The North Face Wawona 6 Six-Person Camping Tent

Product Information

In addition to floor area, peak height and pole structure make a big impact on overall livability. Peak height in particular is an indication of whether or not you’ll be able to stand upright, and most car camping-style tents have a peak height of around 72 inches. However, this number is just part of the equation, and it’s important to also look at the slope of the walls and pole design. Dome tents with simple, X-shaped pole structures only allow you to enjoy that peak height at the middle of the tent. On the other hand, a tent with a more advanced pole system can create nearly vertical walls for walking around. This is one of the main reasons we love the REI Wonderland and Marmot Limestone: Both ends of the tents have vertical walls, and the pole designs truly opens up the interior. The cabin-style The North Face Wawona, REI Skyward, and Big Agnes Big House are other standouts in maximizing interior space. The Big Agnes Big House has a generous 80-inch peak height Capacity: How Many People Actually Fit in These Tents?

But having a smaller volume is an advantage in cold weather, as there’s less air inside the tent to keep warm. In a perfect world, all tents are 100% waterproof and capable of weathering anything from afternoon sprinkles to all-day downpours. Unfortunately marketing claims and real-world performance don’t always see eye-to-eye, and as some of you have no doubt experienced firsthand, there’s nothing worse than having your tent give up the ghost in the middle of a nighttime rainstorm. It comes with three doors, which can make a big difference if you have 6 people staying the night in one space. This is a hard feature to come by, as nearly every 6 person tent we tested only provided two doors.A spacious car camping tent with windows that can be left open in the rain. Outstanding materials, interior space, and external storage. See Review Even the 4P version of the Nemo Aurora Highrise includes standup height ceilings, which adds a ton of livability in any camping tent. Overall we were impressed by the Nemo’s performance, but had a few concerns with the new design. The first came when setting up the tent as a tester managed to bend one of the rivets that hold the side poles in place. It didn’t effect the performance of the tent, but it was enough to remind us that this new design is still relatively untested. The second is that as much as we love the Highrise’s window awnings, they aren’t the most aerodynamic shape out there. We didn’t get a chance to test the tent out in any serious winds, but we felt they could be a liability in heavier gusts. Still, this is an impressive accomplishment as a four-person shelter, and we all felt that the unique design, tough materials, and lifetime warranty were all well worth the asking price. Read our full test and review… Pros:

Tall people may prefer this design to that of a dome-style tent as they can stand up and move around more easily. Pop-Up TentsIn addition to a nice aerodynamic fly, we also look for a good amount of guylines attached to it, as these are ultimately what give a tent’s structure its strength. There’s no better example of a windproof and well-secured rainfly than the Mountain Hardwear Trango 4 we recently tested, but tents like the North Face Wawona, Big Agnes Bunk House, and MSR Habitude 6 are all good examples of how a good rainfly and tough guylines allow a big tent to survive in the wind. Ease of Set-up The Trango has been the go-to for hardcore expeditions and mountaineering pursuits since 1995, which means Mountain Hardwear has been steadily improving this shelter for nearly three decades at this point. The Trango has been our tent of choice for high-elevation camping this year, and our testers all agree that every inch of this shelter is as bombproof as they come. This tent has one of the best uses of space we have ever seen, a great choice for families or campers with lots of gear A bombproof four-season shelter that’s built to climb mountains and survive blizzards. Unmatched quality and toughness with impressive innovations throughout. See Review Good outdoors gear can be a big investment, and durability is the make-or-break factor that decides whether that investment is long-term or short-lived. We look for two main contributors in assessing a tents durability: Fabric quality and hardware quality.