image: ©Calvin Chan Wai Meng | iStock

The consultation, announced on 10 July, forms part of wider efforts to tackle the growing number of young people experimenting with vaping while maintaining access to vaping products for adults who are trying to stop smoking.

Among the key proposals is the introduction of standardised white packaging for vapes, with strict limits on branding, colours, imagery and text. Vape devices themselves could also be required to be available only in white, black or grey, with cosmetic lights and decorative screens removed.

The plans also aim to simplify the way vape flavours are described. Instead of colourful or novelty names linked to sweets, desserts, alcoholic drinks, or fictional concepts, manufacturers would be permitted to use only straightforward descriptions such as “Apple” or “Mint”.

The Government believes bright packaging, eye-catching displays and child-friendly flavour names have contributed to the rise in youth vaping.

Figures from Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) suggest around one million 11-to 17-year-olds in Great Britain reported trying vaping during 2025, with almost one in five children saying they have experimented with e-cigarettes.

Retail displays would also face tighter controls, with proposals to keep vaping products out of sight in shops, much as tobacco products are currently displayed.

The consultation extends beyond vaping and also outlines further restrictions for tobacco products.

Plain packaging requirements, already in place for cigarettes and hand-rolling tobacco since 2017, would be expanded to cover cigars, pipe tobacco, shisha, heated tobacco products, cigarette papers and herbal smoking products.

Additional proposals include introducing positive quit-support messages inside tobacco packaging, extending health warnings to all tobacco products and removing display exemptions currently used in duty-free shops, airports and specialist tobacconists.

Heated tobacco devices would also be required to adopt a standard, drab brown appearance with limited branding and only essential safety information displayed on screens.

The consultation follows the Tobacco and Vapes Act, which received Royal Assent in April 2026, and introduces measures to create the UK’s first smoke-free generation.

It builds on previous action, including the ban on single-use vapes introduced in June 2025, and comes ahead of several further changes due over the next year. These include the introduction of a Vaping Products Duty from October 2026, a ban on vape vending machine sales and free distribution later that month, and a prohibition on vape advertising and sponsorship from June 2027.

The proposals will also apply to nicotine pouches, reflecting increasing awareness and use of alternative nicotine products among young people.

The consultation will run for 12 weeks and cover all four UK nations. No immediate legal changes are being introduced, with final regulations to be developed after responses have been reviewed.

Medicinally licensed nicotine products will remain exempt, as they are regulated under separate legislation.