Extremely low maintenance, reed diffusers are a wonderful alternative to fragrance your home, especially if you’d prefer not to use a naked flame in your home as you would with candles or wax melts.

They are also incredibly easy to make and use. Reed sticks are inserted into a glass bottle with a narrow neck that’s filled with scented diffuser mixture; the reeds soak up the scent and release a most pleasant aroma around your home. Compared to other home fragrance products such as candles or wax melts, reed diffusers produce fragrance that usually lasts longer and don’t require the use of a flame.

If you’ve ever wondered how to make your own reed diffusers, our beginner's tutorial will talk you through the process and options available as well as show you how to simple it is to make your own Lime, Basil & Mandarin scented reed diffuser.

Jump straight in with our video below or read on for a written tutorial and further information on making your own diffuser.

Please note: Our tutorial is designed for personal use only. You will need to follow all legal responsibilities before selling any products to the public. For more information on selling home fragrance products, check out our Ultimate Guide to Selling Your Handmade Candles and Wax Melts.

How to Make a Lime, Basil & Mandarin Reed Diffuser with Augeo Base

If you’re eager to make your own reed diffuser, why not try creating one with our simple tutorial?

Difficulty Level: Beginner

Makes: 1 Reed Diffuser

Materials and Ingredients

Ingredients

• 80g Augeo Clean Multi
• 20g Lime Basil & Mandarin Fragrance Oil

Materials

• 1 x 100ml Matte Black Diffuser Bottle
• 1 x Silver Reed Diffuser Cap
• 8 x White Fibre Diffuser Reeds
• Digital weighing scales
• Stainless steel or glass pouring jug (optional)
• Small funnel
• Kitchen roll to protect your work surface
• Nitrile gloves (or similar protective gloves) and an apron. We’d also highly recommend the use of a chemical mask

Top tip: Before starting, make sure your work surface is covered and you’re wearing the correct PPE as stated in the materials needed above. This is to avoid skin/respiratory irritation from the fragrance oil and to protect your clothes from any splashes.

Step 1 Weighing Out the Augeo

Place the jug on your scales and turn on. If you prefer, you can simply put the funnel in the top of the diffuser bottle and pour it straight in. Make sure the scales are set to weigh in grams. Weigh out 80g of Augeo.

If using a jug, once you’ve weighed out 80g of Augeo, pour this straight into the diffuser bottle.

Top tip: It can sometimes be quite difficult to pour from the 1L Augeo bottles and it may result in some wastage down the sides of the bottle itself. To avoid this, we poured the Augeo liquid down the metal stick of a thermometer. This also helped us to only pour what we needed with minimal mess. You can also use a pouring jug for transferring it to your diffuser bottle, putting the excess straight back into the bottle.

Step 2 Adding Fragrance Oil

Place the diffuser bottle on your scales. Pop the funnel in the top (if not already in there) and turn on the scales.

Add 20g of Lime Basil & Mandarin fragrance oil.

Step 3 Mixing the Augeo and Fragrance Oil

Take the plastic travel stopper and put it in the diffuser bottle. Screw the silver cap on and shake the bottle for around 30 seconds to ensure the mixture is fully combined.

Step 4 Adding the Reeds

Once mixed, unscrew the cap and remove the plastic travel stopper. Screw the cap back on the bottle and insert 8 fibre reeds.

Step 5 Using Your Reed Diffuser

Your reed diffuser is now ready and can be placed in a room of your choosing. Remember to flip the reeds after 48 hours to make sure they’re fully soaked.

For a stronger scent throw, we would recommend leaving the made-up reed diffuser sealed for 48-72 hours to allow the mixture to bind together and settle. This will ensure that the reed diffuser performs at its best once opened.

Which Base Should I Use for My Reed Diffusers?

The most popular base for reed diffusers is Augeo. There are two varieties that we sell – Augeo Clean Multi and Augeo Crystal. This base only requires you to add your chosen fragrance oil. These two bases serve the same purpose - to help enhance the fragrance and provide a long-lasting scent. The only difference between these bases is that the Augeo Crystal has been registered with the Vegan Society and is deemed ‘eco friendly’.

For this tutorial, we’ve chosen to use our most popular reed diffuser base - Augeo Clean Multi.

Which Scent Should I Choose for Making Reed Diffusers?

We have a huge range of over 350 professional grade diffuser-friendly fragrance oils that can be used to make your reed diffuser. There is no right or wrong fragrance you should use so have fun going through our range by scent category to find the right one for your living space. Choosing your favourite fragrance is entirely subjective so it’s really just a matter of personal choice and what you might enjoy the most.

If you’re struggling to choose however, we’ve got some recommendations for you! A spa-style fragrance might be perfect for the bathroom so why not try Spa Day? For the bedroom, a relaxing floral such as Lavender can help you drift to sleep. In a kitchen, a zingy, mint medley like Rhubarb & Wild Mint is another great choice.

For our tutorial, we’ve chosen one of our best sellers - Lime, Basil and Mandarin, a bright refreshing fragrance with uplifting hints of lemongrass and spearmint, perfect for any room in your home.

How Much Fragrance Oil Should I Use in My Reed Diffuser?

Due to the high strength of our fragrance oils, we advise a usage percentage of between 15%-25%. Each oil’s strength varies which means that some fragrances will perform better at a lower percentage and others will benefit from using at a higher percentage. We would always advise that you test your diffusers thoroughly so that you can find the percentage that performs best for the fragrance oil you’ve chosen.

One thing you’ll need to remember when making diffusers is to always check the IFRA 49^th Amendment document download on each fragrance oils page before choosing your desired fragrance. These are safety standards that confirm the suitability of the oil for use in diffusers and the maximum percentage allowed under the guidelines. For reed diffusers, you’ll want to check the IFRA category 10.A.

As the recommended percentage for diffusers is between 15% - 25%, you want to ensure the oil you choose lists the 10.A category at 15% or more. If it’s less than 15%, it’s not recommended for use in a diffuser. If it shows a usage level of over 25%, then we would advise sticking to the maximum of 25% regardless.

For this tutorial, we’ve chosen to use Lime Basil & Mandarin fragrance oil at its maximum usage of 20% fragrance load. The amount of mixture you need would depend on the size of the diffuser bottle used. The container we’ve used in this tutorial is a 100ml round diffuser bottle.

We know we need 100g total, so we’ve used 80g of Augeo base and added 20g fragrance oil to give a total of 100g mixture. This means that 20% (100 x 0.20 = 20) of the overall mixture would be made up of the fragrance oil and meets the IFRA recommended allowance for safety.

Top tip: You may use millilitres or grams when making reed diffusers. Just make sure that you stick to the same measurement for both your base and fragrance oil to ensure accuracy. For ease with simple measuring, we’ve opted to use grams in our tutorial.

What Type of Reeds Are Best to Use for Reed Diffusers?

There are a variety of reeds available ranging from fibre, rattan and bamboo. All have different degrees of their ability to disperse fragrance. We’ve found that fibre reeds are best for scent absorption and release.

In fact, fibre reeds are man-made for the exact purpose of being used in reed diffusers. This means their structure and composition are optimised for fragrance diffusion.

Can I Use My Reed Diffuser Straight Away?

You can start using your reed diffuser as soon as you’ve made it, but we’d recommend allowing a few days for the fragrance to start dispersing through the reeds.

For maximum scent throw, we would advise leaving your made-up reed diffuser sealed for around 48-72 hours so that the fragrance oil can bind effectively with the Augeo base.

When opened and placed in your room, we’d recommend turning the reeds after 48 hours so that the entirety of the reeds are soaked in the mixture. Make sure you use protective gloves when turning the reeds and something to protect your surfaces from any drips.

Where’s the Best Place for My Reed Diffuser?

Did you know that the temperature of a room and placement of the reed diffuser can impact on how well the fragrance is released? Warmer areas such as near windows (when the sun is shining), near radiators (not directly on) or in kitchens can help the fragrance throw to project further.

The warmer area helps the diffuser to work more effectively, and you’ll get a stronger scent. However, one thing to note with placing in warmer areas is that the diffuser may not last as long, as any radiant heat will cause the liquid to evaporate faster.

If you’d prefer a more subtle scent, place the reed diffuser in a cooler area. This will slow down the evaporation so the scent will be less obvious, but it will make your reed diffuser last longer.

We hope you enjoyed this tutorial and learned how easy it is to make your own scented reed diffusers. Why not have a look at our diffuser bottles to decide which you’d like to use for your next reed diffuser making project? We also have a more advanced tutorial for making a coloured reed diffuser to try next!