Eau de toilette is the office default and the better value per ounce. Eau de parfum is heavier and suits cold weather and low application. Parfum lasts longest and projects least. None of these terms is defined by FDA, and the percentages you see quoted everywhere are industry convention rather than a standard. Buy on whether you have smelled it, not on the label.
Search this question and every result tells you the same thing. Eau de toilette is 5 to 15 per cent fragrance oil, eau de parfum 15 to 20, parfum 20 to 30. Stronger costs more and lasts longer, so buy up if you can afford it.
Two problems with that.
The first is that those percentages are an industry convention, not a rule. We checked the primary record on 12 September 2026. The FDA does not define eau de toilette, eau de parfum, parfum or cologne by concentration — or at all. Its own guidance page on fragrances in cosmetics addresses none of those terms.
What it does say is that “fragrance and flavor ingredients can be listed simply as ‘Fragrance’ or ‘Flavor’” because those formulas “are the kinds of cosmetic components that are most likely to be ‘trade secrets.’”
Read that again in the context of the question you came here with. No US regulation requires a bottle labelled eau de parfum to contain any particular amount of anything, and the house is under no obligation to tell you what is in it. The number on every comparison chart online is a description of what brands usually do, presented as though it were a specification.
The second problem is that where you can compare the same fragrance at two concentrations, buyers do not rate the stronger one more highly. They just pay more per ounce for it.
The pair that shows it
Jean Paul Gaultier sells Le Male as an eau de toilette and as Le Parfum, the intense version. Same house, same fragrance family, same shop, both sold by the brand. Read 12 September 2026:
| Le Male EDT | Le Male Le Parfum | |
|---|---|---|
| Size | 4.2 oz | 2.5 oz |
| Price | $132.00 | $126.00 |
| Per ounce | $31.43 | $50.40 |
| Ratings | 7,128 | 8,254 |
| Average | 4.7 | 4.7 |
| 5★ | 86% | 85% |
| 4★ | 7% | 8% |
| 4–5 band | 93% | 93% |
| 1★ | 3% | 3% |
Identical satisfaction. Sixty per cent more per ounce.
The interesting part is how the two sets of reviewers describe what they bought. On the EDT, a July 2026 five-star: “Clean and not strong and over baring!” On Le Parfum, an August 2026 four-star: “Good scent. Very heavy”
Same rating band, opposite adjectives. That is what the concentration is actually buying — not quality, and not a better version. Weight.
So what do the labels mean
They are useful, as long as you read them as a rough guide to how a fragrance behaves rather than a grade.
| Label | Conventional range | What it means in practice |
|---|---|---|
| Eau de cologne | 2–5% | Bright, short, usually citrus. An hour or two, and meant to be reapplied. |
| Eau de toilette | 5–15% | The office default. Opens loud, settles close, three to five hours on most skin. |
| Eau de parfum | 15–20% | Heavier and slower. Five to eight hours, projects further for longer. |
| Parfum / extrait | 20–30% | Dense and close to the skin. Long, but often quieter than an EDP after the first hour. |
Those ranges are the convention. Treat them as a rough guide, because nothing compels a house to hit them and nothing compels it to tell you when it does not.
The counterintuitive one is the last row. Higher concentration does not mean louder — a parfum often sits closer to the skin than an eau de parfum of the same scent, because the heavier materials that make it last are also the ones that do not travel. Men who buy an extrait expecting to be noticed across a room are frequently disappointed, and that is a formulation fact rather than a fault.
The part that actually decides longevity, and it is not the label
Two things matter more than the concentration on the bottle.
The materials. A fragrance built on citrus and light aromatics will disappear in two hours at any concentration, because those molecules are volatile. One built on amber, oud, vanilla and woods will last all day even as an eau de toilette. Le Male is an amber aromatic with vanilla in the base, which is exactly why its eau de toilette performs like heavier scents from other houses.
Your skin. Dry skin holds fragrance poorly and there is no trick that changes it. Applying to moisturised skin is the one intervention that reliably helps, and it helps more than moving up a concentration.
If longevity is the thing you are buying, read what a fragrance is made of before you read how concentrated it is.