There's nothing better on a cool night than having your firewood blazing and friends and family around. It's the perfect way to relax.

However, the fire pit must be lit!

If you've never done this before, it may seem a little daunting, especially if you want to do it without using lighter fluid (which we highly recommend!). 

The good news, however, is that this is not necessarily a given. We've put together our definitive guide to light your fire pit every time!

Fire Pit Safety

For your fire pit, your first priority should always be safety. When it comes to fire and your fire pit, maintaining and adhering to safe practices is essential to avoid any unnecessary damage or accidents.

Here are a few things to consider for your fire pit safety:

Keep your fire pit at least 10 feet away from your house, trees, fences, or any structure

Make sure your deck is away from wood burning fire pits

Place the fire pit on a flat surface

Do not use any toxic products to start a fire

Don't start a fire in windy conditions

Always maintain a safe distance from the source of fire

Keep an eye out for children around the fire

Keep an eye on your fire at all times to make sure the flame doesn't get out of control

Now that we've got that firmly in mind, it's time to get everything we need to make a fire.

Prepare

In order to make a fire, you need to gather some things. Let's break it down

Lighters or igniters - the most common are kitchen lighters or matches, which work well but are slower and a bit tricky. Ideally, you can use a lighter to start a fire faster. If you don't have them, they won't be very expensive to buy.

Tinder - This is the base and starting point of fire. Your tinder can be anything dry and non-toxic. Therefore, leaves, newspapers, pine cones, bark can be used as kindling.

Kindling - This is the next level of kindling of fire, which is twigs and branches. It is also important that they are dry in order to get light and burn long enough for your firewood to burn.

Firewood - Your firewood is the ultimate goal we light. If you want to start a fire, the wood should be dry, seasoned, and piled together. We love the look of the outdoor wood storage area, which complements the material/design of your fire pit.

That's it. Once you have all this in place, you can light your fire pit.

Light your fire pit

There are four simple steps to starting a fire. Here we go:

1. Step 1 - Tinder

First, we're going to create a small fireball in the center of the fire pit. It just needs to be the size of your palm.

2.  Step 2 - Ignition

Next, we will build a small pyramid of fire sticks around the fireball. It's important to leave a little gap for air to circulate, but not so much that the fire reaches its ignition point.

Tip - Leave a little gap on the sides of the pyramid, too, in case you need to add more tinder anywhere.

3.  Step 3 – Lighting

Now we light the tinder. Take out the lighter and light the tinder until it catches fire. Your goal is to light the flame. If your tinder burns too fast and the tinder doesn't ignite, add more tinder.

4.  Step 4 - Firewood

Once your kindling starts burning, it's time to add firewood. Once again, we're going to arrange the logs in a pyramid shape around the igniter, making sure there's enough room for air to circulate.

If the firewood takes a while to light, you can add more kindling underneath to keep the heat in.

In general, however, if your kindling burns well, the wood will burn up quickly.

These are the four simple steps to lighting a fire pit.

Be sure to keep an eye on your fire and add a log or two at night to keep it burning.

Put out your fire

When you're done working for the night, it's also important to put out the fire properly, rather than letting it go out on its own.

It's easy to do - just take a hose and gently sprinkle water on it. Do not pour water over it, as this will damage your fire pit, just sprinkle until the fire dies down and the embers no longer glow.

Once you've lit the fire pit a few times, you realize it's no big deal, and you let it burn brightly every time.

We hope this method works for you and don't forget that the biggest secret of the fire pit is that you can cook delicious food on it.