The lists below are by no means comprehensive, but rather meant to provide you with a starting to point. If there is a site you think should be added to either list, use the contact form on the home page to let us know and we will consider adding it.
The Briar Report - Lots of information going back years and updated regularly.
How-To - Series of articles from Smoking Pipes
Pipes Magazine - They have articles, tobacco reviews, forums, and information on each week’s episode of Pipes Magazine Radio Show.
Pipedia - It’s like Wikipedia for everything pipes and tobacco.
Smoking Pipes Daily Reader Blog - Articles on everything from new blends to history of pipes, etc.
Tobacco Reviews - Exactly what it sounds like, this site contains reviews and ratings of thousands of tobacco blends. While I would never recommend putting too much stock in what other people think about a blend, it can be a wealth of information for getting a general sense of what something is like when you’re deciding what to put in your online basket.
Note as of 5/30/25: The site has not been accessible for more than a week. The splash page has a message about the site being in maintenance mode. STG acquired the site from Sutliff when they purchased MacBaren in early 2025, and immediately made the site inaccessible everywhere but the US. Current online speculation is that their claim to keep the site up and running may have been false…
Informational Sites
Blue Room Briars - If you start getting interested in artisan pipes, this site is worth checking out. It’s owned by two pipe makers and they specialize in artisan pipes, both new and estates. One of the cool things is that if you buy a pipe from them, you can ship it back to them once a year and they will give it a professional cleaning for free.
The Briar Fellowship - Representing a relatively recent development in pipe tobacco, James Ravenwood is what some call a “boutique blender.” He sources leaf from a number of places to hand blend micro-batches of original pipe tobacco blends. Depending on the blend, they will be available in a tin, in bulk, or sometimes both. In addition to his own tobaccos, his site features pipes and accessories, t-shirts, and vintage tobaccos that he sells on consignment.
Country Squire, Jackson, Mississippi - As well as selling pipes and accessories, they do some great house blends, all purchasable by the ounce. They also have a sizeable selection of pipes and accessories. If you get on their email list, you will get notifications for their sales, which run fairly often. The owner, Jon David Cole, is well known in the pipe community, due in large part to being one of the hosts of the now-ended Country Squire Radio podcast, which ran for a decade.
Danish Pipe Shop - Again, if you start getting interested in artisans, this is the site for the heavy hitters from Denmark and Europe. More of a “window shopping” experience, since a lot of the stuff here is crazy expensive because we are talking rock star makers. That said, there are some great pipes at very reasonable prices to be found as well.
Esterval’s Pipe House - Don’t even keep reading this unless/until you really decide you like pipe smoking. This is the place in Germany that you can order tobaccos that you can’t buy in the US, like most of the HU tobaccos. Here’s where the patented Dalton justification gene kicks in. The shipping is crazy expensive; it’s DHL Express or UPS, and ends up being like $50. But, if you create an account on the site and set your location to the US, you’ll see that the price you’ll pay for all the tobacco on the site is tax free (since you’re not in the EU). So on average, the tobacco is $5-$8 a tin cheaper than the cheapest you’d get online here. So the key is to buy enough to balance out the cost of shipping (while not going crazy enough to make the authorities pay attention). As long as everything you order is in stock, it usually arrives in under a week.
Ken Byron Ventures - Another of the “boutique blenders,” the site has dozens of blends that go in and out of stock as the the owner/blender makes them. Many of the KBV blends have cult followings in the community. One of the nice touches is that the standard order comes in a 2 ounce mylar bag (resealable) with a full color sticker for that particular blend, that is made to fit a wide-mouth mason jar lid, the standard container used by many pipe people to store and cellar tobacco.
L. J. Peretti, Boston, Mass. - One of the oldest tobacconists in the country. Some of my favorite “go to” blends are from here. Like many brick and mortar tobacconists, they bought blending components from Sutliff, which closed its doors in March of 2025, so how that will affect the blends listed below remains to be seen.
Missouri Meerschaum - This company is the oldest producer of corn cob pipes in the world. You’ll find a huge selection of cobs ranging from basic models under $10 to limited editions with Italian acrylic stems and different bowls shapes and styles in the $50 range. In addition, they have recently opened a briar section of their site and are carrying lines of briar pipes from different makers intended to be more budget friendly than a lot of the artisan pipes. These range from around $45 into the $200s.
Pipes and Cigars - This is the online store owned by the Scandinavian Tobacco Group (STG). You can find some really great deals here on tobaccos (almost always those made by STG), and they are known for randomly dropping small batch tobacco releases months after they have sold out everywhere else. They are a tobacco company, and that’s their focus. So the pipes on the site tend toward basket pipe quality. This site has a bit of a reputation in the pipe community for very spotty customer service. The inventory system they use is apparently quite old, and not really accurate. So it isn’t unusual, especially in a sale event when lots of people might be buying the same thing, to place an order for something that isn’t actually available. Sometimes you’ll be notified, and sometimes you won’t. Sometimes your order will just be cancelled and your card refunded, and sometimes the order will just sit while they wait for a restock, however long that takes. So some people avoid the site altogether, and others just go into each order knowing its a bit of a crapshoot but feel the price is worth it.
Smoking Pipes - The biggest online retailer of pipes, tobaccos, and accessories; huge selection, good prices, fast shipping. Their pipe selection covers the gambit from factory to high-end artisan, and tons of estate pipes. The parent company, Laudisi, also owns Cornell & Diehl (C & D), one of the larger American pipe tobacco manufacturers, so they have the biggest selection of C & D blends, and often the biggest allotment of their small batch/limited release blends. Laudisi also owns Peterson and Savinelli pipes, so there are hundreds of pipes from each of those brands on the site. The site also has a blog section with a ton of articles and videos going back years.
Tobacco Pipes - Owned by the Sutliff Tobacco company, they will usually have some of the lowest tobacco prices online, and fast shipping. Closed as part of Scandinavian Tobacco Group’s takeover of Mac Baren and Sutliff in March of 2025. The site now redirects to Pipes and Cigars.
Watch City Cigar & Pipe, Framingham, Mass - Again, they sell some pipes and accessories, and do some really good house blends. They’re worth keeping an eye on also for some of the harder to find tinned tobaccos from the US and Europe.
Vermont Freehand - Owned by Steve Norse, this shop has become one of (if not the) largest suppliers of materials and tools for artisan pipe makers. Even if you’re never going to make a pipe, it’s an interesting site to peruse just to see the types (and cost) of materials that go into a pipe.