The Digitization of Scents: Where the Science Stands
Perfume lovers — do you dream of smelling the perfumes you see online, straight from the internet?
In this post, we explore the rapidly approaching future of online fragrance selection, sharing the latest breakthroughs in scent digitization — a topic we also examine in greater depth during our expert webinars.
From Science Fiction to Scientific Reality
What once sounded like futuristic science fiction is now becoming scientific fact.
Neuroperfumery and neuroscience have reached a point where scents can be digitized — just like images and sounds — and transmitted across the internet. This breakthrough opens extraordinary possibilities for how we discover, experience, and purchase perfumes online.
The First Scent Transmitted via IP
Neuroscientists have successfully digitized a floral scent, making it the first fragrance ever transmitted via IP.
To achieve this milestone, they chose violet, one of the most beloved scent notes in history. Violet has been treasured since ancient times and was a key ingredient in your great-grandmother’s favorite Guerlain perfume Après L’Ondée (1906). Today, it remains equally admired in modern creations such as Hermessence Violette Volynka by Hermès — a fragrance loved by both women and men
Digitizing Entire Perfumes
Almost every quarter, neuroscientists move closer to digitizing entire perfumes.
Their goal is not only to transmit individual scent notes, but to deliver complete olfactory experiences into our homes through the internet — enriching online shopping with mood-enhancing neuroscents while also supporting emotional well-being and health.
What Scent Digitization Really Means
To avoid confusion, scent digitization is not about outdated technologies such as iSmell or ScentDrome, where cartridges containing different scents were mechanically mixed like ink in a printer.
True scent digitization works differently. It creates the scent impression directly in the brain — much like digital images create visual perception without physical objects.
How We Currently Experience Perfume Online
Until now, fragrance buyers have relied mainly on visual and acoustic impressions.
A notable example is L’Oréal’s collaboration between perfumery and musicology, which introduced an acoustic perfume sample for Viktor & Rolf Spicebomb, translating scent into sound.
While images and sounds can be digitized easily, smell remained the last unsolved sensory challenge.
Why Smell Was So Hard to Digitize
Vision and hearing have long been mapped:
- Wavelength → Color
- Frequency → Pitch
But no such clear sensory map existed for smell — until recently.
AI Creates the First Odor Map
In 2023, the brain research team at Osmo, a Google Research spinout, together with other international labs, achieved a major breakthrough.
Using artificial intelligence, they created the first odor map capable of predicting what a molecule smells like based purely on its chemical structure.
At the same time, Dr. Sobel and the Max Planck Institute in Munich successfully recreated violet scent digitally — marking the first true scent ever transmitted over IP.
What Comes Next
Currently, the equipment required for scent transmission is large and expensive. However, scientists expect rapid miniaturization and cost reduction — just as happened with early computers and smartphones.
The future of fragrance is not limited to glass bottles. It will exist in data, emotion, memory, and digital experience.
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