Essential Oil Frequency Chart: What the Numbers Mean

✨ Here is the chart you came for. In aromatherapy tradition every oil is given a number in megahertz, and rose sits at the top of the list at 320 MHz. Basil holds the floor at 52. The numbers are a way of saying out loud what aromatherapists have always known: some scents feel bright and lifted, and some feel earthy and close to the ground.

Below is the chart as it circulates, what the two ends of it are used for, and how to pick one oil and actually use it.

On this page: The chart · Where it comes from · What the numbers mean · Why a scent lands · Choosing your bottle · Using oils kindly · The three-breath ritual · Questions

🔮 The essential oil frequency chart

Oil	On the chart	What it is reached for
Rose	320 MHz	Devotion, the heart, an occasion worth marking
Helichrysum	181 MHz	Tenderness, and grief that is still fresh
Frankincense	147 MHz	Ceremony, prayer, the hush before meditation
Lavender	118 MHz	Evening, winding down, the end of a long day
Myrrh	105 MHz	Old ritual and mourning; a deep, bitter-sweet quiet
Blue chamomile	105 MHz	Softness, and soothing a fractious mood
Juniper	98 MHz	Clearing a space, and starting something again
Sandalwood	96 MHz	Stillness that lasts. Long meditation, steady focus
Angelica	85 MHz	Protection, and the old herbal magic of the root
Peppermint	78 MHz	Waking up, clearing the head, getting moving
Galbanum	56 MHz	Green, resinous grounding
Basil	52 MHz	The herbal floor of the chart. Everyday and practical

🌙 Where does the frequency chart come from?

The list has been passed around aromatherapy circles since the early 1990s. The readings are credited to an agricultural scientist, Bruce Tainio, working on a device he built and called the BT3 Frequency Monitoring System.

If you have met the chart as the "Young Living oil frequency chart", that is the same list. Gary Young worked with Tainio and quoted the figures, and the brand is how most people first came across them.

Megahertz is the unit he used. One megahertz is a million cycles a second. Rose at 320 MHz therefore sits a long way above basil at 52, and that gap is the whole point of the chart.

You will meet people who say a bottle of oil cannot be given one tidy number. Aromatherapists have worked with this chart for more than thirty years anyway, and so do we. It is how many of us choose.

💎 What do the high and low numbers mean?

The chart reads itself, and this is the part most versions leave out. The higher figures are said to belong to spirit and emotion. The lower ones are said to sit closer to the body and the everyday.

That turns a list of numbers into something you can actually use. It is a shelf arranged by occasion.

• The top of the chart — rose, helichrysum, frankincense. Florals and resins. These are the occasion oils: an altar, a wedding morning, a prayer, a grief, a birthday you want to mark properly.
• The middle — lavender, myrrh, chamomile, juniper, sandalwood. The oils of ritual you repeat. Evening wind-downs, meditation, clearing a room, settling a house.
• The floor — peppermint, galbanum, basil. Green, herbal and practical. These are the workday oils: waking up, clearing your head, getting on with it.

🕯️ So the useful question is not which oil ranks highest. It is which end of the chart your day is asking for. A Tuesday morning wants peppermint. A quiet anniversary wants rose.

☀️ Why does a scent land so hard?

Because your nose keeps better records than you do. One trace of a familiar perfume can bring back a person, a room or an entire summer before you have found the words for it.

That is what gives a scent ritual its grip. Burn the same frankincense every time you open your journal and the smell becomes the instruction: sit down, slow the room, begin. Lavender becomes the linen cupboard at your grandmother's house. Kama becomes the last thing you do before you go out.

The chart gives you a starting point. Repetition is what makes the scent yours.

🧿 Choosing your bottle

One practical thing before you buy, because it is the mistake we see most. "Oil" covers three different products, and they are not interchangeable.

Prices checked live on 23 September 2026 and rounded, so they stay useful when a sale comes and goes.

A plant essential oil — for the chart oils themselves

This is what the chart is about: a concentrated plant extract, used with a compatible diffuser or however the bottle directs.

Our Song of India Lavender and Frankincense are both 10 ml at NZ$25. They are the two most-asked-for oils on the chart, and between them they cover the evening and the altar.

🌹 If you want the top of the chart itself, we stock Song of India Rose at NZ$75 for 5 ml, usually in very small numbers. If it has gone, the rest of the range below is always there. True rose oil is expensive everywhere, for the simple reason that it takes an enormous quantity of petals. That is part of why it sits where it sits.

The whole Song of India essential oil range starts at NZ$17.50, with most 10 ml bottles at NZ$25.

A perfume oil — for wearing

A perfume oil is a finished product made to go on skin as its label directs. It is not a plant essential oil, and it does not belong on the chart.

Kama Perfumed Oil is NZ$44.99 for 30 ml, and its listed ingredients are isopropyl myristate and perfume. Choose it because you love the scent and it has been part of the room for fifty years.

A reed diffuser — for a room that holds the cue

A reed diffuser is room fragrance. Keep the liquid off skin, and out of any other device.

The 150 ml Kama Reed Diffuser is NZ$59.99 and releases its scent through the reeds.

For a smaller spend, the scented oils collection starts with fragrance oils at NZ$9.99. Browse online for NZ delivery, or come and smell a few at Shop 62 inside Westfield Manukau. The wider aromatherapy collection gathers the burners, diffusers and holders in one place.

The quickest test: where is the scent going? On skin, in a room, or into a diffuser. If the label does not name the use you have in mind, pick a different bottle. A similar aroma is not permission to swap formats.

✨ Using oils kindly

Concentrated oils ask for a little respect, and that is the end of it.

• Follow the directions on the exact bottle and the exact device.
• Never swallow essential oil. Some are poisonous taken internally.
• Never put neat oil straight on skin. Undiluted oil can sensitise you and bring on allergic contact dermatitis.
• Patch test first when a product is meant for skin, as Healthify advises here in Aotearoa.
• Keep oils, diffuser liquid and used reeds away from tamariki and pets.
• Stop if your skin turns itchy, red or scaly. Diffused fragrance can do the same to some people.

🕯️ The three-breath ritual

Choose one oil and give it one small job. Lavender means the day is finished. Frankincense means open the journal. Rose means this occasion matters.

1. Use the product exactly as its label directs.
2. Sit where the scent reaches you naturally. Do not hold concentrated oil under your nose.
3. Take three easy breaths, and name the intention in one sentence.
4. Keep the same pairing for a week, then notice what the scent brings back.

Three breaths is enough. You are teaching yourself to recognise a moment you chose on purpose, and the chart is there to help you choose it.

If you want more ideas, our guides to choosing the right essential oil, oils for spiritual awareness and simple aromatherapy at home pick up where this one stops.

🔮 Questions people ask

Is rose essential oil really 320 MHz?

That is the figure the chart gives it, and rose has held the top of the list since the readings were first passed around in the 1990s. It is the oil aromatherapy tradition treats as the highest and the most precious, which is also why it is the most expensive bottle on any shelf. Our 5 ml Song of India Rose is NZ$75, and it is worth saving for an occasion rather than a Tuesday.

Which essential oil has the highest vibration?

Rose, on every version of the chart. Helichrysum and frankincense follow it. In practice, though, most people get more out of choosing by occasion than by rank — frankincense for meditation, lavender for the evening, rose when something deserves marking. The top three are the occasion oils, and they are lovely to own. They are not the ones you will reach for daily.

Can essential oils raise my vibration?

🌙 That is exactly the language the tradition uses, and it means something real to the people who use it: a scent that lifts a room and lifts you with it. Work up the chart when you want that feeling — frankincense, helichrysum, rose. Light it before you sit down, and give the scent the same job each time. The repetition is what turns an aroma into a lift.

Are fragrance oils and essential oils the same?

No, and the chart is only about the second one. A plant essential oil is a concentrated extract distilled from a flower, resin, leaf or root. A fragrance or perfume oil is a formulated scent, and a reed diffuser is made for a room. All three are lovely things to own for different reasons. Read the ingredients and the directions on the exact bottle, and never move one format into another recipe or device.

Which oil should I buy first?

Lavender at 118 MHz, almost always. It is gentle, it suits an evening you will repeat, and at NZ$25 for 10 ml it is an easy first bottle. Frankincense is the next one to add if your practice is meditation or altar work. Then, when there is an occasion worth it, rose.

Sources

• Sound Healing Research Foundation — Frequencies of Essential Oils: the chart and where its readings come from
• The Practice Rooms — frankincense on the longer chart
• The Droppery — the longer chart, including helichrysum
• Healthify — essential oil use and safety in Aotearoa
• DermNet NZ — allergic contact dermatitis from essential oils
• NCCIH — aromatherapy: never swallow essential oils, keep them from children and pets

Last updated September 2026