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Best Desert Camping Tents in 2022 Reviewed
The Best Desert Camping Tents Reviews
In this section, we’ll start to break down each tent to figure out the strengths and weaknesses. We’ll also cite some of the most relevant customer reviews to let you know every nook and cranny of the actual experience.
Best Overall Desert Camping Tent: Coleman Deluxe Cabin
The blazing hot sun is undoubtedly the least fun thing in desert camping. Nobody likes being forced to wake up after the light and heat find their way into the tent. If you don’t want to bother about this problem, you should get this tent from Coleman.
The fabric of this tent is able to block up to 90% of sun rays. By extension, the internal temperature will be far less than usual.
To give the best value, Coleman incorporated some reflective fabric over the external surface. This way, it’ll be a lot easier to find the tent after a long night wandering into the desert.
Camping with friends? No worries! This tent is built with space enough for 10 people. With a length of 14 ft and a width of 10 ft, it can be spacious enough to include 4 queen-sized beds. Best of all, there’s an internal room divider to give some privacy to your shy friends.
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- Spacious capacity
- Dark Rest technology
- Waterproof construction
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- A bit expensive
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Best Dome Tent: Quechua Waterproof Pop Up Fresh & Black
Dome tents are commonly selected by desert campers for one reason: stability. Unlike other designs, air flows smoothly over the dome structure with little to no shaking. If this is what you prefer, you should love this tent from Quechua.
It’s not only about aerodynamics, though. Our most favorite feature about this tent is its exceptional heat reduction. The 4-layered fabric works on reflecting the sun rays and absorbing its heat to let you sleep comfortably even after the sunshine. By numbers, this tent is able to achieve a 99.9% darkness while decreasing the temperature by up to 60°F!
Lucky for you, Quechua was keen on testing this tent against extreme conditions. The results revealed that it can withstand up to 50 km/h winds and about 200 mm rainwater/hour/m².
The only downside we noticed is the price. We understand that the enhanced performance comes at a price, but it still feels a bit unreasonable.
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- Superior resistance to heat
- Excellent ventilation
- Resistant to extreme weather
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- A bit overpriced
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Best for Individual Use: Desert & Fox Backpacking Camping Tent
Going alone into the desert is the ultimate adventure to a lot of campers. It feels super spiritual and exciting to spend a couple of days with literally nothing to distract you. If this is what you’re after, you save some packing space by considering this small tent from Desert & Fox.
Setting up this tent should be fairly easy thanks to its pop-up aluminum poles. Staying inside is guaranteed to be convenient thanks to the superior waterproofness of its polyester fabric.
After you finish, packing this tent will be as easy as its setup. After you take the poles down, you can squeeze the tent firmly into a compact roll by the attached bundle belt. Next, shove it into the free carrying bag that comes with it to carry it around easily.
The thing we hate the most about this tent is how thin its fabric is. It won’t tear in windy or rainy days. But it will let tones of light and heat inside. If you’ll stay in most of the day, you might want to consider another tent.
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- Affordable
- Waterproof
- Easy and fast setup
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- Thin fabric that doesn’t block light
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Budget Pick: Coleman Sundome Tent
Coleman is one of the most famous brands producing all sorts of camping gear. With such a well-known brand, you might end up paying an awful lot. Luckily, this isn’t the case here. The Sundome is the best tent that balances performance and affordability.
As the name implies, the Sundome blocks some of the hot sun rays through its UV-proof polyester fabric. It’s also tested against winds with speed up to 35 mph. Not fancy, but still great for the price.
Over the top, the tent can be covered by an additional rainfly to block sunlight and rain. We only wish Coleman had fabricated it with enough thickness. Right now, it leaves a large portion of the sides exposed. Thankfully, rainwater can’t enter through the exposed parts because of the welded corners and inverted seams.
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- Waterproof corners and seams
- Affordable
- UV-proof
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- The rainfly doesn’t cover the whole tent
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Best Value: Teton Sports Sierra Canvas Tent
Teton built the Sierra tent with versatility in mind. It stands above a robust steel pole and frames. If you want to feel the soft desert sand, you can remove the floor to turn the Sierra into a stylish canopy.
For the ultimate protection, this tent is fabricated from waterproof canvas. But thankfully, there are multiple windows over the side to promote breathability.
Last but not least, Teton equipped this tent with a pretty huge door. This should enable you to get all your gear inside before a sandstorm.
Unfortunately, this tent is way more expensive than alternatives from other brands. But it might be considered as a worthy investment for serious campers.
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What to Consider Before Buying a Tent for Desert Camping
As you can tell, not every tent can be suitable for desert camping. Here are the most important criteria that you should look for.
Think About the Size
Size is obviously the main attribute to consider in a tent. Ideally, there should be 20 sq. ft. of floor space per person. You might go a bit lower, specially if you’re camping alone. However, we don’t recommend this.
It’s always preferred to get a tent that has room for one more person than you need. Since you’ll camp in a desert, you’ll want to keep most of your stuff inside nearly all the time. Otherwise, the endless desert reptiles might stay in your gear and enter your tent when you’re not paying attention.
Sewn-In Floor vs. Zippers
Most campers prefer to purchase tents with sewn-in floors to guarantee the best protection against lurking animals and annoying sand.
Nevertheless, a zippered floor will do the same job perfectly. Zippers don’t leak anything unless exposed to water. But as you can tell, going with zippers gives the best versatility and value. When
you remove the floor, you’ll be able to enjoy the sand texture while enjoying the cool shade of your tent.
Choose a Suitable Wall Fabric
How much sun protection do you need? This question is directly affected by the choice of your tent fabric.
Dark Tents
Based on the opinions of online customers, dark tents are the ultimate choice for camping in the desert. As the name implies, such tents have extra dense fabric that blocks nearly all of the sun rays. As a result, you’ll wake up when you’re well-rested, not when the sun forces you.
And since most of the UV rays are also blocked, these tents should maintain a cooler temperature when compared to the outside.
Nylon and Polyester
Nylon and polyester are currently the most common materials used in tent fabrication. They’re generally valued for their excellent waterproofness and overall sturdiness.
Although they can’t block the sun as efficiently as dark tents, they can still produce an acceptable environment with dimmed or ambient light. However, this property varies considerably between different manufactures.
Checking the fabric thickness should give you a general idea about how much light protection they’ll give. If you’re unfamiliar, fabric thickness is measured with a unit called “denier”. The higher the number, the denser the wall will be.