One of the greatest drugs known to man. They should give it away at the convenience store. Possibly one of the greatest to snort, too: Valium slides down like a sugary pixie stick with little or no pain to the nostril.
Diazepam
Well-documented
Well-documented
Multiple authoritative sources agree on dosing and effects.
- 5 corroborating sources
- 1 ROA with full dose ladder
- duration data present
- 27 combo interactions documented
- toxicity data (PsychonautWiki, PubChem)
Well-documented
Multiple authoritative sources agree on dosing and effects.
- 5 corroborating sources
- 1 ROA with full dose ladder
- duration data present
- 27 combo interactions documented
- toxicity data (PsychonautWiki, PubChem)
Aliases: Valium, Zetran, Diastat, Apaurin, Mother's little helper
Summary
Diazepam is a long-acting benzodiazepine with a rapid onset, considered the standard by which other benzodiazepines are compared. Its long elimination half-life and active metabolites result in extended effects that can persist for days. Commonly used for anxiety, panic disorders, alcohol withdrawal, muscle spasms, and seizures.
Dose Information
| ROA | Light | Common | Strong | Heavy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oral | 2.5-5mg | 5-15mg | 15-30mg | 30mg+ |
Light
Common
Strong
Heavy
Sources
Oral
Dose ladder — PsychonautWikiBenzo Equivalence Calculator
mg
10.0
mg
Diazepam
=
—
mg
Diazepam
| Substance | Equivalent Dose | Potency |
|---|
⚠ These are approximate equivalences for educational and cross-tapering reference. Individual response, tolerance, and half-life differences mean actual equivalence varies. Always consult a healthcare provider for tapering guidance.
Onset, Duration & After-effects
| ROA | Onset | Comeup | Peak | Offset | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oral | 15-60 min | 30-60 min | 1-2 hrs | 2-6 hrs | 4-8 hrs |
| Intravenous | 1-5 min | - | 15 min | 1-6 hrs | 10-24 hrs |
Effect Profile
51 reportsScores (0–10) curated from multiple sources:
- Effect keyword matching from PsychonautWiki catalog
- Validated against 36 Erowid trip reports
- Weighted by importance: core (×3), major (×2), minor (×1)
Benzodiazepine
6.1
Strong
6/10
Strong anxiolysis with moderate sedation and cognitive impairment, low euphoria
Anxiolysis
×3
8
anxiety suppression
anxiolytic
muscle relaxation
muscle relaxant
relaxation
emotion suppression
“so just be smart about it, you can, going from never having taken any benzo's in your life, take a 5 mg tablet and feel the designed effects of the drug, which are to calm, relax, slightly sedate and...”
“Clonazepam ( K-pins) give me the best long lasting anxiety relief.”
Sedation / Relaxation
×2
6
sedation
drowsiness
relaxation
muscle relaxation
“but anyway, you can also take a handful of those 5 mg tablets, say 50mg in total, or 100 mg in total, or even 200 mg in total, and you will feel very little more than the minimal dosage of valium...”
“Flurazepam (as Dalmane) also seemed all over and prescribed to everyone when I was growing up, seemed more hypnotic but also mellow like diazepam, long.”
Motor / Cognitive Impairment
×1
6
motor control loss
amnesia
memory suppression
delusions of sobriety
“Unmistakable effects (no delusions of sobriety with this one) but it wore off after like 4 hours.”
“Not everyone gets great effects from valium even if they have no tolerance and take a stupid amount of them..”
Euphoria / Mood Lift
×1
3
euphoria
physical euphoria
disinhibition
relaxation
“but anyway, you can also take a handful of those 5 mg tablets, say 50mg in total, or 100 mg in total, or even 200 mg in total, and you will feel very little more than the minimal dosage of valium...”
“I mean the couple times I have run out of my klonopin which I have a stupid high tolerance for, and all benzos in general.”
User Experience
anxiolysis
“so just be smart about it, you can, going from never having taken any benzo's in your life, take a 5 mg tablet and feel the designed effects of the drug, which are to calm, relax, slightly sedate and...”
Based on reports from:
Tolerance
Build-up
develops over 1–4 weeks of daily use; hypnotic tolerance faster than anxiolytic tolerance
Reset
Falls after you stop, at a rate that varies from person to person. If you've been using regularly, cut down gradually with medical help rather than stopping suddenly.
No tolerance chart. Our decay curves for these drugs were estimates, and a curve can make tolerance look longer-lasting than it is, which is the dangerous direction.
How fast tolerance to these drugs fades after a break has not been measured well enough to draw, so don't count on a dose you used to take still being safe: after time off, start with a much smaller amount and don't use alone. Mixing sedatives with each other, with alcohol or with opioids sharply raises the risk of a fatal overdose. If you've been using regularly, don't stop suddenly: withdrawal from benzodiazepines, alcohol or GHB/GBL can cause seizures or delirium, so get medical help to cut down gradually.
Sources: FRANK: benzodiazepines · Alcohol and Drug Foundation: GHB · FDA 2020: benzodiazepine boxed warning · FDA 2019: gabapentinoids and breathing · NHS: alcohol use disorder
Cross-Tolerances
Other benzodiazepines
Z-drugs (zolpidem class)
Barbiturates
Effects
Aggregated from 36 single-substance Erowid and 15 Bluelight experience reports; 65 Erowid reports where another drug was taken too are left out
Each bar shows the share of analyzed reports whose text mentions that effect — a mention is not always a first-hand experience (fear of an effect or something witnessed can count). Mentions saying the effect did not happen are left out; that check reads keywords, so it can miss some. The shaded band on a bar, and the small range after its number, is the 95% interval: where the share could plausibly be with other reports of the same kind. Fewer reports, wider band. Tap or hover any number for details. The second value is the Bluelight extractor's per-effect confidence; a dash means the row is Erowid-derived, which has no confidence measurement.
Rows resting on fewer than 20 reports show a count (“3 of 7”) instead of a bar. Why 20?
Effect glossary — · full glossary
Positive Effects 20
39.2% (95% interval 27 to 53 percent)
89%
33.3% (95% interval 20 to 50 percent)
–
21.6% (95% interval 12 to 35 percent)
82%
16.7% (95% interval 8 to 32 percent)
–
13.8% (95% interval 7 to 26 percent)
80%
4 of 15
76%
2 of 15
82%
2 of 15
82%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
95%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
90%
1 of 15
70%
1 of 15
75%
1 of 15
90%
1 of 15
80%
1 of 15
95%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
80%
Adverse Effects 28
11.7% (95% interval 6 to 23 percent)
88%
11.7% (95% interval 6 to 23 percent)
82%
8.3% (95% interval 3 to 22 percent)
–
7 of 15
84%
3 of 15
92%
2 of 15
78%
2 of 15
80%
2 of 15
82%
2 of 15
88%
2 of 15
82%
1 of 15
95%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
80%
1 of 15
75%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
80%
1 of 15
75%
1 of 15
80%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
95%
Show 8 more adverse effects
1 of 15
90%
1 of 15
80%
1 of 15
80%
1 of 15
75%
1 of 15
80%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
85%
1 of 15
90%
Also reported in combinations. In the 65 Diazepam reports where another drug was taken too, 15 (23.1%) mention hospital, emergency services or an overdose, 4 (6.2%) a seizure and 2 (3.1%) psychosis. In the 36 single-substance reports: 2.8%, 0.0% and 5.6%. One or more of the three comes up more often in the combination reports (26.2% against 8.3%), by more than chance would explain; that does not show the combination caused it. These are not in the figures above: they cannot be put down to Diazepam alone, and a mention is not always something that happened to the writer.
Combinations
Cross-Check Diazepam with another substanceCommunity Trip Reports
Anecdotal first-person accounts from Reddit, Erowid, Bluelight, and Dose.wiki. Click a source to expand. Reports are harm-reduction context, not medical guidance. Tags summarise each author's own verdict — how reports are classified.
Erowid 8 reports 2 positive 3 neutral 3 cautionary visit
I have been a valium user for over 4 years. I am 22 at the time and in near perfect health. A bit of asthma, but nothing serious. For me, this drug has many uses and I'll name a few. First off. . . relaxation. I have encountered no other drug that works as efficently. Secondly.
This report details my subjective experience following the oral administration of a legally prescribed dose of 5mg Diazepam (Valium) for the management of my chronic insomnia.
My experience started with a visit from a friend who brought with him 200 pills of what he said were home made 10mg pills of diazepam, they were lighter blue than the pharmacutical ones and very crumbly and at the bottom of the bag they were in was a lot of the same coloured powder and smaller crumbs.
I decided to take valium as an alternative to general anesthetic during my wisdom tooth extraction. I had never taken it before, and I am generally somewhat hesitant with psychoactive drugs.
I have decided to document my first real experience with Valium, and will try to update the record every fifteen minutes. I am quite an experienced user of alcohol, cannabis and cocaine, and have also tried mushrooms (psilocybin). I take lots of coffee (about 4 - 5 cups a day.
I was 21 at the time, and I was taking no other drugs, with the exception of aspirin, Tylenol, and Advil, all of which had so little if any affect that I had given up on them, and I drank only socially, lightly and infrequently.
I started taking Valium when I was 17 as a recreational drug; I only used it occasionally and was hardly addicted. I had taken pills like vicodin and codeine and never had an addiction to any of them, but I liked them a lot.
Bluelight 6 threads 5 neutral 1 cautionary visit
I got to my friends party at about 10pm, just as things started to liven up. There was about 15 people there, most drinking from the keig (sp?), some passing a crack pipe around which i chose not to participate in. I pour a beer and sit down next to a girl that looks pretty out of it.
Last night I was given a reasonable amount of Diazepam powder to try out. It came as fluffy white powder. No realy notiable smell. After reading around online I decided to start with a 25mg dose, seeing as my scales are only accurate to 0.01g I measured out 100mg and then divided it by eye.
High Dose Benzodiazapine (Valium) 175mg High Experience Level Report As a brief introduction I have a pretty high tolerance to Benzo's in general. - I can take 2mg to 4mg of Xanax and not pass out. It would take 6mg-7mg to get me to sleep, let alone cause me to black out.
I came across some diazepam, and shortly thereafter I entered a relationship with a girl I had been fond of for about two years. These two events are unrelated, I should mention. The girl and I lived in different cities, each 4 hours apart. We saw each other on weekends when I could come into town.
so i think this was like a year ago, but i decided to post this trip report anyways. first of all, valium is this single shittest and depressing drug ever. it leaves you feeling (if you do feel at all) like a zombie. anyways. i left my house at maybe 12 midday on a saturday.
I pull in to the lot. Trade the bills. The transaction is made. I now look in awe at these little green pills that are soon going to sledgehammer my mind into oblivion.
Pill Identifiers
23
known pill identifiers on record — view imprints, colors, shapes, and images
→
Diazepam's nerd page
Pharmacology, chemical data, effect profiles, and more
→
Helpful Links
Add missing routes to PsychonautWiki Journal
The PsychonautWiki Journal app already has Diazepam, but its built-in entry only covers Oral. Here are the other routes we have data for. You can't edit a built-in substance, but you can add a Custom Unit for any of these routes to log it.
⬇ Download import file
Import this file as custom substances
and you get "Diazepam (Substance Search)" with every
route's full dose ladder and timeline, no typing. Works on iOS and
Android (v15+); the format is confirmed by the app's
developer. The manual values below work for older
versions.
Duration (reference)
Diazepam: routes the PsychonautWiki Journal app is missing Source: SubstanceSearch (substancesearch.com) Intravenous duration: onset 1-5m · peak 15m · offset 1-6h · total 10-24h · after-effects 12-48h Note: ranges are harm-reduction guidance, not a prescription. Start low, go slow, and test your substances.
Ranges are harm-reduction guidance, not a prescription.
Report an issue or suggest an edit
Spotted incorrect or dangerous information, have a correction, a new study, or a useful addition for Diazepam? Let us know. Reports are reviewed by moderators — this is not posted publicly.