Elemental ingredient
Elemental ingredients are ingredients based on elemental origins. They are used in many different professions.
Vanilla
Essences
Elemental essences are elemental ingredients used in some vanilla WoW recipes. Not to be confused with enchanting's essences.
The Burning Crusade
Elemental Motes
Elemental motes are elemental fragments which can be assembled into Elemental Primals, used in many professions (at the Master level).
There are multiple ways of collecting each mote type which vary by element, but all of them drop off of certain Outland mobs related to their element, specifically elementals of the related element.
A stack of 10 of any mote can be made into a Primal (of the same element), i.e. 10 
[Mote of Water] → 1 
[Primal Water]. The reverse conversion is not usually possible, but see Earth Shatter and Fire Sunder as exceptions.
Engineers can also use a 
[Zapthrottle Mote Extractor] to gather motes from gas clouds in Outland.
Elemental Primals
[Primal Air]
[Mote of Air] x10 combines into a Primal Air.
[Primal Earth]
[Mote of Earth] x10 combines into a Primal Earth. Primal Earth can be broken into 10 Motes of Earth by Miners with the Earth Shatter Smelting ability.
[Primal Fire]
[Mote of Fire] x10 combines into a Primal Fire. Primal Fire can be broken into 10 Motes of Fire by Miners with the Fire Sunder Smelting ability.
- [Primal Water]
- [Mote of Water] x10 combines into a Primal Water.
[Primal Life]
[Mote of Life] x10 combines into a Primal Life.
[Primal Mana]
[Mote of Mana] x10 combines into a Primal Mana.
[Primal Shadow]
[Mote of Shadow] x10 combines into a Primal Shadow.
Primal Might
[Primal Might] - Transmutation combining one each of five Primals: [Primal Air], [Primal Earth], [Primal Fire], [Primal Water], [Primal Mana]
Wrath of the Lich King
Crystallized Ingredients
A crystallized ingredient is the version of elemental substances introduced with the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. These compare directly to Motes, which were introduced with The Burning Crusade.
They are used, either directly, or when combined into Eternal ingredient forms, in various tradeskill recipes.
10 of any crystallized element can be made into an eternal ingredient (of the same element), i.e. 10 
[Crystallized Air] → 1 
[Eternal Air] (You need only have 10 in inventory, they need not all be in one stack).
The reverse conversion is done by right-clicking the item.
The engineering item, [Zapthrottle Mote Extractor], can also gather crystallized ingredients in Northrend from Gas clouds.
Eternals
Eternals powerful type of elemental ingredient used in some Wrath of the Lich King recipes. Their mote equivalent is crystallized ingredients.
- [Eternal Air]
- [Crystallized Air] x10 combines into a Eternal Air.
[Eternal Earth]
[Crystallized Earth] x10 combines into a Eternal Earth.
[Eternal Fire]
[Crystallized Fire] x10 combines into a Eternal Fire.
[Eternal Water]
[Crystallized Water] x10 combines into a Eternal Water.
[Eternal Life]
[Crystallized Life] x10 combines into a Eternal Life.
[Eternal Shadow]
[Crystallized Shadow] x10 combines into a Eternal Shadow.
Removed
[Eternal Might] - Transmutation combining one each of four Eternal ingredients
Cataclysm
Volatile Ingredients
Volatile ingredients are a powerful type of elemental ingredients used in Cataclysm recipes. In order to simplify things, they do not have a mote equivalent.
Removed
- A
[Volatile Shadow] item was planned, but did not emerge from Beta.
Mists of Pandaria
Mote of Harmony
Motes made a comeback in the Mists of Pandaria expansion, where 10 
[Mote of Harmony] can be turned into 1 
[Spirit of Harmony].
Spirit Ingredients
Spirit ingredients were a powerful type of elemental ingredients used in Mists of Pandaria recipes. They acted much like volatile ingredients in that they also did not have a mote equivalent. They could stack up to 200.
Unlike their older counterparts, these items refer to seasons instead of elements.
They were ultimately removed during beta in favor of just keeping it simple and only having the [Spirit of Harmony].
Table of elemental items
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