The Finest 4-Season Tents of 2024

Treading into the fourth season is no easy feat, and after you’ve slogged waist-deep and punched in the route, you’re going to need a shelter that’s as tough as the weather. 4-season tents are the elder shelters of the camping world, and are toughened in all aspects to put up with the worst of it on your next mountaineering, ski-touring, or alpine hunting trip.

After a few seasons spent in the high country, these are the tents we find ourselves reaching for time and time again. And while many 4-season tents can feel more like single-season tents, we considered shelters from all ends of the spectrum, from shoulder-season welterweights that are keen to poke their noses into the alpine, to expedition-ready brutes that will shoulder a 24-inch storm on Denali with ease.

Our experts are old hands at this, and have tested more than 20 different burly shelters over the seasons — lugging them up the stratovolcanoes of the North Cascades, and diving headlong with them into the refrigerated high valleys of Colorado. We sought out uncomfortable, persistent, and downright mean conditions to test these tents in, and kept a weather eye out for important functional differences when it came to extreme weather resistance, durability, livability, and overall weight and packed size.

Below are the tents that not only survived, but thrived during our climbs and ski tours. If you’ve only recently begun camping in the alpine, check our detailed buyer’s guide and FAQ sections at the bottom of the page before scrolling through the top picks for 4-season tents. And if you can’t decide between tents, consult our comparison chart to get down to the nitty-gritty.

Editor’s Note: We recently updated this guide on January 26, 2024, to add the SlingFin HotBox, our top-choice in on-route bivy-style shelter, as well as the Hyperlite Mountain Gear UltaMid 4, one heckuva-good pyramid-style shelter.

The Best 4-Season Tents of 2024

4-Season Tents Comparison Chart

How We Tested 4-Season Tents

Proving the mettle of 4-season tents is no joke. From driving snowstorms to freezing temps — you have to be fully immersed in the conditions that make them expedition-worthy. To create this guide, the GearJunkie team does just that, and every year, we put each model through its paces in brutal conditions — trying to find the limit of these bomb-proof shelters so you don’t have to.

Our team includes mountaineers, alpine climbers, skiers, splitboarders, and high-country hunters of every stripe, living and recreating in the ice chests of the Rockies, Sierra, and Cascades. Senior Snowsports Editor Morgan Tilton grew up in the mountains of Colorado, and makes year-round travel into the mountains look easy — living and playing in the hills around Southwest Colorado. Tilton has been putting skis, snowshoes, and mountaineering boots on the ground for this guide since 2021, and began our look into 4-season shelters with a slate of 10 of the best from across the spectrum.

In addition, Senior Editor Nick Belcaster also tied in and punched in his fair share of the route in order to test these tents — climbing and mountaineering in the North Cascades of Washington State and British Columbia. Belcaster has a number of years of helping lead the Equipment arm of one of the larger mountaineering guide operations in the country, the American Alpine Institute, under his belt.

His experience also extends further to having coordinated the equipping of a season of guided Denali ascents for around 100 people, wrangling everything from rigging expedition sleds to ensuring it all had a ski plane to fly out on. There’s little space in a turbo-prop Beaver for sub-par tents — and even less in our closets — which demands a hard look at what really works out on the ice.

During testing, we scrutinized each tent with some specific criteria in mind — durability, extreme weather resistance, and livability — to offer a variety of options for different objectives. We also strive to test 4-season shelters in a variety of climates, as the dry and frigid alpine of Colorado is a whole different ball game compared to the tempest-whipped western flanks of the Cascades. Our notes were also compared with the knowledge of experienced AMGA-certified mountain guides, to ensure that these are the best 4-season tents available today.

Whether you’re making an assault into the Alaska Range, or overlanding into the backcountry on a hunting excursion, we’d feel confident recommending anything on this list for the toughest of adventures.

Buyer’s Guide: How to Choose a 4-Season Tent

The burliest four-season tents are constructed to withstand brutal winds, shed heavy snowpack or rain, and comfortably store gear in a protected cubby. The tradeoff? These designs can often retain summertime warmth and humidity.

Year-round tents are protective across variable and tough conditions, but they’re not the most airy for hotter days or nights. Also, the high-end construction requires beefier material that sports a bigger bill than most three-season builds.

All options considered, these heavier-set tents are a dependable choice for mountaineers, expeditionists, and other seasoned outdoor travelers who want a dependable structure any day of the year that provides protection in the harshest elements.

Seasonality

Tents are typically built for three-season or four-season conditions. A three-season tent will suffice if you plan on using your tent across the spring, summer, and fall.

The infrastructure of a three-season tent can handle rain and light snow. Usually, these builds are not ideal for heavy snow, super-high winds, or vicious storms — like the blizzard conditions you might face while ski mountaineering. A four-season tent is a better choice for full-on winter, the weight of snow, and strong winds.

Types of 4-Season Tents

A spectrum of designs exists within the four-season tent category. For instance, our lineup here includes year-round tents for vehicles from truck beds to rooftops. Folks often seek four-season tents for backpacking and hunting in inclement weather in the winter, along alpine routes, or during the shoulder seasons.

People need four-season shelters for mountaineering, with or without skis, or winter backcountry trips. Some of these tents are better suited above or below treeline, while others are perfect for polar exploration.

Mountaineering tents are often streamlined and constructed with a single wall to save weight and easily move camp day to day on a long, challenging expedition. In contrast, a basecamp tent is roomier and weighs more.

Basecamp tents are a comfortable choice for a shorter haul to a lower point where adventurers need to spend time acclimating to altitude or waiting for a safe weather window. Most of these designs are double-walled to help enhance ventilation and prevent condensation, and a broad range of capacities exist to house large groups or a ton of gear.

Tunnel tents can withstand brutal wind — think 70 mph — better than dome or wedge-style tents, which can hit a limit of around 50 mph. But tunnel tents are not freestanding.

Capacity & Doors

Folks aiming for lighter-weight four-season tents can invest in a one- or two-person design. Three- and four-person tents are a common choice, too, while some four-season basecamp options are large enough to fit big groups of six or more people.

Your ideal tent capacity depends on the number of campers, their overall size, and how much equipment you need to store inside the tent or vestibule. Brands generally categorize their tents based on the number of people, but the dimensions — length, width, height, and vestibule size — vary from tent to tent.

The tent’s peak height, which is where the tent is the tallest, also differs between each model. It’s nice to have a generous height in a four-season tent when the weather turns south and you really need to hunker down.

Get out your tape measure as you research. If you’re tall or wide, pay extra attention to the width and length of the tent dimensions as well as the area of your sleeping pad. And consider how much storage space you’ll want for gear. It’s also a good idea to visit a local retailer where the tent can be set up for you to check out in person.

You’ll want to consider whether one or two doors are more functional for you. Two doors can be helpful for each sleeper to have their own exit and entry or to access gear organized in multiple vestibules. But, eliminating a door can cut weight and cost.

Vestibule & Interior Storage

To help protect equipment, four-season tents have one or two zipper-enclosed vestibule doors — but not all vestibules are created equal. They each have a unique volume, height, and shape.

Some vestibule entries include a double door like on the Mountain Hardwear Trango 2 Tent or interior loops to hang items like in the MSR Remote 2 Two-Person Mountaineering Tent. The Remote 2 also features a storm flap along the bottom and a ventilation window along the top, which are strategic additions.

Compare your body and sleeping pad measurements to the tent’s width and length. If your expedition requires a lot of gear, it can be nice — or necessary — to have extra room to bring cargo inside the cabin. Otherwise, the vestibule can be a great spot to leave the pack or boots. The foyer is also a good place to cook over a compact, portable stove if you’re stuck in the tent due to hair-raising weather.

Inside, four-season tents usually have mesh pockets along the wall to store items like a phone or headlamp. Again, these features are not universal. The Remote 2 only has two mesh pockets, while the Mountain Hardwear Trango 2 Tent has more than 10 pouches that line the walls and ceiling.

Generally, lighter tents don’t have as many storage compartments as heavier tent designs. Another nice touch is interior loops for hanging a clothesline, carabiners, or to clip a lantern.

Weight

A dwelling’s weight hinges on the materials, size, and whether the walls are single or double. Most four-season tent specs include a trail or minimal weight and a packaged weight — the former doesn’t include stakes, guylines, or stuff sacks. (We highlight the minimal weight of the products listed in this guide.)

One of the lightest four-season tents on the market is the Hilleberg Akto 1 Tent for a single person, tapping in at 3 pounds, 12 ounces. By comparison, the Hilleberg Allak 2 is 6 pounds, 3 ounces.

The sizes and weights of the tents in our guide widely vary. The heaviest option is a basecamp tent with room for three adults that weighs close to 9 pounds. Our lightest choice is the Samaya 2.5 Tent, which utilizes Dyneema Composite Fabric and is only 3 pounds 12 ounces. Weight is most crucial if you’ll be hauling your tent for consecutive days and want to minimize the heft of your load.

Regardless of weight, you’ll need to select a tent that delivers the protection and features you need — like two doors, the capacity for three people, or a large vestibule. Generally, the lighter a tent is, the less headroom there is. But cutting ounces isn’t as important as being adequately protected in the conditions where you plan to go.

If you’re picking a four-season rooftop tent that will be stationary, the weight matters less but needs to be within your manufacturer’s roof rack requirements.

Ventilation

The nemesis of four-season tents is the challenge of providing excellent ventilation. While ultralight tents often feature walls constructed of mesh, storm doors that furl back, or no walls at all for airflow, four-season tents don’t. These structures feature minimal windows to optimize structural protection and warmth in wind, rain, and heavy snow.

Walls constructed of mesh decrease the overall temperature inside the tent, so the majority of four-season tent walls are solid fabric. Simultaneously, if you’re posted up inside your tent for a bout of stormy weather, you’ll want good ventilation to minimize indoor frost and moisture.

Well-designed four-season tents have integrated passive ventilation ports or windows in the tent and rainfly. These vents can keep out snow while minimizing condensation, so the inside of the tent doesn’t feel clammy. The MSR Remote 2 Two-Person Mountaineering Tent fly features four vents with snow flaps, which provide ventilation and help reduce condensation while keeping out spindrift.

Single-Wall vs. Double-Wall Tents

Tents are either single-wall or double-wall designs. Single-wall tents are lighter weight, nonbreathable, waterproof, and don’t include a rainfly. They typically don’t offer as much storage for gear.

A double-wall tent actually contains two items: a breathable tent paired with a waterproof rainfly. The setup usually offers vestibule space to stash equipment.

The kit weighs more and requires more time to set up compared to a single-wall tent. Single-wall tents are less breathable and produce more condensation but can be worthwhile for light, fast, difficult mountaineering missions where minimal weight is preferred.

Material & Durability

A price tag is usually reflected in the balance of the materials’ durability and weight. Ultralight, strong materials often cost more than heavier fabrics. The KUIU Storm Star 2 Person Tent ($599) is constructed with a 40-denier ripstop nylon tub and floor and a 30-denier tent body that has a DWR (durable water-repellent) coating. The tent is 29.5 square feet and weighs 5 pounds, 5.2 ounces.

In contrast, the NEMO Equipment Kunai 3 ($699) is 36.5 square feet but only weighs 5 pounds, 3 ounces. The tent is constructed with ultralight waterproof-breathable nylon and a polyurethane-coated floor.

A separate footprint, or groundsheet, isn’t required for an enclosed single-wall tent. Lightweight materials are pretty durable, but they tend to break down if they’re roughly handled. Investing in a lighter-weight bundle means the recreationist should be mindful with gear care.

Bathtub Floor

A bathtub floor means the waterproof fabric comprising the floor extends a few inches off the ground and up the tent walls. Often four-season setups have a bathtub floor for extra protection during a weather event.

Waterproofness

The material used in tent construction is either inherently waterproof or treated with a DWR coating to block precipitation. If the fabric is treated, it’ll eventually need a refresh, depending on the conditions faced, user care, and volume of use.

Tent Setup & Poles

The majority of our top four-season tents are freestanding. This type of skeleton takes more time to assemble because the ground needs to offset the stake just right — especially if it’s windy or rainy out.

In contrast, tunnel tents or ultralightweight tents and shelters are nonfreestanding, meaning they don’t include tent poles to be hoisted. Instead, one or two trekking poles plus stakes are used to elevate three-season tents. And four-season tunnel tents need to be staked down extremely well with rocks in summer or grippy stakes in winter.

Many four-season tents have color-coded poles and pole clips or pockets on the canopy and fly. That addition helps recreationists efficiently put up their shelter when time is crucial and they need to get out of the elements. These year-round designs also feature strategically placed guylines, often with reinforced attachment points, and many loops to stake down the tent.

The poles vary from tent to tent. The KUIU Storm Star 2 Person Tent features DAC NFL poles, which are a super-lightweight aluminum alloy blend that’s extra strong and stiff. The Big Agnes Battle Mountain 3 has the DAC NSL aluminum poles, which are still lightweight yet slightly stronger.

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