**The Volcano Hybrid vaporizer has some features only accessible via a smartphone app. On November 15th, 2019, Apple removed all vaporizer apps from its store. Apps that were downloaded before removal will still work. Android users are not affected. Please read our blog post to learn more about the app removal, and how it affects specific vaporizers.**
Update 8/19/2019: We've been spending time with the latest and greatest from Storz & Bickel, and are ready to share all of our thoughts in our full Volcano Hybrid Review.
After some images and initial rumors, we’ve been keeping a close eye on Storz & Bickel’s upcoming Volcano Hybrid. Now, we’ve had a chance to sit down with a representative of the team in Germany to discuss the upcoming vaporizer, which as it turns out, will be available extremely soon.
Volcano Hybrid: The basics
The Volcano Hybrid vaporizer officially launches on Friday, June 28th in Europe. We’re in the process of getting ready to stock the Hybrid, and hope to have it ready for sale as close to launch day as possible. When it hits shelves, it will carry a list price of $699, $100 more than the Volcano Digit, which Storz & Bickel will no longer produce. Make sure to keep an eye here in the next few weeks, as we’ll update this post when we have the Volcano Hybrid for sale.
With that out of the way, let’s get to some of the more in-depth questions about the latest from Storz & Bickel, with answers gleaned from our interview with their representative, Emily.
Whip it up
While the previous models of Volcano vaporizer only used a pump that was perfect for bags, the Volcano Hybrid also lets you hook up a (rotating) whip for direct draws. This improved versatility lets you decide how much vapor you want to take in, with the same great taste and cooling you’ve come to expect from the legendary Storz & Bickel. Some internal changes were needed to add the whip, and it looks like the Hybrid adds a little conduction to the mix, like the Plenty. We’re not sure if this changes the vapor much, but we’re looking out for that once we get a unit to test. Either way, the hits we got from the whip during this interview were memorable.
Keeping it current
How do you make the most popular and enduring vaporizer even better? By not changing much. Successful products don’t need to be redesigned, just updated. In that spirit, the Volcano looks mostly the same, and still has the same vaping process, but with some tweaks to bring it into the modern era. Storz & Bickel has moved from buttons and switches to sleeker touch-sensitive controls. They ramped up the customization with a bluetooth app. But best of all, it now only takes a minute or two to heat up, instead of the three to six minutes it took before.
Bluetooth controls
**On November 15th, 2019, Apple removed all vaporizing apps from its store, including this Storz & Bickel app. It might not be permanent, but we are planning on an extended absence. The Volcano Hybrid works fine on its own, but can’t be customized with the app on an iPhone, unless it was downloaded before November 15th. Android users still have access to the app.**
Alongside the cosmetic changes to the front of the Volcano Hybrid, there are also plenty of under-the-hood changes to get excited about. The addition of Bluetooth lets you control the Volcano through a smartphone app. It’s not just for quick adjustments either -- the updated app will let you tweak the temperature between balloons, across a session, or on the fly.
New filling chamber, same accessories
Existing Volcano owners may be wondering whether their old accessories work with the Volcano Hybrid, and the answer is that some will, and some won’t. The Hybrid has a redesigned filling chamber that works differently from the existing Easy Valve, so your old bags will work just fine, but you’ll need to buy a new filling chamber reducer to take advantage of the Storz & Bickel dosing capsules. While Storz & Bickel tried to make all of the parts compatible, the new feature set on the Volcano required a redesign for proper heating, so only having to buy a new filling chamber (and reducer if you want to use dosing capsules) is a fair compromise.
Coming soon
We’ll update this post with more information as we get closer to launching the Volcano Hybrid, including the chance to pre-order the latest and greatest from Storz & Bickel. It’s important to note that Storz & Bickel will continue to produce accessories for the Volcano Digit, but is no longer producing the vaporizer itself, so if you’re hunting for a Volcano Digit, you should act fast before they disappear. While Storz & Bickel classically plays its releases close to the chest, they did make sure to mention that there’s more exciting stuff on the way outside of the Volcano update.
