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By S Bin Shaheen, Fragrance Expert at Perfumeo. Last updated September 2026.
How we checked this. Every claim below was tested the same way: both note lists pulled from Fragrantica rather than from retail listings, shared notes counted as a fraction of the original’s full pyramid, and no percentages quoted, because nobody publishes a formula and no percentage is verifiable. Where a comparison rests on community opinion rather than overlapping notes, we say so rather than presenting it as fact. We stock the Rasasi range and handle these bottles daily, which is how several of the errors below came to light in the first place.
Search any Hawas fragrance and the autocomplete fills with the same question: what is it a clone of. The answers circulating are mostly repeated hearsay, and the most confidently repeated one does not survive contact with the note lists.
So here is the honest version. We have compared every Hawas people ask about against the fragrance it supposedly copies, using Fragrantica as the single source for both sides, and counted what actually overlaps. Where a comparison is community opinion rather than something the notes support, we say so instead of pretending otherwise.
The short answer
Rasasi does not market any Hawas fragrance as a copy of anything. Most of the comparisons you see online are community shorthand for “this reminds me of that”, and several fall apart when you check the compositions. The original Hawas in particular is not the clone it is routinely claimed to be.
Hawas and Invictus Aqua: the claim that does not hold up
This is the comparison you will see most often, usually stated as fact. It is worth examining properly.
Hawas lists apple, bergamot, lemon and cinnamon; watery notes, plum, cardamom and orange blossom; ambergris, musk, patchouli and driftwood. Twelve notes.
Invictus Aqua in its 2018 form lists grapefruit and violet leaf; sea notes, violet, woody notes and palisander rosewood; ambergris and amberwood. Eight notes.
Count the overlap and you get one: ambergris. Stretch the definition to treat watery notes and sea notes as the same idea and you reach two of eight. There is no apple, no cinnamon, no plum and no cardamom in the Paco Rabanne. There is no violet, no grapefruit and no rosewood in the Rasasi.
They share a category, which is salty aquatic freshness, and both finish on ambergris. That is genuinely all. Wearers comparing them are responding to a family resemblance rather than a copied formula, and anyone buying Hawas expecting to smell Invictus Aqua will be surprised.
Worth adding a complication: Invictus Aqua exists in more than one version, with the 2016 and 2018 releases carrying different compositions. Comparisons that do not specify which one are not saying anything precise.
Hawas Ice
The most common answer here is that Ice clones the original Hawas rather than any designer fragrance, and that one holds up. Ice lists apple, Italian lemon, Sicilian bergamot and star anise over plum, orange blossom and cardamom, on musk, amber, driftwood and moss. Set against the original, the heart is nearly identical and the base is close. The real differences are star anise replacing cinnamon at the top, and moss replacing patchouli underneath.
There is a second answer worth adding, because it comes up constantly. Within the Hawas line, Ice rather than the original is the flanker wearers most often name as the closer match to Invictus Aqua. The cold citrus opening and the clean salty base are what drive that, and it is a fairer comparison than the one usually made about the original.
It still does not make it a clone, for a reason almost nobody mentions: the original Hawas launched in 2015 and Invictus Aqua in 2016. The fragrance routinely described as the copy came first. Whatever the resemblance, the timeline runs the wrong way for a simple clone story.
So the honest framing is this: Hawas Ice is a flanker of Hawas first, and the closest thing in the line to Invictus Aqua second. Our full comparison of the two covers which to buy.
Hawas Tropical
The comparison here is to a Jean Paul Gaultier tropical release, and it is the strongest in this article, though still not a clone.
Tropical lists coconut water, fig leaf and ginger; coconut, fig and mint; sandalwood, tonka bean and musk. The Gaultier is marketed on coconut water, green fig and sandalwood, and all three of those appear in the Rasasi. That is a real structural overlap rather than a vague impression.
What the marketing shorthand leaves out is the rest of each composition, and the ginger and mint in Tropical push it somewhere greener and cooler. One reviewer who owns both put it plainly: they understand why people call it a clone, but if you want the Gaultier, buy the Gaultier. That is fair advice.
Hawas Fire
The community comparison here is not to a designer fragrance at all but to a niche Middle Eastern release, and there is a long-running discussion thread devoted to it. We cannot score it, because Rasasi publishes only six notes for Fire and wearers consistently report a red fruit accord that appears nowhere on the official list.
What we can say is that the resemblance people describe sits in the sweet fruit over fresh mineral structure rather than in shared materials on paper. Treat it as a family likeness. Hawas Fire is best judged on its own terms, since it is the loudest thing in the line either way.
Hawas Sapphire, Black and Elixir
Sapphire draws comparisons to an Ex Nihilo release, with reviewers placing it between two versions of it and noting Sapphire adds a tropical twist the originals do not have. That is a directional comparison, not a formula match.
Black gets grouped into the pineapple and moss family that a famous Creed release made popular, which is a broad category containing dozens of fragrances rather than a specific claim.
Elixir is regularly listed as a version of a Jean Paul Gaultier gourmand, and this is the comparison we would treat most sceptically. Elixir is built on spearmint, mugwort, dark chocolate, lavender and vanilla, and reviewers who own both say it smells nothing like the fragrance it is compared to. The mint and chocolate combination is unusual enough that it deserves to be judged alone.
Rafan
Not a Hawas, but it comes up in the same searches. Rafan belongs to Rasasi’s Duo Collection and draws the closest comparison of anything the house makes, with wearers putting it near a well-known Issey Miyake salty aquatic and one placing it very close indeed. Both are built on sea salt freshness over clean woods.
Rafan lists sea salt and ginger, seaweed and vetiver, cedarwood and oakmoss, and the seaweed is the note that gives it a texture most salty fragrances skip.
Why these comparisons keep spreading
Three reasons, and they are worth understanding if you buy in this part of the market.
Retailers benefit from them. Attaching a famous name to an affordable bottle sells it, so listings repeat comparisons without checking the compositions.
Categories get mistaken for copies. Salty aquatic freshness with an ambergris base is a genre, not a formula. Dozens of fragrances share that structure without any of them copying each other.
And note lists are unreliable. We have found the same Rasasi pyramid published against three different fragrances by three different sellers, and one sample retailer listing Hawas Tropical’s notes under Hawas Elixir. If the starting data is wrong, every comparison built on it is wrong too.
How to judge a comparison yourself
Pull both note lists from the same source, ideally Fragrantica, since brand marketing lists are usually shorter and make overlaps look larger than they are. Count the shared notes as a fraction of the original’s full list. Ignore percentages, because nobody publishes a formula and no percentage is verifiable. And check which version of the original is being discussed, because flankers and reformulations mean a single name can cover several different compositions.
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Frequently asked questions
What is Rasasi Hawas a dupe of?
Officially, nothing. Rasasi has never marketed it as a copy. The commonly repeated comparison to Paco Rabanne Invictus Aqua shares only ambergris out of eight notes, so it does not stand up as a clone claim, though both sit in the salty aquatic family.
What is Hawas Ice a clone of?
Hawas Ice is a flanker of the original Hawas rather than a clone of a designer fragrance. It shares nearly the whole heart and most of the base with the original, changing the top and swapping moss for patchouli.
Is Hawas a clone of Aventus?
No. That comparison is usually made about Hawas Black, and even then it refers to a broad pineapple and moss category rather than a formula match. The original Hawas is fruity and aquatic with no smoky birch.
What is Hawas Fire a dupe of?
Community comparisons point to a niche Middle Eastern release rather than a designer one. It cannot be scored properly because Rasasi publishes only six notes for Fire and wearers report more than that in the bottle.
Are dupes and clones the same thing?
People use the words interchangeably, but neither describes anything legally or technically precise. A fragrance can share a structure, a category or a general impression without sharing a formula, and most so-called clones fall into that middle ground.
Should I buy a fragrance because it is a dupe of something?
Rarely. If you want a specific designer fragrance, nothing else will scratch that itch. If you want a good fragrance in a similar style with better longevity for less money, the Hawas line delivers that on its own merits, which is the honest reason to buy it.
The verdict
The Hawas line is better than the clone conversation suggests. Its performance is the genuine selling point, not its resemblance to anything else, and the fragrance most often called a copy turns out to share almost nothing with the original it is compared to.
If you want the full picture of the range, our guide to every Hawas fragrance compared ranks them, and our brand guide covers the house behind them. Everything in our Rasasi collection is genuine sealed stock with free UK tracked delivery.
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