The 7 Best Pop Up Tents (Bought & Tested!)

Ease of Use

For ease of use, I timed how quickly each tent pops open out of the carry bag, how long a full set up takes (staked down and guyed out), and how long it takes to pack everything away:

Pack away includes removing all the stakes and guylines. If you skip the stakes and guylines entirely, you save yourself another 30 to 45 seconds.

• The Colemans are the fastest by far: They pop open literally out of the carry bag, and there are only 2 guylines to deal with

• The Quechuas have a guided pack up: Color-coded buckles and straps walk you through folding the tent back up

• The Tetons take the longest: Unlike the others, the rainfly isn’t pre-attached (you buckle it on yourself), and the vestibules need staking down too

Spaciousness

For spaciousness, I measured the peak height, the base area inside each tent, and the vestibule space outside it:

Only the Tetons have vestibules: 1 on the Vista 1 (12 in at its widest, 3.3 sq. ft.) and 2 on the Vista 2 (15 in at their widest, 8.6 sq. ft. total). The Quechuas slope from front to back: their lowest heights are 30 in (regular 2 Seconds), 29 in (Fresh & Black 2) and 32.5 in (Fresh & Black 3).

Related: How Big Are Pop Up Tents?

• The two lowest tents want thin pads: At a 33-inch peak height, I’d use sleeping pads with a maximum thickness of maybe 2 inches inside the Teton 1P and Coleman 2P

• 38 to 40 inches buys you a real mattress: In the taller tents I’d go up to a 6-inch camping mattress. My head touches the mesh when I sit upright on one, and an 8-inch mattress felt pretty claustrophobic
• Only 3 tents fit a queen: The Teton 2P, the Fresh & Black 3P and the Coleman 4P. The 2-person Quechuas and Coleman couldn’t even fit a full-sized mattress without bulging

Comfort & Features

For comfort and features, I looked at the doors, the storage options, and the dark room technology in each pop up tent:

Only the Fresh & Black tents have the dark room (blackout) fabric, which earns them a bonus in this test.

• The Teton 2P is my only pop-up tent with 2 doors: One on each length of the tent, and I found their size the most generous of all my pop-up tents. Its gear loft hooks to the top of the tent with 4 S-hooks, and each of the 4 loops can still hang a small lantern

• Pocket sizes vary wildly: The Fresh & Black’s pockets are 21 x 8 in and each split into 2, the Teton 2P’s are 9 x 4 in, and the regular Quechua’s are just 7 x 6 in
• The Colemans have no lantern loops: But you can hang a lantern from the attachments meant for tying up the window and door fabric, and their single pocket is 16 x 8 in, split into 2

Ventilation

For ventilation, I looked at hot day options, rainy day options, and I also tested for condensation by sleeping in each closed-up tent overnight:

• The Fresh & Black vents can stay partially open in heavy rain: Hook each vent’s 2 S-hooks to the guylines, and no water leaks in

• The Tetons are the hot-day champions: The rainfly comes off entirely, a good two-thirds of the tent is mesh, and the 2P’s 2 doors and 2 vestibules give lots of cross ventilation even with the rainfly on

• The regular Quechua’s rainfly can’t be removed: Its only vent is a tiny one at the rear, which made the inside a little stuffy with everything closed up

Weather Protection

For weather protection, I rain tested every tent, and I also wind “tested” each one by staking and guying it out completely, then shaking it as hard as I could:

The Teton’s rainfly was starting to get damp at the 1-hour mark, so I’d treat 1, maybe 2 hours of non-stop heavy rain as the limit. The 2P’s floor seam isn’t taped either: seal it and the tent stays completely dry.

• The Quechuas are the best against rain and wind: They survived 3 days of heavy afternoon thunderstorms plus a flooded yard, and with all 7 guylines out they felt super stable and sturdy however hard I shook them

• The Tetons handle light to moderate winds easily: Not as sturdy as the Quechuas with only 4 pre-attached guylines, but overall, not too bad
• The Colemans are fair-weather tents: With only 2 guylines they weren’t the most stable, and even the door design leaks water into the tent in rain

Quality

For quality, here’s a summary of the materials in each pop up tent’s construction, arranged from the best quality down:

• The Teton’s stitching is consistent and very good: No loose threads at all, and the poles are a little thicker than my other pop-up tents’. I do wish the flooring were a bit thicker though: after my 1-hour rain test it wasn’t wet, but it felt like it might have leaked pretty soon after, so I highly recommend using a groundsheet
• The Quechua flooring is thicker and more rugged than the Teton’s: With consistent double stitching and no loose threads. The trade-offs are slightly thinner poles and mesh that isn’t no-see-um
• The Colemans had the quality issues: Some parts weren’t as well-stitched (I found loose threads), some of the seam tape wasn’t well-applied, and water seeped through it after just a few minutes of heavy rain

Portability

Finally, I weighed each packed-up tent and measured its packed size:

Weights are the tent and carry bag alone, no stakes. For scale, my regular Coleman 2P Sundome (a dome tent) packs down to 23 x 8.5 x 6 in, or 1,173 in³, smaller than every pop-up here.

Related: Can You Backpack with a Pop Up Tent?

• Of the 2-person tents, the Teton has the smallest packed size: And the Fresh & Black has the largest
• The Coleman and regular 2 Seconds are the lightest 2-person tents: And the Fresh & Black is the heaviest