Tents and Shelter

Why the number on the label is a lie, and what to spend on instead.

Updated

Tents are the category where the marketing number does the most damage.

A two-person tent fits two people and nothing else

Two adults shoulder to shoulder, packs in the vestibule. If you want room to sit out a wet afternoon, or you are two people and a dog, buy the three. Weights have come down far enough that the penalty is small, and this is the single best piece of tent advice there is.

Season rating, properly understood

Three-season covers spring to autumn and suits almost everyone. Four-season means it takes snow loading and wind, at a cost in weight, price and ventilation. A one or two-season shelter bought for a trip that might see real weather is the classic error.

Weights, updated

A good two-person three-season tent is now 1.3 to 1.8kg, where 2.5kg was respectable when most of these reviews were written. Under a kilo exists and uses trekking poles instead of tent poles, single-wall construction, or both, with condensation as the trade.

The features that decide whether you like it

Where to spend and where not to

Pay for the fly fabric, the pole hubs and the zips, which are the parts that fail. Do not pay for the branded footprint: a cut sheet of polycryo or a groundsheet from a hardware shop does the same job for a tenth of the price and a fraction of the weight.

Hammocks are a different answer

In warm humid forest with uneven ground, a hammock beats any tent for comfort. It needs two things people discover the hard way: insulation underneath, because your bag compresses where you need loft, and a tarp, because netting stops insects and nothing stops rain. Use wide tree-friendly straps, which many parks now require.

And pitch anything new in the garden first, in daylight, dry. That is when you find the missing peg.

Kept current

The reviews (94)

Written at the time, about gear that in most cases is no longer made. Useful for what the writer noticed, not as a shopping list.