The Quick Burn | TL;DR

• Give your candle enough time to develop an even melt pool, especially during the first burn.
• Trim your wick to approximately ¼ inch before each burn to help maintain a controlled flame.
• Keep your candle on a stable, heat resistant surface away from drafts, fans, and anything that could catch fire.
• Don’t burn your candle for longer than 4 hours as recommended by the National Candle Association and never leave a burning candle unattended.
• Take a look at my hand poured candles and see what I’m making in small batches.

Want more context? Keep reading below for the Slow Burn.

Just For You!

Up to 15% Off Your Order

Bundle your favorites and save. Hand poured coconut-soy wax candles, made in small batches.

SHOP NOW

How to Properly Burn a Candle: The RANNI Candle Care Guide

Lighting a candle seems pretty straightforward.

You light the wick. You enjoy the scent. You blow it out.

But if you want your candle to burn evenly, smell beautiful, and last as long as possible, there are a few little things worth knowing.

I don't think candle care needs to be complicated or precious. You shouldn't need a 20 step routine just to enjoy a candle.

These are simply the things I recommend doing to get the most out of every burn.

Before You Light Your Candle

A great candle burn starts before you even strike the match.

Trim the Wick

Before every burn, check your wick.

I recommend trimming it to approximately ¼ inch before lighting. A properly trimmed wick helps maintain a controlled flame and can reduce excess soot and smoke.

If there's any charred wick, ash, or other debris sitting in the wax, remove that before lighting your candle too.

Find the Right Spot

Where you burn your candle matters too.

Place your candle on a stable, heat-resistant surface away from fans, air conditioning vents, open windows, and other drafts.

You also want to keep it away from anything flammable and somewhere it won't be accidentally knocked over.

A calm environment gives your flame the best chance of burning steadily and evenly.

Your First Burn Matters Most

If there's one thing I want you to remember from this entire article, it's this:

Don't rush your first burn.

When you light a candle for the first time, allow the wax to melt evenly across the surface and toward the edges of the vessel.

This helps establish an even melt pool and sets your candle up for better burns going forward.

A common guideline is approximately one hour of burn time for every inch of candle diameter, although the ideal burn time depends on the candle's size and formulation.

For my candles, I recommend paying attention to the melt pool rather than obsessing over a specific number of minutes.

Once the wax has melted evenly across the surface, you're in a good place to extinguish it.

Why Does the First Burn Matter?

You may have heard people talk about “candle memory.”

The idea is that the way your candle melts during its first burn can influence the way it burns during future uses. If you repeatedly extinguish a candle before the wax has had enough time to melt outward, you can encourage an uneven burn pattern.

This is one of the reasons I always recommend giving your candle enough time to establish an even melt pool on that first burn.

If you want to learn more about what happens when a candle burns unevenly, I wrote a whole article about it here.

How Long Should You Burn a Candle?

This is probably the candle-care question I get most often.

The answer isn't exactly the same for every candle.

As a general guideline, I recommend giving your candle enough time to develop an even melt pool, while avoiding excessively long burns.

The National Candle Association recommends not burning a candle for more than four hours at a time, and I think that's a good upper limit to keep in mind.

If you've reached the four hour mark, extinguish your candle and let it cool completely before lighting it again.

What Is a Candle Melt Pool?

A melt pool is the layer of liquid wax that forms around the wick while your candle is burning.

As the candle burns, the heat from the flame melts the wax outward from the wick.

Ideally, you want to see a relatively even pool of melted wax across the surface of the candle.

A healthy melt pool is one of the easiest ways to tell that your candle is burning as intended.

Keep an Eye on the Flame

Once your candle is lit, you don't need to stare at it.

But you should pay attention to anything that looks unusual.

A flame that becomes unusually large, flickers excessively, produces significant smoke, or behaves erratically is a reason to extinguish the candle and let it cool.

Once the candle has cooled, check the wick and surrounding area before burning it again.

This is another reason keeping your wick trimmed matters.

Don't Move a Burning Candle

This one seems obvious, but it's worth saying.

Once your candle is lit, leave it where it is.

The vessel and melted wax can become extremely hot, and moving a burning candle can increase the risk of spilling hot wax or knocking the candle over.

If you need to move it, extinguish the flame first and allow the candle to cool.

When Should You Extinguish a Candle?

You don't need to burn your candle until every last bit of wax is gone.

In fact, you shouldn't.

As the wax gets very low, continued burning can cause the vessel to become excessively hot.

I recommend following the specific safety instructions included with your candle and stopping use when only a small amount of wax remains.

Once you're done burning it, let the candle cool completely before handling or storing it.

How to Extinguish a Candle Properly

You can extinguish a candle using a candle snuffer or by carefully blowing out the flame.

Whichever method you use, avoid splashing or pouring anything into the wax.

And never use water to extinguish a candle.

Once the flame is out, let the candle cool completely before moving it.

How to Make Your Candle Last Longer

Want to get more life out of your candle?

The best thing you can do is avoid extremely short burns and extremely long burns.

Give the candle enough time to develop an even melt pool, but don't let it burn for hours and hours at a time.

Keep the wick trimmed.

Keep the wax free of debris.

Keep your candle away from drafts.

And most importantly, actually let yourself enjoy it.

A candle isn't supposed to sit untouched because you're afraid of “using it up.” It's meant to be burned.

What If My Candle Starts Tunneling?

If you notice your candle burning down the center while leaving wax around the edges, that's called tunneling.

It's one of the most common candle-burning issues, and it's exactly why the first burn matters so much.

I already went deep on the causes of candle tunneling and what you can do about it, so rather than repeating everything here, you can read that guide next.

The RANNI Way to Burn a Candle

At the end of the day, I don't think candle care should take the joy out of burning a candle.

My goal is to make candles that are beautiful, fragrant, and thoughtfully formulated from the start. Your job is simply to give the candle the conditions it needs to burn the way I intended.

1. Trim the wick.
2. Give the first burn enough time.
3. Let the melt pool develop.
4. Keep the candle away from drafts.
5. Don't burn it for too long.
6. And then sit back and enjoy the damn candle.

That's it.

Want More Candle Care Tips?

If you're new to candle care or simply want to get better at burning your candles, keep an eye on The RANNI Edit. I'm building out a whole collection of guides to help you get the most out of every candle.