You wouldn’t want to freeze (make that feel cold) while on your camping trip. But neither do you want to carry a bulky camping tent heater that’ll limit your campsite choices to where you can get electricity. Or, God forbid, it’s a propane heater and you suddenly run out of fuel in the middle of the woods? So what’s the alternative to staying warm while adventuring the outdoors — a snug camping blanket.
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A suitable camping blanket is an excellent companion to keep the shivers at bay whether you’re on an outdoor campsite in the woods or relishing a vibrant music concert on a chilly night. Camping blankets are no longer an optional addition to your camping gear but a vital necessity that should be safely tucked in your car, ready for your next adventure.
Nonetheless, choosing an appropriate camping blanket can be a daunting task, given the proliferation of options from various brands and your unique preferences.
In this article, we’ve done the work for you by sifting through the options and presenting you with some of the most highly regarded camping blankets to choose from.
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What Makes a Good Camping Blanket?
Before reviewing some of the top-rated camping blankets, here are some essential qualities to look for when buying a camping blanket.
Weatherproofing (warm camping blanket)
Out in the open, there’s exposure to the elements such as wind and water. The ideal camping blanket needs to do more than the average blanket at home. To keep you warm, it has to grapple against winds in the wild that try to penetrate through the materials while also offering water resistance for a cozy camping experience. Applying DWR (Durable Water Repellent) coatings to the materials improves the blankets’ wind and water resistance.
Durability
In the comfort of your house, there’s no need to worry about natural abrasive components like pointed rock ends, mud, thorns, and thicket. Your camping blanket, on the other hand, will need a tough material such as polyester and ripstop nylon that can hold out against a characteristically harsh outdoor environment. Besides, it needs to be purposely stitched to withstand wear and tear.
Lightweight and Portable
The portability of camping gear is such a vital concern for campers. While your in-house blanket can be voluminous, you’d want a compact and lightweight camping blanket with an easy-to-carry storage bag for ease of movement. Our picks below feature blankets that mostly weigh below 3 pounds; hence are easy to pack and light to carry.
Comfortable; Smooth and Comforting
You need a camping blanket that’s tough against the outdoor weather but gentle on you, providing supreme comfort for the ultimate snug experience. The material should comfortingly caress the body while offering warmth.
Budget
The general rule of thumb is that it’s likely to be of higher quality if it’s more pricey. Nevertheless, you do not need to break the bank to have a camping blanket that suits your requirements. You’d want to ensure you’re paying for quality and not merely to carry a brand name on you.
Design
Just because the camping blanket is essentially insulating you from the cold weather, it doesn’t have to look like some random rag picked from the First World War. It can as well incorporate elements of admirable design and style to your preference. You could make a bold fashion statement with a classy camping blanket at an outdoor evening concert.
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The Best Camping Blanket on The Market
Manufacturers make camping blankets intended to survive a draconian outdoor terrain. Coming in an assortment of sizes, they’re built using wool or some synthetic insulation for durability and portability.
Camping blankets and sleeping bags are relatives with regard to the materials they’re made of to perform the functions of insulation from the elements. But they differ in that they’re more flexible and stylish compared to sleeping bags. Their flexibility enables them to support a mobile outdoor lifestyle, unlike sleeping bags that are quite restrictive by design.
Outdoor enthusiasts prefer camping blankets due to their versatility and the ease with which they’re adaptable to different settings. You can use them on the beach, in the tent for extra warmth, or cozy lounging on your living room sofa.
Here’s a beeline to some of the most recommended ones to keep you warm outdoors.
1. Rumpl The Original Puffy Camping Blanket
Over its six years since inception, Rumpl has continued to impress outdoor devotees with a string of magnificent products that provide extreme comfort and warmth. Each blanket Rumpl builds embodies all the desirable qualities that a camper looks for in a blanket; portability, warmth, and durability.
The Original Puffy Blanket is made from the same high-quality materials found in sleeping bags and puffy jackets. Moreover, it comes in an array of adorable colors for your preference.
Rumpl thought of sustainability when crafting these blankets by making the insulation and ripstop shell from 100% recycled materials. The best part is you can readily carry the camping blanket to a picnic, a beach party, or a hiking escapade.
Upon purchase, the blanket comes in a bag for conveniently handling the compact blanket weighing 2.1lbs and measuring 14in by 6.5in when packed.
The blanket features a DWR coating that repels water, stains, and odors. But even when the blanket gets dirty in the mud, it can be machine washed. Just throw it into the washing machine, and voila, you can re-use it the next day.
Rumpl offers size variety too. The blanket comes in two different sizes for one person or a blanket for two. You can use the cape clips to wear the 1-person blanket allowing you to operate hands-free as you take a drink or push up sticks into the fire. You can also stake the blanket into the ground using the provided corner loops.
2. Kelty Bestie Blanket
Kelty’s Bestie Blanket is the perfect camping gear for the frugal outdoor shopper. Kelty, a reputed manufacturer with years of experience manufacturing sleeping bags at a pocket-friendly price, is a high-quality piece.
Cozy insulation, compactness, and softness to the skin are cardinal benefits besides the reasonable price tag. The blanket is suitable for wrapping around the shoulders while outdoors for that added warmth or spreading to lay on the grass as you watch the sunset.
Bestie makes use of synthetic fiber, Cloudloft, for insulation. Cloudloft is warm yet cheaper compared with other insulating materials, resulting in an affordable blanket.
As it weighs below 2lbs and easily fits into its stuff sack of 11.8in x 6.7in, it’s a pretty convenient carry-along in your car. More so, it’s a light load to carry from the car to the picnic site.
You can choose from four colors; navy, brown, purple and light blue.
3. Coalatree Green Kachula Adventure Blanket
Coalatree’s Kachula blanket is a testament to their innovative prowess in unleashing top-notch hiking gear to insulate from outdoor chills. It’s a highly durable blanket made from an amalgamation of sturdy ripstop nylon and recycled cotton.
Weighing 1.9lbs, it’s constructed to be a lightweight and sought-after compact gear for outdoor trips, hikes in chilly set-ups, or weekend getaways.
To keep you dry and warm, Coalatree coats it’s adventure blankets with an environmentally friendly DWR coating on both sides. This helps to keep the blanket water and odor proof, and better still, dirt proof.
Another brilliant invention of this product is that it can double up as a pillow thanks to a concealed pocket with the zipper. To convert the blanket to a pillow, roll it up into the pocket and zip it up. You have a pillow for your sleeping bag or while traveling on the road. Dazzling.
The best part about these blankets is that they’re wearable as ponchos with a detachable hood. You’ll be spoilt for choice as the blankets come in six charming colors.
4. Kammok Bobcat Trail Quilt
Kammok, the Austin based manufacturing brand, is well-known for its stylish hammocks. But when it ventured into camping blankets, out came the Bobcat. The Kammok Bobcat Trail Quilt is your go-to insulation piece suitable for outdoor camping.
Kammok makes the Bobcat Trail Quilt from superior down feathers and treats it to be hydrophobic. Using tough 20D ripstop nylon enhances its durability by cushioning it against abrasions.
At $199 apiece, it doesn’t come cheap, but it does more than just a comfy camping blanket. When buttoned together, it can form a hiking sleeping bag. That’s a major selling point that offers value for money. More so, it also forms an under-quilt for hammocks.
Lastly, the Bobcat is portable with a convenient-to-carry package with handles and comes with a lifetime warranty. It’s an ultra-lightweight camping blanket.
5. NEMO Puffin Blanket
Designed to deal with chilly nights out in the open, the Puffin Insulated Blanket will keep your entire body warm owing to its unique configuration and effective insulating materials, all at an accessible price. Its centenary design is well adapted to your body curvature providing maximum insulation as it intimately wraps around your entire body.
Its conquering feature is the blanket’s foot hideaway that, when buttoned-up, fully conceals your feet, wrapping them from the biting cold.
The clever design is not all; the Puffin is easy to clean and convenient to carry in a stash away bag that’s also convertible to a pillow. When stashed away in a stylish compact pack, it’s 8×14 inches and weighs 2.6lbs. As a result of the synthetic insulating materials and nylon ripstop, cleaning the Puffin is an easy-peasy task.
6. Horizon Hound Down Camping Blanket
Extremely light and long-lasting, Horizon Hound offers you the supreme feel of carefully sourced down at a desirable price tag of below $100. It’s a less expensive alternative if you compare it with Rumpl’s down blanket.
Weighing just over a pound, the feather filling and down combine to produce a lightweight blanket that doesn’t compromise warmth. It’s ideal for keeping you cozy all year long.
This classic sleeping blanket rivals a premium sleeping bag as it’s made from similar high-quality materials like the 20D ripstop nylon fabric that withstand tears. To top it all, the blanket is machine washable and treated with DWR coating to ward off odors, water, sand, and stains.
It comes in two sizes:
- The Trek; suitable for warmer weather. Measures 11×5.5×16 inches.
- The GR20; appropriate for colder weather and measures 12×6.5×18 inches.
7. Pendleton Wool Glacier National Park Throw Blanket
Pendleton has paid tribute to American National Parks for the longest time by rolling out wool blankets artistically dyed in stripe and block. Made in the USA from virgin wool, these traditional blankets are cozy, thick, and relatively heavy.
If you’re super keen on appearances and not the latest advancement in camping gear, these will be your go-to blankets. Comprising an impressive collection of picturesque designs on their camping blankets, Pendleton has provided a feast for the eyes of those who thrive on posting colorful camping photos on their social media platforms.
The Glacier National Park Blanket is the most iconic of these blankets.
They come in 3 dimensions:
- Twin (66×90 inches)
- Full (80×90 inches)
- Queen (90×90 inches)
8. Kammok Arctos Ultralight Down Trail Quilt
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Arctos is the ultimate camping blanket. This is Kammok’s camp blanket that’s most feature-laden, making it head and shoulders ahead of its contemporaries. This ultralight blanket weighs a measly 26.25 ounces. Kammok has designated it as a trail quilt.
It can keep you cozy even when the temperatures dip to 20℉(degrees Fahrenheit) because of the top-of-the-line 850-fill down stuffing.
In the Arctos, you’ll get all the Kommak Bobcat camping blanket has to offer and more. The Arctos is convertible to a poncho. And what’s more, with zippers in its lower portions, you could turn it into a sleeping bag if you so desire.
Purchase: $359
9. Arcturus Military Wool Blanket
This is an all-purpose, heavy-duty wool blanket that is most suited for the most severe scenarios. That’s why the military and other emergency staff prefer it. The 4-pound blanket is 80% wool.
Arcturus blanket that’s highly tolerant to extreme conditions measures 8×6 feet.
To crown it all, the blanket is machine washable. After a hiking adventure over extreme terrain, you can toss the camping blanket into the washing machine and have it ready for your next plan.
10. Sorison Large Puffy Camping Blanket
Bouts of biting cold as you scramble to keep warm around a bonfire over camp will be history if you can get a hold of Sorison’s Large Puffy Camping Blanket. With a dimension of 80 by 54 inches, the blanket can fit in up to three people.
Durability, warmth, and portability are its notable fascinations. If that’s not enough, it provides incredible comfort and warmth through its unique atomic loft insulation that comprises a mix of microfiber and synthetic down. Its 20D ripstop nylon material makes it tough capable of use for innumerable camping sprees.
The blanket comes with a concealed pocket to put away your valuables. It’s easy to carry using its stuff sack that comes complete with shoulder straps.
Conclusion
A camping blanket is no longer considered a luxury but a necessity for an enjoyable camping trip. You can choose from the vast array that we’ve delved into above. It depends on your budget, design preference, the harshness of the terrain you’ll be exploring, whether the blanket is required for a 1-person use or use by a couple, or the portability.