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tl;dr if there's smoke coming out of your chimney there might be a problem, and you should read more below.

When I ask if your wood stove is efficient, it's not to "save the planet". It's because if your stove isn't running right that means you're burning more wood and putting out less heat than you could, and you may also be depositing more soot in your chimney than you would prefer.

Cheap single-chamber stoves tend to be pretty inefficient. Properly designed double-chamber stoves, and most of the stoves on the market qualify even if the second chamber is small and not easily noticed, run IMO acceptably efficient. Catalytic stoves are even more efficient but the added expense is IMO not necessary.

First thing, you won't have no smoke at all coming from your chimney. All stoves will produce smoke until they get up to temperature. You want to get the stove up to its regular running temperature before you check the chimney.

White smoke from a wood fire is mostly methanol, with some ethanol and some other products. The second chamber of the stove is where unburned organic compounds will combust once that chamber is up to temperature. White or light gray smoke coming from the chimney means either the stove itself is inefficient, or you're not allowing enough air into the stove or enough airflow through the stove. There has to be enough oxygen coming in to fully combust the carbon in the wood.

Note that white clouds from your chimney aren't necessarily white smoke. It can also be condensing water vapor. Water is a product of burning hydrocarbons and if the humidity is high that water will condense once the stove exhaust cools down. High humidity in the environment will increase this effect. Look closely at the top of the chimney, if there's a clear gap between it and where the white clouds appear then it's water vapor. A lot of water vapor may also mean you're burning green wood, which isn't a good idea for various reasons.

Darker smoke means the materials you're burning aren't very appropriate for the purpose. I'd recommend switching to different materials, or different wood, to help keep from fouling up your stove.