Don Juan Chiles Scoville Heat Scale

Looking to take your spiciness up or down a notch? Here at Don Juan Chiles, we ranked our chiles based on the Scoville Heat Index to make it easy for you to find the chiles that meet your need for heat!

The Scoville Heat Index is a measure of the spiciness of a chile. It was created by Wilbur Scoville in 1912 and is based on the quantity of capsaicin, the naturally occurring compound that gives chiles their heat. The Scoville scale ranges from 0 (no heat) to over 2 million (extremely hot). The heat of a chile was measured by diluting it in sugar water and then having tasters sample it until they can no longer detect any heat. The number of dilutions is then used to determine the chile’s Scoville rating.

Today, the Scoville heat index is determined using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) instead of the original tasting method. HPLC measures the concentration of capsaicinoids, the compounds responsible for heat, in a chile extract. This method is much more accurate and consistent than the original human taste-testing method.

Learn more about our chiles below, and we’ve made it easy to buy chiles online right here at Don Juan Chiles.