Friends invited you out for hookah and you've never even held a hose? Relax, nobody at the table is taking a test. These six things are honestly all you need to know for your first time smoking hookah, so the night goes the way it should.
You order hookah per table, not per person
A hookah is a social thing: two or three people share one and pass it around. When the server asks “Which hookah?” they mean the tobacco flavor, and you decide that together. Bigger group? Get two different ones and compare.
First time: go for a mild, fresh flavor
The classic beginner picks are lemon mint or apple: fresh, light and hard to get wrong. Skip the “strong” ones and the dark tobaccos for now. We wrote a separate guide on flavors, but for your first night the smartest move is to tell the server “something mild and fresh” and let them do their thing.
How to smoke hookah: take it slow
A hookah isn't a cigarette: you draw the smoke in slow and easy, no forced deep drags. The hookah is at its strongest for the first ten minutes or so, so don't go hard right away. Breaks between puffs are completely normal; one hookah lasts about an hour and it's not going anywhere. If you're curious where the smoke travels before it gets to you, spin the 3D hookah and take it apart piece by piece.
Hookah etiquette at the table
Three unwritten rules: pass the hose by hand, don't toss it across the table; don't blow into the hose (unless the hookah master asks you to clear out stale smoke that way); and don't hog the hose for five minutes while you tell a story. Take a pull, pass it on. Most places also have plastic mouth tips, so go ahead and ask for your own.
Water on the side (and something in your stomach)
Golden rule: don't show up on an empty stomach, and drink more water than usual. Tea is the classic drink with hookah, and coffee works too. If you start feeling dizzy at some point, that's normal for beginners: put the hose down, drink some water, get some fresh air for a couple of minutes and you'll be fine.
How much it costs and how long it lasts
A hookah lasts 45 to 90 minutes on average (the hookah master changes the coals along the way, which is a sign of good service, not a sign that something's wrong). In Belgrade the price is usually RSD 600–3,000 per hookah, roughly €5–26 (more numbers on prices), and since you share it with friends, it works out to about the price of a cocktail per person. And to be upfront about it: hookah is tobacco and smoke. It isn't harmless to your health, and it's not an everyday thing. Grown-up stuff, grown-up call. We've put together exactly what the WHO and the CDC say in the health questions below.
Where to try it
For your first time, pick a place where the staff is patient with beginners. You can usually tell from the reviews. Start with the city you're in:
For Belgrade and Novi Sad we also have guides with hand-picked places and quotes from guests: the best hookah bars in Belgrade and in Novi Sad. Below is one place from each of these four cities, all with good guest ratings on Google.
Health questions
We took the answers from two sources only: the WHO advisory note on waterpipe tobacco smoking (second edition, 2015) and the hookah page of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). We're not doctors, so we didn't add anything of our own about health.
Is hookah worse than cigarettes?
According to the US CDC, hookah carries many of the same health risks as cigarettes and is not a safe alternative to them. Compared with a single cigarette, one hookah session can expose you to nearly 9 times the carbon monoxide and 1.7 times the nicotine. The World Health Organization (WHO) calls the belief that hookah is safer than cigarettes a misconception, and its conclusion says hookah causes diseases usually linked to cigarette smoking, including addiction.
Does hookah have nicotine?
Yes, if there's tobacco in the bowl. The CDC says hookah smoke contains many of the same harmful substances as cigarette smoke, including nicotine, tar and heavy metals, and the WHO writes that nicotine is exactly what makes hookah addictive. As for tobacco-free (“herbal”) blends, the WHO says their smoke carries the same harmful substances as tobacco blends, apart from nicotine. The CDC also says smoke from both types contains carbon monoxide and other toxic agents.
Do you inhale hookah?
Yes, you inhale the smoke, and a lot of it. The CDC estimates that in an hour of smoking, which is about how long one hookah usually lasts, you breathe in around 90,000 ml of smoke. That's 100 to 200 times more than from a single cigarette, which delivers about 500–600 ml.
Does the water in a hookah filter the smoke?
No. The CDC says the water does not filter the smoke, and even after passing through the water, the smoke still has high levels of toxic agents. The WHO lists the idea that water filters the smoke as a common misconception, one of those that lead many people to think hookah isn't as addictive as cigarettes. Then there's the charcoal: according to both sources, that's where the high levels of carbon monoxide come from.
Find the nearest place on the map and see who's open right now. And if you end up liking it and want one of your own, we've written up how to set up a hookah at home step by step.
