The popularity of vaporization has left little time for conversation on the art of rolling. However, this minimalist, easily accessible, tried-and-true consumption method still reigns supreme globally. The creative potential and skill required to craft a functional roll is celebrated among many cannabis enthusiasts.

Defining joints, blunts, and spliffs

If you’re new to cannabis, there are three broad categories that rolls fall under: joints, blunts, and spliffs. Each can be defined by their content (cannabis-tobacco ratio) as well as the rolling material, tobacco, hemp, etc.

What is a joint?

Joints are arguably the most iconic way to consume cannabis. Small and portable, you can take them anywhere and spark up where you please.

They consist of cannabis rolled up inside a thin rolling paper that is usually white, but novelty papers come in all colors and flavors. Papers can be big, small, made out of hemp, rice, paper, etc. There are all kinds of variants.

Joints often have a crutch, or filter, which adds stability to the roll and allows you to smoke your joint to the end without burning your fingertips.

What is a blunt?

A blunt is a roll with cannabis inside a cigar or blunt wrap. These wraps are made out of tobacco, which adds a buzz and energy to your cannabis high.

Typically, they’re bigger than joints and last a lot longer.

What is a spliff?

A spliff is like a joint, but it has tobacco and cannabis mixed together in a rolling paper. They usually have more tobacco than a blunt, so will have even more of the energetic, buzzy effects of tobacco. Spliffs usually have crutches too.

Spliff smokers can alter the ratio of cannabis and tobacco to their preference—lots of cannabis with a little tobacco, lots of tobacco with a little cannabis, or somewhere in between.

The paper differences between joints, blunts, and spliffs

Paper choice is important to your smoking experience; it’ll impact the amount of weed you need (the size of the paper), the flavor (tobacco papers are notably sweeter than hemp paper), and burn (thicker papers tend to burn slower than thinner papers).

Papers and blunt wraps can be flavored, but they aren’t for everyone. Some consumers think flavored papers meddle with the complex tastes and aromas of cannabis, while others are loyal to specific brands because of their distinct flavor additives (this is more common among blunt aficionados).

Consumers also choose papers based on rolling ease and functionality. The best papers don’t tear, seal seamlessly, handle well between your fingers, and burn uniformly. Nothing is a surer sign of a failed roll than a joint that runs, i.e., burns lengthwise along one side.

Interior

Like a joint, the interior of a blunt is strictly marijuana. Whether it’s a blunt or a joint doesn’t depend on the strain inside, just that it’s exclusively marijuana. A blunt or a joint mixed with anything else is not a blunt or a joint and should be referred to by a different name.

Exterior

Again, this is where the major difference between a blunt and a joint occurs. A blunt is made by filling a piece of tobacco paper with your choice of marijuana. Alternatively, a blunt can be created with a cleaned-out cigar wrap. Cigar wraps are typically made from compressed tobacco leaf.

And while we’re on the subject of cigars, cigar wraps, and blunts, there’s a huge debate about hand-rolling vs. machine-rolling. Honest Blunts are rolled by a machine. That allows us to ensure that every Honest Blunt lives up to our exacting standards.

And really, it’s not about who or what rolls the blunts. It’s about what they’re made of. We use only the best bud and the best organic-processed hemp-leaf wrappers to build our blunts. Nothing cheap and no fillers. That’s the Honest Marijuana way.

It reminds us of the legend that the best Cuban cigars were hand-rolled on the thighs of virgins. What does that do? Absolutely nothing. The hand-rolled angle was just a way to make that particular cigar stand out. It didn’t contribute to the quality or the taste. What was inside did that.

We’ll put our machine-rolled Honest Blunts up against any hand-rolled blunt out there, and we’ll guarantee that “hand rolling” won’t make a lick of difference in the quality, the taste, or the experience.

Color

Blunts are brown, and that’s all you get. No wacky colors or fun prints. Just the dull brown color of dirt or mud. But really, that’s okay, because the contrast between the brown wrapper (whether it’s tobacco, cigar, or hemp) and the green ganja makes each and every blunt a thing of beauty. You might even call it a work of weed art!

So why is this important to our discussion of blunt, joint, and spliff? Because color sets the three apart. Joints are rarely brown (unless you go out of your way and pay through the nose to get brown rolling paper), and blunts are never white, gold, or — god forbid — polka dot.

Size

Like joints, blunts can range in size. Because they use wrap or paper meant for cigars, they are almost always longer and thicker than the typical joint. While the length doesn’t vary all that much, the thickness can fluctuate depending on the amount of marijuana packed inside.

Some like their blunts packed full so that they resemble a commercial cigar. Some like their blunts packed less than full so that they resemble a drinking straw. Regardless of the size, it’s what’s on the outside — tobacco paper or cigar wrap — that makes a blunt a blunt.

Flavor

The flavor of a blunt will be affected by the type of exterior wrapping you use. At the most basic, a tobacco flavor will be mixed in with the flavor of the strain you choose. Sometimes this is good. Sometimes it is bad.

It may take some experimentation to find the right strain to mix with the blunt wrapper of your choice (if you roll your own, of course). A better option is to let the professionals construct your blunt for you. That way, you’ll be guaranteed to get the freshest, most flavorful, longest-burning blunt possible.