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Hottest Pepper
The world’s hottest pepper is constantly changing, evolving almost.
It seems every year a new pepper is either created or discovered so check back often to see new record breaking peppers!
PepperHead® has the most up-to-date list of the World’s Hottest Peppers.
Here at PepperHead® we have been growing these “super hots” for over 20 years and have grown and eaten every pepper on this list.
We are dedicated to providing you spicy lovers with the ability to grow all of these insanely spicy peppers in your own backyards.
Without further ado, here is our Top 10 Hottest Pepper List.
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Top 10 Hottest Peppers In The World [2023 Update]
SHU = Scoville Heat Unit (A measure of Spiciness)
Pepper Scoville Scale displayed as Peak SHU Values
SHU is a way of quantifying how spicy a pepper is by measuring the concentration of capsaicinoids. Capsaicin is the chemical responsible for the spicy sensation within a pepper.
1. Carolina Reaper 2,200,000 SHU
The previous world champion, Carolina Reaper has been beat! by itself… The Carolina Reaper is once again officially the Worlds Hottest Pepper.
Originally ranked as world’s hottest in 2013, the Reaper was tested again in 2018 with an even higher SHU. (71,000 SHU higher to be exact) This gives the reaper a renewed title as World’s Hottest!
It was bred for heat and that it is, with an average SHU of 1,641,000 SHU and peaks at 2.2 Million SHU!
Let’s put the scoville rating into perspective for you:
The Carolina Reaper pepper is 200x hotter than a Jalapeno #WorldsHottestPepper
Just looking at the pictures above, you know its one mean pepper. The Carolina Reaper has a unique stinger tail that is unlike any other pepper and every pod is different!
It gets this insane heat from being a cross between a Ghost Pepper and a Red Habanero. Oddly enough this pepper doesn’t just have heat, but excellent fruity flavor to boot. Well, that is before it melts your face off.
More Carolina Reaper Info
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Watch these Chicks eat The Carolina Reaper
10 Even more Hilarious Videos of The Carolina Reaper Challenge
Test your heat tolerance with the PepperHead Challenge! Eat a whole Carolina Reaper Pepper on camera and receive a FREE T-Shirt!
You can now buy the reaper as powder, live plants or seeds so you can grow your own plant and try for yourself.
2. Trinidad Moruga Scorpion 2,009,231 SHU
Straight from the depths of hell the Trinidad Scorpion Moruga Blend, AKA Moruga Scorpion, is a rare sought after pepper that was only just recently discovered.
Native to the lands of Moruga in Trinidad and Tobago. Once you take a bite of this formidable pepper the heat never stops building.
This pepper may be lacking the Reaper’s stinger, but don’t let that fool you. The Moruga Scorpion is every bit as hot as The Carolina Reaper.
More Moruga Scorpion Info
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Watch Rhett & Link from Good Mythical Morning Eat the Moruga Scorpion
3. 7 Pot Douglah 1,853,936 SHU
Well renown in the pepper community as one of the hottest peppers with the best flavor.
The 7 Pot Douglah is the hottest pepper you can find that isn’t red.
The hottest “superhot” peppers are traditionally red, but the Douglah defies the odds by being brown AND scortching hot.
You can’t go wrong with fresh, dried, or powdered Douglah on any food.
Also known as 7 Pod Douglah, Chocolate 7 Pod or the 7 Pot Brown.
More Douglah Info
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4. 7 Pot Primo 1,469,000 SHU
The 7 Pot Primo is very distinctive with its long skinny “tail”.
This pepper was created by horticulturist Troy Primeaux.
Some peppers cultivators have tried to replicate the Primo look by breeding their own peppers to have a long stinger.
When you just look at this pepper, you know it’s going to be INSANELY hot. It coincidentally looks strikingly similar to The Carolina Reaper…
More Primo Info
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5. Trinidad Scorpion “Butch T” 1,463,700 SHU
The Trinidad Scorpion Butch T is a previous Guinness World Record Holder (2011) from Australia.
No doubt it’s insanely hot, but other peppers have been proven to be hotter.
It’s aptly named due to the scorpion stinger found at the tip of the pepper and also the creator, Butch Taylor.
The burn from this pepper is unlike any other.
More Butch T InfoThe Trinidad Scorpion Butch T pepper burns like you swallowed a 1,000 suns.
$7.95
$18.95
6. Naga Viper 1,349,000 SHU
Naga Viper is an extremely rare pepper cultivated in the UK. Hybrid of many different peppers and years of cross pollination created this variety of “Super HOT” pepper.
It was never fully stabilized before being released so pod variation is expected.
More Naga Viper Info
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7. Ghost Pepper (Bhut Jolokia) 1,041,427 SHU
The Ghost Pepper is the most famous “Super Hot” due to the amount of press it has received in the past.
It exploded in popularity on YouTube and other social sites where pepperheads ate whole Ghost Peppers as part of a challenge.
This is the first pepper to scientifically test over 1 million scovilles.
Many mistakenly believe the Ghost Pepper is still the World’s Hottest pepper, this list shows it is far from it.
This isn’t 2007. If you have friends that still think the Ghost Pepper is the hottest pepper, share this page with them.
However, don’t be fooled by how low this is on the list as it can still bring a grown man to his knees.
More Ghost Pepper Info
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Kid swallows ghost pepper, instantly regrets it.
8. 7 Pot Barrackpore ~1,000,000 SHU
The 7 Pot Barrackpore is one of the hottest of the 7 Pot peppers.
This one is from the Town of Chaguanas in Trinidad and Tobago.
Many of these “super hots” come from this region.
More Barrackpore Info
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9. 7 Pot Red (Giant) ~1,000,000 SHU
The 7 pots were named after their ability to heat up 7 pots of stew and that it does! There are 100’s of varieties created from crossing this breed with other peppers. Some varieties include 7 Pot Jonah, 7 Pot Yellow, 7 Pot Katie, 7 Pot Barrackpore and countless others.
$5.95Read more
10. Red Savina Habanero 500,000 SHU
Back in the early years of super hots, the Red Savina Habanero was KING!
It held the title of the World’s Hottest Pepper from 1994 to 2006. 12 Years!
The Red Savina has since been dethroned and many peppers have passed it in heat, but still to this day it is one of my favorite peppers to grow because it has the perfect balance of heat and flavor..
The Red Savina just barely makes the Top 10, but does so in fashion with its great flavor and extreme heat.
More Red Savina Info
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Are you a PepperHead®?
Try growing these Superhot peppers! PepperHead® seeds grow real peppers with real published SHU ratings.
Order all Top 10 Hottest Pepper Seeds and save 30% over purchasing individually!
We are so excited about our brand new product, the PepperHead Powder Sampler Kit! Its the perfect gift for spicy lovers.
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Honorable Mentions
Lets talk about some upcoming hybrid peppers that show promise. These two hot peppers will be added to the list once their validity has been confirmed.
Dragon’s Breath 2,483,584 SHU
There have been recent reports of a Dragon’s Breath pepper claiming to be hotter than the Carolina Reaper.
Preliminary testing of the Dragon’s Breath pepper pegs it at 2,483,584 SHU which would blow the Carolina Reaper out of the water.
It could be a publicity stunt in which the “news” websites ate up, even claiming Dragon’s Breath could kill you. Technically a pencil can kill you too…
$8.95Read more
Pepper X
Pepper X is another pepper claiming to be TWICE as hot as the Carolina Reaper has surfaced, but this might have more merit. Very limited information is know about Pepper X as the creator has kept it under wraps.
However, we will have to wait and see if Pepper X is real before adding to our Top 10 list.
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Hi I live in Tunisia North Africa harrisa is dip with any meal from breakfast to dinner.
2021 I started to make my own harrisa from the reaper beautiful as a side dish with olive oil tuna and Tabuna bread
You are wrong. The picture you are showing a a Carolina reaper is actually a muraga Trinidad scorpion. You need to get your peppers straight. Misclassification on your part. Pretty embarrassing!!
Sorry but nothing on this list counts because each pepper is a genetically engineered hybridized miscegenated pepper.
NOTHING on this list is found in nature.
This might come as a shock to you but literally every modern day crop is a hybridized plant far different from anything that grew/grows in the wild and carefully developed over hundreds of years of agriculture. Naturally occuring is irrelevant to the fact that they ARE peppers, and they ARE hotter than any others. Otherwise the list would be “hottest NATURALLY occurring peppers in the world… of which there would a very different list… not even the jalapeno would make the technical cut.
Yes u are most likely right we genictly engineer a lot of everything. But they still will burn the ish outta someone with homemade pepper spray!
I am going to try to eat a red chili pepper ️
My neighbors grow chili peppers I am going to ask them if I can have a red one ️
I am your neighbor. Of course!!! You can try one. I recommend the Carolina reaper it’s super mild.
Just had some sliced bits from a Carolina reaper on lunch. It’s a slow burn that last a long time it gets hotter and sneaks up on you. But more flavorful than the ghost pepper
Tried the ghost pepper last week. Less flavor than the reaper but it punches hard right when you bite into it and buns for a short while.
I’ve been having heartburn and diarrhea for up to 3 days after eating these peppers l
I ate Carolina Reaper and Ghost pepper just the same way as you did, but they were chocolate Ghost Peppers, I found the chocolate Ghost are a lot tastier than the Carolinas, but I didn’t try the regular red Ghost one, maybe the Carolinas are better tasteful, I don’t know, but I found Carolinas have a bitter after taste that Ghost peppers don’t, later I will try the red ones
Same.
Send me one so I can beat the world hot eating contest
Visiting this site for the first time. Finding out if African Birds Eye chilli is grown by your company and how is it rated?
Some of us adorn gardens with colourful chillies. Do you do germination testing and guarantee your chilli cultivars? Some of us in KZN province enjoy very hot chillies thus can we be assured that your chillies are hotter than any in South Africa? Lastly, how many seeds are you advertising for $60 (US), thus seeds per the pack?
My brother ate almost every other pepper ️ that there is and he never knew about pepper X but yeah he wants to try the Carolina reaper!
The Carolina Reaper is no joke but the flavor is amazing!
I would like to grow the best hot peppers in the world
I have a California reapper plant ,after 3 years I got some peppers,are deadly hot
I AM RIGHT THERE WITH YOU. I WOULD LOVE TO BE ABLE TO CREATE ONE FOR EITHER MEDICAL/MILITARY USE OR EATING. ( MILITARY USE
500,000,000 SHU. MOST DEFINITELY…) THE PEPPERS I GROW WOULD BE SOOOOOO HOT LEATHER OR WELDING GLOVES WOULD HAVE TO BE WORN TO KEEP FROM BLISTERING YOUR FINGERS PICKING THEM…
Thank you so much for sharing, I an very interested im all kinds of information about all peppers…..
I have always heard that eating bread is the only way to help reduce the heat in your mouth … is this wrong ?
Milk and the thicker the better. Like a liquid yogurt
I heard dairy products help
It’s true, bread helps a lot, but I found that could milk is better!!! It instantly ceases the burning like magic (as long as you keep it inside your mouth), when you finally swallow it, the burn comes back, but halfway!!! So, it’s only a matter of be drinking more!!! Try it and you’ll see what I’m talking about!!!
Oh my god Corolina Reaper is hot i tried it at a chicken hot wings place it was burning my mouth
I did the Carolina reaper and survived about 10 minutes before I had to tap out I ended up passing out
Did you guys know that human beings are the only animal in the world that purposefully ingests spicy food? Other animals may stumble across something spicy and try it out of hunger but it’s not an active choice. No other animal actively seeks out anything spicy.
I think this is a really interesting concept. I think about it a lot. Humans are following a construct. We go see horror movies to endure the scares..and then get entertainment from it. Is it the same with something as spicy as the peppers mentioned here? I’m sure there’s a thesis paper that could be written about this, lol
Parrots seek out and eat hit peppers . They love them mixed into their diet and they have long lives.
I like peppers alot but I don’t like to eat that much
I have a question and maybe someone has an explanation for..
I recently ate a dried Carolina Reaper and found it seemed hotter than a hot sauce I ate a few years ago, so maybe it’s the years that is throwing me off lol..
The dried Carolina Reaper hits the scales with around a a chili record breaking 2 Million SHUs
The hot sauce was marketed as “THE END” and was advertised asthe hottest hot sauce in the world at the time I tried it…
Unlike the pepper, it gets it’s heat from a mixture of Habaneros, Carolina Reapers,and Extract.. The outcome was a product that I had to sign a waiver before I could even try it, because of the 6 Million SHUs it produces.
That’s not a question.
Great research, please add creams for rheumatism with capsaicin, more research on loosing weight, longevity and heart health, thanks
apparently y’all aint been to the middle east. Sivathei peppers are hotter than almost ALL of these save for the ghost and scorpion.
Apparently you didn’t read this article. The ghost pepper is more than 1/2 the heat of a Carolina Reaper. So your so called hot pepper isn’t even hot.
As a Trinidadian. I’m proud of our peppers…hottest ever ..
I think the ghost peper should have been spicer than The carolina reaper
Iwant the hottest pepper seeds
Thanks, nice article. I’ve been getting into more of the hotter peppers lately and had to look up the hottest. Something I’m def going to get in the future. Again thanks.
Naga bhut Assam India is officially declared the most spiciest chilli by scoville units, 1,041,000 Scoville units
Hey guys , I’ve found the best cure for this yrs flu virus.
A hot sauce made with heaps of garlic and the top 5 powdered chillies , mixed in with any tasteless food.
Guarantee within 24-48 hrs ,it’s up and gone .