Why 119 bottles want to be Aventus

There are 119 bottles in our index built to smell like one fragrance. Not a family, not a style — one bottle, released by Creed in 2010 and composed by Olivier & Erwin Creed. No other fragrance we cover comes close. Second place has half as many.

The reason is not mysterious once you smell it. Aventus opens on pineapple — bright, juicy, slightly sharp — over bergamot and apple, and before you have finished deciding whether a man's fragrance should smell of fruit, birch smoke arrives underneath and answers the question for you. It is the contrast that does it: something sweet and something burnt, held in the same breath.

Aventus, from first spray to the end of the evening

0:00after the first spray

Top

• pineapple
• bergamot
• apple

Heart

• birch
• patchouli
• rose

Base

• oakmoss
• musk
• ambergris

Spray1h 2h4h8h

Why everyone wants a copy

Inspired by the life of Napoleon; the smoky-pineapple release that became the best-selling niche masculine of its era.

That success has a price, and it is a large one: Creed sells it at $510 for 100ml. Which is exactly the gap the copies are built to fill. When something is this loved and this expensive, a whole industry forms to answer one question — can you get close enough for less?

27,500 people have rated Aventus. They land at 4.32 out of 5 — close to consensus, in a hobby that rarely agrees on anything.

The batch question

Ask anyone who has worn Aventus for long and they will mention batches. The complaint is so common it has become part of the fragrance's identity:

“Batch variation is the eternal talking point, with some bottles projecting like beasts and others feeling weaker and shorter-lived.”

What it costs to smell like this

At retail, Aventus works out at $510 per 100ml. The best value we can find, measured the same way, is Nusuk Ana Al Awwal Silver at $17 per 100ml. Move the slider to see what that difference is worth to you over a year.

What you would keep

If you get through 2 × 100ml a year

Aventus

$1,020

Nusuk Ana Al Awwal Silver

$34

Back in your pocket

$986

Three to start with

And if you simply want the lowest price on the shelf, these are the three cheapest bottles of the 119 we list:

Every one of them, and the other 116, is on the full Aventus review, cheapest first.