Hot Sauce Scoville Blend Calculator
Mix two hot sauces to hit a target Scoville heat level.
Find the exact ratio to blend mild and hot sauces for your perfect heat.
The Scoville scale measures the heat of peppers and hot sauces by quantifying capsaicin concentration. It was invented in 1912 by American pharmacist Wilbur Scoville in the United States.
Scoville ratings of common hot sauces and peppers:
| Sauce / Pepper | Scoville Heat Units (SHU) |
|---|---|
| Bell pepper | 0 SHU |
| Tabasco Original | ~2,500 SHU |
| Frank’s RedHot | ~450 SHU |
| Cholula | ~1,000 SHU |
| Tapatio | ~3,000 SHU |
| Valentina Extra Hot | ~2,100 SHU |
| Texas Pete | ~750 SHU |
| Jalapeño (fresh) | 2,500–8,000 SHU |
| Habanero | 100,000–350,000 SHU |
| Tabasco Habanero | ~7,000 SHU |
| El Yucateco | ~5,800 SHU |
| Crystal Hot Sauce | ~800 SHU |
| Melinda’s Habanero | ~36,000 SHU |
| Da Bomb Beyond Insanity | ~135,600 SHU |
| Pepper X | ~3,180,000 SHU |
Blending formula:
When mixing two hot sauces by volume, the heat of the blend is a weighted average:
Blended SHU = (Volume A × SHU A + Volume B × SHU B) ÷ (Volume A + Volume B)
Practical use:
If you have a mild sauce (Cholula, ~1,000 SHU) and a hot sauce (habanero, ~100,000 SHU), and you want to hit 10,000 SHU, you need mostly mild with just a small splash of hot.
Heat perception is logarithmic — a sauce at 10,000 SHU doesn’t taste exactly twice as hot as 5,000 SHU. Your palate adapts, so always taste-test after blending before adjusting.
Tips for blending:
- Start with small amounts — it’s hard to dilute if you add too much heat
- The oil in capsaicin binds to fat, not water — dairy (milk, yogurt) cools the burn better than water
- Let blended sauces rest for 30 minutes so flavors meld before final tasting
- Acidity (vinegar) can intensify perceived heat, even without more capsaicin