Vivant are the brand you reach for when you want most of the experience without the flagship price. They came out of the same Shenzhen scene that produces a lot of the world’s vape hardware, and they made their name doing one thing well: a cheap vaporiser that doesn’t feel cheap in the hand. People in Australia found them because the good German and American units cost a fortune here once you add shipping and the exchange rate, and Vivant filled the gap underneath without making something that fell apart in a month.
The range is small and a bit scattered. One dry herb portable, two concentrate units, and not much overlap between them. Here’s the honest rundown of each.
The Alternate
The Alternate is Vivant’s dry herb portable, and it’s the one most people came to the brand for. It’s a conduction vape, so the herb sits against a hot ceramic chamber rather than having hot air pulled through it. That means it’s quick off the mark and dead simple, but you do have to give it a stir halfway through or the top of the bowl stays pale while the bottom cooks. Five preset temperatures, a coloured light to tell you where you’re at, and a glass mouthpiece that actually cools the vapour a touch. Sits nicely from about 180°C for flavour up to 215°C if you want it thick and warm. The quirk everyone mentions is the proprietary charging dock, so don’t lose it, and the draw is a little restrictive compared to a convection unit. For the money, though, it’s a genuinely good first vape.
The DAbOX
The DAbOX is a concentrate vape, not a herb one, so go in knowing that. It’s a chunky little box with a quartz or ceramic coil atom, built to take a dab and turn it into vapour in a second or two. Conduction again, in the sense that the coil heats the concentrate directly. Three voltage settings rather than a temperature in degrees, but in practice the low setting is the gentle flavoursome one and the high setting is where you get the big rip, roughly the equivalent of pushing past 230°C on a proper e-rig. It suits someone who dabs and wants something they can throw in a bag without babying it. The trade-offs are the ones you’d expect at the price: coils are a wear part you’ll replace fairly often, and the loading is fiddly if you’ve got big fingers. Tough as old boots otherwise.
The Ambit
The Ambit is Vivant’s go at a pocket e-rig for concentrates, and it’s the most interesting of the three. Same idea as the DAbOX, but with a proper temperature readout and a glass bubbler-style mouthpiece that filters the vapour through water, so it’s a lot smoother on the throat. It runs an interchangeable atomiser system, which is handy because you can swap a tired coil instead of binning the unit. Sits well around 200°C for taste and climbs toward 250°C when you want the dense stuff. Who’s it for? Someone who’d like the experience of a desktop e-rig but wants it portable and doesn’t want to spend three figures. The catches: the glass attachment is glass, so it’ll break if you drop it on tiles, and battery life under heavy use is just okay. Still, it’s a clever little unit and the smoothest vape Vivant make.
Living with one
These aren’t sealed bricks, which is the good news. Coils and atomisers unscrew and get replaced rather than ending the device, the glass parts on the Alternate and Ambit come off for a soak in iso, and a cotton bud through the chamber after a few sessions keeps the flavour honest. The weak point across the range tends to be the chargers and the proprietary bits, so look after the dock and the cables. Treat a Vivant vaporizer decently and it’ll see you through a good while, but they’re not heirloom gear, so don’t expect a decade out of one the way you might from the pricier names.
Which one suits you
Quick version. Dry herb and you want a solid cheap starter: the Alternate. Concentrates and you want something rugged and pocketable: the DAbOX. Concentrates but you want it smooth, with a real temperature readout and water filtration: the Ambit.
If you’re cross-shopping, it’s worth a look at the broader portable vaporizers and concentrate vaporizers ranges to see where Vivant sits. Brand-wise, the usual budget rivals people weigh up are XMax (XVape) and Boundless, both of which lean a bit more towards convection on the herb side if that matters to you.