Rolling Papers Compared: RAW, OCB, Zig-Zag, Elements & King Palm

Rolling papers are the cheapest thing in a smoke shop and the one most likely to ruin a smoke. A dollar's difference in paper changes taste, burn rate and how much of what you rolled actually gets used. Most people pick a brand at eighteen and never revisit it.

Here's the actual difference between the papers on the wall.

19+ only. Rolling papers are sold with tobacco and cannabis products and are 19+ in Ontario.

The Four Materials

Everything on the shelf is one of four things.

Hemp — the most common premium paper. Slightly textured, which makes it grippy and easy to roll. Burns at a medium, even rate. Very little flavour of its own. This is the sensible default for most people.

Rice — the thinnest option. Almost no taste, burns slowest of the papers, and produces the least ash. The trade-off is real: rice papers are slippery and less forgiving, so they're harder to roll if your technique isn't solid. Experienced rollers tend to end up here.

Wood pulp — the classic. Thicker and more opaque, the easiest to handle, burns fastest, and produces more ash than the others. It has a faint papery taste that some people specifically prefer because it's what they grew up on.

Palm leaf — not a paper at all. A whole dried leaf rolled into a cone. Burns slowest of anything, holds far more than a paper, and adds a mild natural character.

There's also a bleaching question that cuts across all of these. Bright white papers have been chemically whitened. Brown or tan papers haven't. Unbleached is the standard for anyone who cares about taste, and it's why the premium end of the market is almost entirely brown now.

Brand by Brand

RAW — unbleached hemp, and the paper that made unbleached the default. Natural brown, no dyes, a lightly criss-crossed watermark that helps prevent runs. Medium burn, neutral taste, forgiving to roll. If you have no opinion yet, start here. We stock RAW King Size WIDE at $5.18.

OCB — a French house going back to 1918, best known for very thin papers with an excellent gum line. Their rice and hemp lines both burn slow and clean. OCB's gum strip is genuinely one of the better ones on the market — it seals reliably without needing to be soaked. OCB is $3.45 on our shelf, the cheapest pack we carry.

Zig-Zag — the oldest name here, French, and the one everyone recognises. Classic wood pulp, thicker, easy to handle, faster burn. Zig-Zag is the paper to hand someone who has never rolled before, because it tolerates fumbling. Available on our accessories wall.

Elements — ultra-thin rice paper with a distinctive claim: it burns with almost no ash, leaving a trace of residue rather than a grey column. The magnetic closure on the pack is a small thing that people who use them refuse to give up. Thin, slick, best for confident rollers. on the accessories wall.

Juicy J — flavoured papers, the outlier in this list. If you want the paper itself to contribute taste rather than get out of the way, this is that category. Juicy J papers are on the accessories wall, and they also make hemp wraps at $2.30.

King Palm — real palm leaf cones with a corn-husk filter built in. No rolling required, slowest burn on the wall, holds substantially more than a paper. King Palm is $5.75.

Sizes, Decoded

The names are inconsistent across brands, which is most of the confusion:

Name	Roughly	Holds	Who it's for
Single wide	68 × 35 mm	~0.25–0.5g	Small solo smokes
1¼	76 × 45 mm	~0.5g	The most common size sold
1½	76 × 60 mm	~0.75g	Wider, easier to fill
King Size Slim	108 × 44 mm	~0.75–1g	The standard for sharing
King Size Wide	108 × 55 mm	~1g+	More paper, more forgiving

Two practical notes. King Size Slim is the most popular size in Canada by a wide margin — if you're not sure, buy that. And wide is easier than slim at the same length: extra paper width gives you more margin for error on the tuck, which is why King Size Wide is a better learning size than King Size Slim despite looking more intimidating.

Which One Should You Buy?

• Never rolled before → Zig-Zag or RAW King Size Wide. Thicker, grippier, forgiving.
• You roll fine and want the paper to disappear → OCB or Elements rice.
• You want minimum ash → Elements.
• You don't want to roll at all → King Palm cones or pre-rolls.
• You want the paper to add flavour → Juicy J.
• You want the cheapest that's still good → OCB at $3.45.

Four Things That Improve Any Roll

Regardless of paper:

1. Use a filter tip. It gives the roll structure, stops scooping, and means you can actually finish it. Most premium packs include tips.
2. Grind evenly. Uneven grind is the number one cause of a joint that burns down one side. It's almost never the paper's fault.
3. Pack firm, not tight. Firm enough to hold shape, loose enough to draw easily.
4. Store papers flat and dry. Papers in a pocket get creased and creased papers tear on the tuck. The tin or the original pack, every time.

Ordering

The full paper and cone wall is on our accessories page, which also carries grinders, glass, Clipper lighters and storage.

We're an Indigenous-owned shop on Six Nations of the Grand River with a real storefront near Brantford. Papers are light and cheap to ship — they're the natural thing to add to a flower order, and they count toward the $250 free-shipping threshold. Otherwise it's $25 flat by Xpresspost with tracking, Canada-wide.

If you're weighing papers against just buying joints already rolled, we ran the numbers in the pre-roll guide — rolling your own comes out around $1.30 a gram-joint against $5.75 for the cheapest single.