My perfume predictions for 2026
Savoury gourmands. Worldbuilding. Ultra-strong editions. These are the fragrance trends I think we'll see over the coming year...
Depending on the sources you choose to read, the current explosion in the popularity of fragrance and fragrance collecting means that anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 new perfumes will be released over the course of 2026. Now, I can’t see into the future per se, but an awful lot of fragrances cross my path and, from that, I can take a solid shot at what I think this means for the market – and for my fellow olfactory obsessives.
Now, when it comes to upcoming releases, there are scant details out there right now for what will be dropping over the coming year. However, taking into account the few we do know about and what I’ve noticed in the releases over the past year, here are my totally subjective 2026 fragrance trends.
Fragrances with a backstory
One trend I’ve seen becoming particularly prominent in the luxury bodycare world over the past couple of years is new brands with beautifully intricate worldbuilding. Take 39BC, a body oil-maker whose entire vibe is dedicated to reimagining Roman bathing rituals, from the beautiful bottles, to the notes used, to the copywriting referencing the love affair between Cleopatra and Marc Anthony. Or To My Ships, a personal care brand launched by Daniel Bense (formerly of Aesop and Sunspel) that draws on classic literature, notably The Illiad, to tell the stories of its scents. While the founder is present, these brands are about creating moods rather than simply listing off ingredients – and, crucially, the founder is more hidden than in much of contemporary perfumery, where the founder or the perfumer tends to be the selling point.
As the fragrance market gets evermore crowded, I think we will start to see this sort of approach adopted more widely by perfume brands with fragrances sold on their backstories and the mood they are creating as opposed to simply on notes – much like Maison Margiela’s Replica line which attempts to re-create ‘moments’ in time that build into a coherent brand universe – a new era of brands that bring more to the table that “you’re gonna smell great”. It’s gonna be about the vibe.
Scent accessories
Right at the end of 2025, Victoria Beckham dropped her Portofino ‘97 Necklace, featuring a fully functional, charm-sized version of the Portofino ‘97 fragrance bottle hanging from a brushed brass chain that could be refilled from a full-sized edition via a matching mini funnel. It sold out. The idea of accessories for your fragrance isn’t necessarily new (Acqua di Parma sells leather sleeves for its bottles, Jo Malone London sells alternative lids), however, as the market expands, I think accessories will get more adventurous, innovative and covetable – in a similar way to how traditionally home scent and/or grooming brands such as Diptyque, Officine Universelle Buly or Trudon offer all manner of accoutrements for the maintenance and elevation of their candles (stands, trimmers, toppers etc). I predict perfume pedestals, artist-collab refillable bottles, and the inevitable gimmick or two along the way.
Savoury gourmands
While we have been inundated by dessert-style gourmands over the past few years (lots of milkshakes, lattes and jammy-creamy creations), certain notes have started creeping onto my radar that suggest a shift to the more savoury. Notes of tea (black, green, matcha, chai) are bringing a herbaceous, tannin-y note into trend after the dominance of coffee over the past couple of years (see: the just-released Infusion de Santal Chai by Prada). Salt has crept in with its signature mineralic bite. Nuts are increasingly bringing a woody, buttery edge. While these have been bubbling in the background of scents over the past few years, I think they’ll the hero notes of a new wave of gourmands over the coming year – less sweet and more serious, yet still delicious.
Bonkers fantasy notes
Over the past year, we saw a latex note in Vyrao’s beautifully squeaky and sexy Ludeaux and a beautiful, burnt lava note in Terre d’Hermès Intense (one of my most-worn fragrances of the past year – see below). Fantasy notes have always been an attention grabber for smaller independent houses, but as we move into 2026, I think we’re going to start seeing more of them at the major brands, and even perhaps in the mainstream. After all, in a market that’s seeing more and more releases, what better than a unique note to truly sets you apart?
Extraits a go-go
Back when I was at GQ in the late 2010s, I remember seeing an explosion of “intense” flankers to classic perfumes – sometimes these were slightly stronger concentrations and sometimes these were an entirely new formulation focusing in on a specific note in the original mix. Nearly a decade later, and I feel that we have started to see the next wave of flankers in a similar vein, but this time it’s “extraits”.
Through 2025, we saw extrait editions of existing ‘icon’ fragrances dropped by Byredo, Prada, By Killian, Maison Francis Kurkdijan and more. I think this will most definitely continue over the coming year because, frankly, at significantly higher price points, these are a bit of a money spinner. Less cynically, perhaps, I think this is also because those who wear fragrances really want those fragrances to last on their skin and be super present – subtle fragrances are increasingly out and bigger, ballsier scents are increasingly in. We are in our collective maximalist era.
However, I think the real trend predictor is more along the line of Brioni’s Les Extraits de Parfum collection or Parfums de Marley’s Les Extraits triptyque, both of which launched last year. These capsule collections exist separately to the houses’ existing lines of perfume as a unique offering of extrait-strength juices in distinct bottles. We’ve already seen this with Louis Vuitton’s Les Extraits Collection, but I predict we’ll start to see more brands across the board start to release specific ‘extrait de parfum’ lines with fragrances that are only available at this concentration (and higher price point).
Check back in this time next year and we’ll see if I was right…
What trends do you reckon we’ll see hitting the perfume scene over the following year? Let me know in the comments below.
As soon as you said savoury gourmands I thought of Lynx Marmite 😂