After six months of frequent use, the stitching along one arm had come unraveled, and the small straps holding up the back of the armrests had both ripped in half. Stumps, stools, boulders, and picnic tables are fine for sitting briefly outdoors. But if you want to kick back and stay comfy, the right camping chair can make all the difference. The Woodlands Screen House uses six lightweight aluminum poles, just like the Screen House Shelter.
Finally, these shelters feel noticeably smaller than any of our picks. We also tested and liked the Coleman Mountain View 12 x 12 Screendome Shelter; it was an also-great pick until Coleman discontinued the model. Make your tailgate, campout, or backyard party even more enjoyable with the Ozark Trail 10′ x 10′ Instant Straight Leg Canopy. Made of a durable polyester construction, this canopy tent provides 100 square feet of cooling shade anywhere and the easy push-button system offers safe setup and takedown. It features built-in vents on the top for added ventilation and offers you 50+ UV protection from the hot sun all day long. All you need to do to put together this Ozark Trail 10-foot by 10-foot Canopy is extend the one-piece steel frame, attach the canopy top, and adjust the telescoping 3-position legs to the desired height.
Keep in mind that lightweight chairs won’t be nearly as comfortable as traditional camping chairs, so take the word comfortable with a grain of salt. The first trip was an early-February expedition to Indian Cove Campground in California’s Joshua Tree National Park, where our highly exposed group campsite made daytime temperatures in the high 70s feel like the 90s. We used the shelters for sun protection, setting up camp chairs inside one and a play mat and toddler toys inside another, and placing the large Clam shelter over a picnic table piled with markers and coloring books. No other chair in our testing pool—except perhaps the extremely pricey Yeti Trailhead—came close to matching the King Kong’s build quality. Our testers consistently said the King Kong chair was the most heavy-duty-feeling model of all the chairs we tested. The Coleman Cooler Quad has been our pick since 2016, through numerous camping trips and several testing sessions.
The included carrying bag does not have wheels to aid in transportation, but at only 29 lbs. We don’t find that to be a noteworthy drawback as the nylon handles and shoulder strap work just fine in carrying the tent. Most of our testers found the REI Co-op Skyward Chair to be one of the least comfortable chairs in our testing pool. People who did like it tended to have smaller body types, so if you find that other camping chairs are too big for you, the Skyward might be a good fit. At a little over 7 pounds, it’s also the lightest traditional chair we tested—but it had the lowest weight capacity (250 pounds).
She has personally tested a dozen tents and an equal number of hair dryers. Getting our hands dirty with one of the best sun shelters on the market. Digging our toes in the sand under one of the best full-overhead coverage beach tents on the market. GCI Outdoor makes several rocking chairs, and we plan to try more of them to see if they’re any better than the Freestyle Rocker, which we weren’t enthusiastic about. The cupholders on the L.L.Bean Kids’ Base Camp Chair aren’t as roomy as those on our picks, and they’re not as adept at holding stubby water bottles or mugs of hot chocolate.
The Renetto Original Canopy Chair is the best chair with a built-in canopy. Escape to the beautiful sunny days and gentle warmth found ozark trail camping chair at all our sunbelt resorts. With our resort-style amenities and variety of activities, you’ll want to stay all winter long.
In summer 2023, she bought a newer Coleman Cooler Quad Chair to compare to her 2016 model, and she found them to be more or less the same. Kalee Thompson is the senior editor heading up Wirecutter’s kid coverage. When she wrote the first version of this guide, Kalee lived in Southern California, where she tested chairs on three group camping trips. Though all of these shelters are self-standing and staking them may not be strictly necessary in calm weather, it’s wise to always do so in case the wind picks up unexpectedly. Before staking out a tent, make sure all of its doors are zipped closed to avoid staking it too tightly and straining the zippers.
Another said it’s been an essential chair in their life and that it is still going strong after countless soccer games, birthday parties, beach trips, and school events. If you’re looking for highly specialized or ultra-lightweight chairs for backpacking, our recommendations are probably not for you. We also don’t have suggestions for couch-style or loveseat chairs (we’d like to look at those someday, though). Several REI reviewers who bought both the tent and the fly for rain protection note that the fly has only two walls, leaving much of the tent exposed. The add-on fly for our runner-up pick, the L.L.Bean Woodlands Screen House, offers four-walled protection, though it’s also more than twice as expensive.