix diffusing will depend upon your judgment of how much to dose the difficulty, whether it be a human or an infected space. As with natural medicine, there is no right or wrong dose, only an appropriate or inappropriate way to dose.
In terms of time of day to diffuse essential oils, again there are guidelines available, but one must still always use one’s best judgment. For example, peppermint oil is good to diffuse early in the morning for its awakening effect, and also at middle or late afternoon when we tend to become sluggish but still need to be alert. However, it would probably never be wise to diffuse peppermint oil in the evening unless one were planning to stay up late. Chamomile, however, would be precisely the type of essential oil to diffuse in the evening, to help one wind down from one’s hectic day and spiral happily downward into restful sleep. Speaking of sleep, there is no end to the essential oils appropriate for promoting good sleep, than which there is nothing more healing and healthful. There is only benefit to be derived from diffusing the right essential oil all night long.
Placing the most appropriate essential oils next to you as you exercise (imagine a gym that didn’t stink), wafting over your head as you sleep (imagine sleeping more deeply than ever before), behind you as you work in your office (imagine being effortlessly alert without irritability all day), will enhance your life more than you may presently imagine possible. And about once a week, it is wise to clean your diffuser according to the manufacturer’s instructions. This will allow your diffuser to work at optimal levels, the oils to be most efficiently utilized, and you to gain the most from your diffuser.

Essential Oil Recipes for Diffusers

These essential oil diffuser recipes will give you a head start when putting together various blends to use within your diffusers. Everything from curing a headache with these aromatherapy techniques to blends used for stress relief will be found in the extensive list below. Enjoy!