30-Second Verdict
The PAX 4 wins, 8.3 to 7.5, and it isn't close in most categories. More vapour, bigger battery, better cleaning access, a chamber you can actually load without a steady hand, and the half-pack lid in the box rather than on a separate order. The Mini 2 does exactly one thing better than the PAX 4 — better than everything, in fact: it weighs 89 grams and fits in a closed fist. If that sentence just decided your purchase, buy the Mini and skip to the shop link. Everyone else: the extra money buys a properly better device.
PAX 4: 8.3/10
PAX Mini 2: 7.5/10
Buy the PAX 4 if:
- You want one PAX that covers everything — nights out, evenings in, actual sessions
- Vapour matters: 7.8/10 against the Mini's 6.5 is the biggest gap on the sheet
- You want the half-pack lid included and real-time manual temperature nudging
- You'll use it more than a couple of times a week (the Mini's hour of battery gets old)
Buy the PAX Mini 2 if:
- Absolute minimum size and weight is the entire brief — nothing named-brand is smaller
- It's a second device: the invisible one for the smallest bag and the shortest errand
- You microdose in short sessions and an hour of battery is genuinely enough
- The Mini's price is your ceiling and design still matters at that ceiling
Quick Specs:
| PAX 4 | PAX Mini 2 | |
|---|---|---|
| Heat-up | ~20s | ~22s |
| Battery | Sealed 2800mAh, ~5 sessions | Sealed (capacity unpublished), 7–8 short sessions, ~1hr use |
| Bowl | ~0.35g, half-pack lid included | 0.5g full / 0.25g with half-pack lid (sold separately) |
| Weight | 125g | 89g |
| Warranty | 2yrs, 3 with registration | 2yrs, 3 with registration |
| Price | Check current price | Check current price |
The Hook: The Clutch Bag and the Handbag
There is a hierarchy of bags in this flat, and I did not design it, and I do not administer it.
At the top there's the weekend bag, which is for weekends. Below that, the work bag — the big structured one that holds a laptop, a book (there is always a book), an emergency second book, and approximately one drawer of Boots. Below that, the handbag proper: the going-out one, edited down, everything in it earning its place. And at the bottom, the clutch — the tiny one that fits a card, a key, a lipstick, and precisely nothing else, deployed maybe six times a year when the dress code demands it.
Sarah explained this taxonomy to me once, unprompted, with the weary patience of someone describing tax brackets to a child. The relevant detail for this article is that each bag has different rules, and the rules decide what gets carried — not the other way round.
The PAX Mini 2 — her Greenstone, bought without asking, known as "the little one" for three weeks before I told her it had a name — is a clutch-bag object. It was purchased on clutch-bag logic: "It's pretty and it fits in my clutch bag. That's all I need." Eighty-nine grams. One of her friends thought it was a lipstick, which in the taxonomy is basically a compliment.
The PAX 4 is a handbag object. Bigger, more capable, still elegant, still edited — the thing you carry when you're actually going somewhere and intend to do something when you get there. When it arrived for review, Sarah annexed it inside a fortnight: "I'm taking this one to my mum's at the weekend." What about the Mini? "The Mini's in my work bag. This one's nicer."
Capability versus disappearance. That's the whole comparison. The AirPods of vaporisers against the Smeg toaster of vaporisers — I've made both arguments at review length, and I'll only lean on the toaster once today, promise. The question this article answers is simpler than either: sixty-one quid sits between these two PAXes. Which side of it should your money land on?
We stock both at HerbVape.co.uk — details and pricing below.
Vapour Quality
PAX 4: 7.8/10 · PAX Mini 2: 6.5/10 — the PAX 4, by the widest margin in this article.
The Mini 2 is pure conduction done as well as pure conduction can be done at 89 grams — which is to say: consistent, predictable, and ceilinged. Mode 2 gives you four draws with character, the 3D screen keeps the hot spots down, and the output never surprises you in either direction. I wrote that you're not paying for the vapour, and the 6.5 is that sentence as a number.
The PAX 4 is a different generation of the same idea. The conduction-leaning hybrid — the Flow's architecture scaled down — gives it cleaner opening draws than any non-Flow PAX, denser mid-bowl extraction, and more bowl-life. Its flavour is compressed rather than expansive, similar in character to the Mini 2 — but with meaningfully more density behind it and more draws before the oven takes over.
Both are sippers. Both punish a bong-rip draw with warm air. But where the Mini 2 gives you a recognisable rendering of your flower, the PAX 4 gives you — at its best, mid-temp, dessert strain — flavours you can actually name separately. That's not a difference of degree; between these two it's the difference between a vape you tolerate and a vape you don't have to apologise for. Winner: PAX 4, decisively.
The Strain Test, Side by Side
Same jars, same grinder, same house protocol — the flower held still so the ovens have nowhere to hide. The Mini 2 ran 0.25g under its half-pack lid at its fixed presets (180/193/204°C); the PAX 4 ran 0.35g full-chamber, using its manual nudge to sit on 180/193/205°C. Note the asymmetry, because it's the article in miniature: the Mini 2 must half-pack (Tom loaded 0.5g into it once, complained the flavour was weak, and got the site's most-quoted telling-off: "Tom. Half-pack lid. Read the manual"), while the PAX 4 half-packs by choice, with the lid included in the box.
Jack Herer
Jack is the strain that shows you up, and it filed the two devices in the correct order without any help from me.
Low temp: the Mini 2 managed pine needles and lemon peel on draw one — "thin, but present" — held the citrus through draw two, and was into green-herb territory by three. Four draws, two of them good. The PAX 4 opened with the best draw any PAX has given me — pine, lemon peel, a thin thread of fresh resin, bright and legible — held most of it through draw two, thinned by three, and stretched to five draws total. Same shape of decline, one extra draw, and a first draw in a different class. Hot walls blend fragile top notes on both; the PAX 4's convection assist just delays the sentence.
Mid-temp, they converge, as conduction always does: black pepper well-defined on both — pepper is the durable heart of this flower and neither oven troubles it — over a woody haze, four consistent draws each. The Mini 2 hands you "one blended thing rather than a sequence of layers"; the PAX 4 hands you pepper and wood "blended together rather than stacked." I wrote those verdicts months apart and they are the same verdict. At mid-temp on Jack, the price gap buys you density, not resolution.
Top temp: earth, toast, a little leather on both, three draws to a finished bowl. The Mini 2's presets are the quiet extra tax here — "no 185°C to hide in, only Mode 1, Mode 2, and thirteen degrees of nothing between them" — where the PAX 4's manual nudge at least lets you pick your poison by the degree.
Wedding Cake
Where Jack exposes, this jar flatters — and it flatters both of these more than anything else in their price brackets.
Low temp: vanilla and sweet cream, thick, on both. The Mini 2's rendering earned the highest score this device has ever been given in our flat — Sarah said it smelled like a bakery and went back to her book. The PAX 4, for its part, got asked whether I'd put something in the oven. Dessert genetics and hot walls want the same things, at 89 grams or 125.
Mid-temp is where the money shows. The Mini 2 gives you butter, baked cake, warm dough, pepper late — all of it good, all of it arriving as "warm sweet cream as one satisfying thing." Richness, not resolution; that's the review's phrase and it's the honest ceiling. The PAX 4 at 193°C names its components: vanilla, butter, dough, pepper, four things rather than one undifferentiated sweet — the single strongest argument for its vapour score. On this jar, the sixty-one quid buys you exactly one upgrade: separation. Whether that matters is a personality test. Sarah's answer is on record — she doesn't do tasting notes and loves the Mini anyway. Mine is the score gap.
Top temp: toasted, nutty, caramelised sugar tipping burnt on both, three draws, done.
The flavour-device/delivery-device call: neither is a flavour device. The Mini 2 is a delivery device with charm — richness, not resolution. The PAX 4 is half and half — good enough to separate vanilla from butter, not good enough to keep hold of pine. Both are dessert-strain machines; if your jar leans Jack, neither of these is where your money should go and the reviews say so in writing.
Design & Build
PAX 4: 9.5/10 · PAX Mini 2: 9.0/10 — PAX 4, in a family photo finish.
The two best-designed objects in the shop, from the only vape company that employs people who'd rather be at Apple. The Mini 2 is the purer expression of the idea — 93mm of aluminium that feels milled from a single block, the best-designed portable I've held, small enough that you keep checking your pocket. The PAX 4 is a step on rather than a step up: denser, more substantial, slimmer than the Flow, with the 3D oven screen refined one more generation and colour options (that Sage Green stopped Sarah for a full thirty seconds) that turn it into an object rather than a tool.
The PAX 4 takes the extra half point on practical grounds: the larger oven opening makes loading a two-second job instead of a steady-hand exercise — the Mini's small opening puts a fifth of your grind on the worktop if you rush — and the half-pack lid ships in the box, where the Mini makes it a separate purchase for a device that needs it. Both are beautiful. One is beautiful and convenient. Winner: PAX 4.
Battery & Charging
PAX 4: 7.5/10 · PAX Mini 2: 5.0/10 — PAX 4, comfortably.
This is the Mini's structural weakness and there's no styling it out. PAX won't publish the Mini 2's capacity, and once you've used one you understand why: about an hour of real use, seven to eight short sessions, top-up daily if you're a regular. The motion-sensing standby is clever, but a cell that small is a cell that small — no software trick fixes physics.
The PAX 4's 2800mAh gets you about five proper sessions and up to fifty minutes continuous — not class-leading (the Solo 3 v2 laps both of these), but a normal evening without thinking. Charging: the PAX 4 does USB-C straight into the body, ~100 minutes full, 50% in ~25. The Mini 2 does USB-C via a magnetic dock, ~90 minutes — which means there's still a proprietary piece of kit to forget, just a smaller one than the bad old days.
Both sealed, both on the 18–24-month degradation clock, both excluded from warranty on that count. Winner: PAX 4, and it's the least contested section in the article.
Ease of Use
PAX 4: 9.5/10 · PAX Mini 2: 8.0/10 — PAX 4.
Genuinely close in spirit — both are one-button, four-mode, lip-sensing, motion-standby devices that a first-timer operates without instructions. Sarah used the Mini for three weeks without asking a single question, which remains the best usability review this site has published.
The PAX 4 pulls ahead on three specifics: the real-time manual adjustment (the Mini gives you four fixed modes and nothing between them), the bigger oven opening (fewer Tom incidents), and a haptic buzz firm enough to feel through a jacket. The Mini's fiddly loading is the one place its size actively costs you — fine grind, gentle pack, don't rush, and use the lid you had to buy separately. Winner: PAX 4, though a beginner would be happy with either.
Cleaning & Maintenance
PAX 4: 8.5/10 · PAX Mini 2: 8.0/10 — PAX 4, narrowly.
The 3D oven screen is the shared hero — it lifted the PAX cleaning curse on the Mini 2 and the PAX 4 inherits the fix. Both screens pop out cleanly; both devices want a brush every three or four sessions and an ISO soak weekly if you're daily-driving.
The PAX 4 adds proper airpath access — magnetic mouthpiece off, dampened bud through the oven cavity, roughly ten minutes for a full clean, no tools. The Mini 2 asks for a monthly pipe-cleaner through the vapour path and an occasional seal-ring replacement. High-frequency-low-effort on both; the PAX 4 is simply the best PAX cleaning experience yet, which I said in its review and repeat here without inflation. Buy the PAX maintenance kit for either. Winner: PAX 4, by access rather than effort.
Portability
PAX 4: 9.5/10 · PAX Mini 2: 10/10 — the Mini 2. Its one win, and a real one.
The only category the Mini takes, and it takes it off everything, not just its sibling. Eighty-nine grams. Closed fist. Coin pocket. Clutch bag. The most portable named-brand vaporiser you can buy, full stop — smaller than most lighters, mistaken for a lipstick in the wild, unnoticed in Sarah's bag by everyone who's ever been near it.
The PAX 4 is itself superb — 125g, roll-of-mints footprint, reads as generic consumer tech, disappeared into a Friday night without a case. For 95% of real situations they are equally invisible. The remaining 5% is the clutch-bag tier: the pocket-less dress, the tiny bag, the shortest possible errand. In that tier the Mini is the only device on the site that qualifies at all.
Sarah's comparative ruling, delivered while transferring exactly one of them into the going-out bag: "Better than the Mini for going out — looks like an iPod when I pull it out." The Mini stayed in the work bag. Neither was insulted. Winner: Mini 2 — because the pocket is the point, and its pocket is smaller.
Value for Money
PAX 4: 7/10 · PAX Mini 2: 6.0/10 — PAX 4.
Both pay the PAX tax; the question is what the tax buys at each tier. The Mini 2's markup is roughly thirty per cent of the ticket — design and badge money over a Smono No.3 that vapes better for less. The PAX 4 loses the same spreadsheet fights (the V3 Pro remains the elephant in the room — that's its own article), but its tax buys a more defensible bundle: best-in-class ease of use, near-best portability, and vapour you'd actually choose.
The intra-family maths: the price gap gets you +1.3 on vapour, +2.5 on battery, an included lid, manual temperature control, and easier everything. It costs you 36 grams and the clutch-bag tier. Pound for pound the PAX 4 is the better PAX purchase, and the Mini 2 review's own "Vs PAX 4" section already conceded it: "the natural step up." Winner: PAX 4.
Score Comparison
| Category | PAX 4 | PAX Mini 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Vapour Quality | 7.8/10 | 6.5/10 |
| Design & Build | 9.5/10 | 9.0/10 |
| Battery & Charging | 7.5/10 | 5.0/10 |
| Ease of Use | 9.5/10 | 8.0/10 |
| Cleaning & Maintenance | 8.5/10 | 8.0/10 |
| Portability | 9.5/10 | 10/10 |
| Value for Money | 7/10 | 6.0/10 |
| Overall | 8.3/10 | 7.5/10 |
Six categories to the PAX 4, one to the Mini 2 — and the Mini's one is a perfect ten. That's the cleanest score-sheet summary this site has produced: a device that loses almost everywhere and still owns the only category some buyers care about.
Who Should Buy Which
Buy the PAX 4 if you're buying one device. This is the honest default. It does everything the Mini does at 95% of the invisibility, and everything the Mini can't do — a proper evening of battery, a full chamber for shared sessions, vapour with enough behind it to be the whole plan rather than the top-up. First PAX, only PAX, upgrade from a PAX 3, upgrade from a Mini you've outgrown: all roads lead here. It's also the better beginner buy despite the higher price, because the thing you learn on shouldn't be the thing that runs out of battery in an hour.
Buy the Mini 2 if disappearance is the brief, or if it's device number two. There are people — I live with one — for whom "it's pretty and it fits in my clutch bag" is a complete and unanswerable specification. If your use is short, occasional and stealth-first; if the bag it has to fit is genuinely tiny; if the Mini's price is where the budget ends and you refuse to carry something agricultural — the Mini 2 remains the only premium object in its weight class. Just buy the half-pack lid with it. It isn't optional. Ask Tom.
Buy neither if vapour per pound is your metric — at these prices the Smono No.3 and V3 Pro out-vape both, and I've said so in print. You're in a PAX article because you already know that and don't care. Respect.
How I Actually Choose
Strictly speaking, I don't choose between these two — the household does, and the luggage hierarchy adjudicates. The Mini 2 is Sarah's: the Greenstone lives in her work bag as a permanent fixture and gets clutch duty on the rare nights that tier is invoked. I borrow it as the dress-shoe option — dinners out, visiting mates who don't know I vape, anywhere even the PAX 4 feels like too much presence.
The PAX 4 runs three or four sessions a week in my going-out rotation — the pocket slot, pubs and gigs and cinemas — except when it's been annexed, which is often, because it's the only vape Sarah has actively tried to steal in eight months of them coming through this flat.
I once asked her, in the spirit of research, which one she'd keep if she had to pick. She looked at me the way she looked at the man who tried to sell us one sofa cushion. "Why would I choose? They're for different bags." Which is, infuriatingly, the entire conclusion of this article delivered in nine words, unpaid.
The Verdict (The Bookend)
Nobody stands in a shop choosing between a clutch bag and a handbag. They're not competitors; they're tiers. You buy the handbag first — it's the one that actually carries your life — and the clutch comes later, when there's an occasion that demands the smallest possible version of being organised.
Same here. The PAX 4 first. The Mini 2, if ever, second. The PAX 4 is simply the better device: better vapour, five times the battery score, easier to load, easier to clean, and only marginally less invisible. The Mini 2's counter-argument is one number — 89 — and for the clutch-bag tier of your life, no other number matters.
The hierarchy has spoken. It usually does.
FAQ
PAX 4 vs PAX Mini 2 — which should I buy?
The PAX 4 for almost everyone: better vapour (7.8 vs 6.5), far better battery, included half-pack lid, easier loading and cleaning, for a bit more money. Buy the Mini 2 only if absolute minimum size is the entire brief or it's a second, stealth-only device. Both carry the same 2+1-year warranty.
Is the vapour difference really noticeable?
Yes — it's the biggest gap on the score sheet. Side by side on the same jars, the PAX 4 delivers denser draws, an extra draw or two of life per bowl, and (on dessert strains at mid-temp) flavour components you can actually name separately. The Mini 2 gives you richness, not resolution. Both are conduction-hearted sippers; neither will out-taste a glass-path device.
How do the batteries compare in real use?
PAX 4: about five full sessions, up to 50 minutes continuous, ~100-minute USB-C charge into the body. Mini 2: seven to eight short sessions — roughly an hour of actual use — charged through a magnetic USB-C dock in ~90 minutes. Both cells are sealed and follow the standard 18–24-month degradation timeline, which the warranty doesn't cover.
Do I need the half-pack lid?
On the Mini 2: absolutely, and it's sold separately — the 0.5g full oven is too big for even conduction, and overloading it is the classic mistake (flavour goes weak, manual goes unread). On the PAX 4 it's included and it's the difference between an efficient solo bowl and wasted flower. Either way: use the lid.
Which is easier to clean?
Both benefit from the pop-out 3D oven screen, and both want a quick brush every three or four sessions. The PAX 4 edges it (8.5 vs 8.0) with its magnetic mouthpiece and accessible airpath — about ten minutes for a full clean, no tools. Budget for the PAX maintenance kit whichever you pick.
Can either be used with a water piece?
Neither has a dedicated water mode — that's the Flow's territory. The PAX 4's Mode 4 (220°C) works through a water piece at home as an improvisation. The Mini 2's output is too modest for water to make sense. If bong sessions are part of the plan, read the PAX 4 vs PAX Flow comparison instead.
Is the Mini 2 too small to be practical?
For a daily driver, honestly, yes — the battery and the fiddly loading make it a tool for short, occasional, invisible use. That's not a flaw; it's the design brief. It's the AirPods trade: the specs lose the argument, the experience wins it, and the pocket is the point.
About Dennis M.
Dennis M. has been vaping daily for the best part of a decade — since an original Mighty in 2018 — and has tested 50+ devices for this site. He works in IT, has ADHD, and uses cannabis for chronic pain management. He lives in Manchester with his partner Sarah, whose bag hierarchy has now formally absorbed two PAX devices and shows no signs of returning either.
He has tested titanium chambers, hand-blown glass and pure convection heaters, and the two vapes his household actually fights over are the two that lose the spec-sheet arguments. He has decided not to examine what this means for his life's work.
A note on spelling: 'vaporizer' is the de facto international spelling, but I've stuck with the British 'vaporiser' throughout this blog.
Questions, corrections, or a device you want tested? dennis@herbvape.co.uk
Related Content
Full Reviews:
Head-to-Head Comparisons:
- PAX 4 vs PAX Flow: Which PAX Should You Buy?
- PAX 4 vs V3 Pro: Design Tax vs Spec Sheet
- PAX 4 vs Solo 3 v2: Pocketability vs Vapour Quality
Best-Of Guides:
New to Vaping?
Get Both at HerbVape.co.uk
PAX 4 — the handbag: the PAX that carries your whole evening.
Buy the PAX 4 →
Worth grabbing with it: Pax Basic Maintenance Kit — brushes, buds and ISO wipes for the weekly clean.
PAX Mini 2 — the clutch: 89 grams, closed fist, gone.
Buy the PAX Mini 2 →
Worth grabbing with it: Pax Half Pack Oven Lid — not optional. Genuinely. Ask Tom.
Just one more bowl.
Last updated: 25 September 2026.
Review Policy: I buy or borrow the devices I review. HerbVape.co.uk is my employer, but my opinions are my own — they pay me to be honest, not to sell you shite. Affiliate links and discount codes exist because running a site costs money, not because they influence scores.
Strains Used: Jack Herer — sativa (Haze × Northern Lights #5 × Shiva Skunk), ~20% THC, terpinolene/caryophyllene/pinene-dominant, pine-citrus-pepper profile with fragile top notes. Wedding Cake — indica-leaning hybrid (Triangle Kush × Animal Mints, via Triangle Mints #23), ~24% THC, caryophyllene/limonene/myrcene-dominant, vanilla-cream-dough dessert profile over peppery earth. Same two strains, same jars, across every vaporiser reviewed on this site — the strain is the control, the device is the variable. Strain effects vary by individual, batch and consumption method.
Medical & Legal Disclaimer: Nothing in this review constitutes medical advice, and I am not a medical professional. Cannabis is a controlled substance in the UK; medical cannabis is legal only on prescription from a registered specialist clinic — Sapphire, Cantourage and Zerenia are three of the larger ones. HerbVape.co.uk sells vaporiser hardware only: we do not sell, prescribe, or recommend cannabis or cannabis products. Vaporisers are sold for use with legal dry herbs and legally prescribed medical cannabis. You must be 18 or over to buy one, and cannabis law varies by jurisdiction — check yours.