Choosing The Right Tent Size For Your Next Camping Trip

Choosing the tent size that suits your situation can be a difficult decision, here is a few suggestions that may help you.

It does depend on what style of camping you do. When you go camping do you stay in the same place for a week. several weeks or are you always on the move staying for one night or several nights. If you are always on the move then maybe a bit smaller and easy to put up tent may suit you better.

• Keep in mind the size of the tent when it’s packed up and where you are going pack in the tent when going to your destination -  back of the car or do you have plenty of room in the trailer.
• To be comfortable in a tent you need enough room for your beds, luggage, personal things and some spare floor space so you are not walking on your bed or belongings.
• A good size tent for a couple is about 2.7 x 2.7 mtrs or 3 x 3 mtrs (10’x10’) or similar size, a smaller tent can be used but a larger one is generally preferred to be more comfortable. This size is usually described as a 4 person tent.
• Tent size is defined by the number of persons that can sleep in it. This does not allow room for any luggage etc. So a 4 person tent is good for 2 or 3 persons, a 6 person tent may suit 4 persons and so on. Also height of the tent is important, to be able to stand up and get dressed is much more comfortable.
• If you have a baby and need the room for a portacot to I would suggest at least the 3 x 3 mtrs or a bit larger. Our first canvas tent was 3.3 x 3.6mts (11’ x 12’ ) and we squeezed in 2 adults and 3 young kids. Thankfully they moved out when old enough.
• When one or several of your kids is old enough to move out an option is to buy another tent rather than upgrading to a larger several room tent. Sometimes it can be easier to find flat ground for a smaller tent rather than at much larger tent. When your kids are old enough they will be able to up the tent themselves.

The best way to get the idea of sizes of tents is to go to a tent display at an Outdoor Centre or a Camping show and get some advice from the staff.

What size tents do your prefer to use?

The above photo was taken in 2001 at Fraser Island showing our 3 tents we used then for 2 adults the main tent, which has and open extension on the back, excellent for fridge and to put chairs etc at night, 2 kids in the tourer tent and our oldest son has they dome tent.

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