An avid swimmer, surfer, hiker, and camper, she currently lives on the island of Oahu in Hawaii, where she can be found, as much as possible, in water. It is also important to consider the way in which the tent poles attach to the tent. Many of our picks use grommet attachments, which are more secure and simple to repair than ozark trail canopy tent key attachments if anything should break. Whether you’re thinking of hitting the road or staying close to home for your next car-camping adventure, you and your loved ones will need a comfortable place to sleep. The carry bag comes with a hand strap at the top, and this entire tent weighed about 17.8lbs for everything.
You will however need to replace the stakes that come included, as they are not the best quality. But if you only plan to use the tent one or twice a year, that’s probably not something you’ll have to worry about. The Ozark Trail is the smallest tent, making it easier to fit in a small car. The Coleman Instant 8 is ozark trail shower tent spacious and the big mesh windows are perfect to let the air in. The CORE tent is comfortable, originally made to sleep 9 people, there is plenty of space for 8. If you want to know more about the selection process for these tents, or to have more info to help you decide on which one to pick, keep reading below.
We’ve also put together a handy buyer’s guide down at the bottom as a resource for shoppers who are new to the Ozark Trail brand, so make sure to check it out. There you’ll find all the info you could ever want on the materials, build quality, and weather-worthiness of these affordable tents. It includes everything you need for your outdoor adventures and is priced competitively with a decent warranty.
Weight-wise, with its 32.6 lb (14.8 kg) this is not a lightweight tent, but this is a normal weight for such a steel construction. You will see in the comparison table below that it is lighter than some of its competitors. There is lots of mesh around and on the ceiling, so this will work great if you use the tent in a warm climate.
(As its name indicates, it’s meant to house six people, but we wouldn’t recommend that.) The Wireless 6 has two large doors and a full rain fly. A classic polyester dome tent, the Mineral King 3 uses two high-quality pre-bent aluminum poles, which maximize head and shoulder space, making this tent feel less cramped than other dome tents we tested. Two large doors provide easy entry and exit, and a vestibule—that’s camping speak for “mudroom”—outside each door adds significant sheltered storage. The Mineral King 3 has a full rain fly, which you can roll up halfway or completely remove for epic stargazing. It also comes with a groundsheet (aka footprint) to protect the tent floor.
For each of these 6 factors, we’ll compare the different tents to find out which one is the best. The tent with the highest combined score will win the title of “Best Tent” in its category. It’s a sturdy tent made by CORE, a small company based in the Midwest, privately owned and known for great designs.
This cabin style tent includes two doors and a removable room divider to create two separate rooms. The floor plan comfortably fits two queen airbeds or up to eight campers in sleeping bags on the floor and the three-hub design allows for added head room. The geodesic structure of the Base Camp tents is built to withstand wind and rain. It has two main that thread through sleeves, stretching between the four corners of the tent. Generally, we like clip-on designs better, since those are easier to put together, but in the case of the Base Camp models, the sleeves add extra tension and stability throughout the tent fabric.
And finally, the biggest con is probably that the quality isn’t the best with the slightly sticky tent fabric, loose threads, snagging issues and inconsistent mesh. The Ozark Trail 10-Person Tent also comes with a room divider, so you can split the tent into 2 rooms, and each “room” can fit 2 queen-sized camping mattresses. If there’s no rain, you can unzip the windows for more ventilation, and there’s a bug net to prevent larger bugs from getting in. It took me about double the time to set it up on my own (so, 20 minutes). But unfortunately, because I’m not tall (I’m 5’3″), I couldn’t get the rainfly up on my own, and that’s where I got stuck.