A novel methodology to directly pre-determine the relative wavelength response (RWR) of a DFB laser, in terms of a combined current linearly scanned wavelength response and current modulated wavelength response (CMWR), in wavelength modulation spectroscopy (WMS) is presented. It is shown that the assessed RWR can be used to mimic the measured response with standard deviation of discriminations that are below 3.4 x 10(-3)cm(-1) under a variety of conditions. It is also shown that its performance supersedes two commonly used assessment models of the CMWR but is slightly worse than that of the third model. however with the benefit of solely using a single fitting parameter (the concentration) instead of more. When the novel method is applied to the assessment of CO2 concentration in a Herriot-type multipass cell by using the technique of calibration-free WMS, the results show that there is virtually no difference compared to that by use of the best of the other methods. It is concluded that the novel method is more robust and simplifies the retrieval process of gas concentration.