After six months of regularly using the Coleman Cooler Quad Chair, we think it’s the best choice for most people who are seeking an upright chair for car camping, tailgating, and outdoor gatherings. We noticed during the first of our three camping trips—a weekend in California’s Joshua Tree National Park, with a total of seven families—that, given the choice, campers prefer to take the biggest seat. When we set up a dozen chairs around the campfire without comment, people consistently claimed them from largest to smallest.
The seatback has some slightly padded sections that do at least a little something to enhance comfort, and the armrests are nominally padded too. But, this isn’t the kind of chair you’re going to want to spend most of the day in. Simply put, it can be notoriously difficult to find furniture that’s big and robust enough to support you properly. That’s as true for camp chairs as it is for recliners and the like. Where camp chairs are concerned, most of them top out at around 300 pounds of supported weight.
The Helinox Chair One weighs about 2 pounds, compresses smaller than a 2-liter bottle of soda, and is the most comfortable and easy to stow of the three top backpacking chairs we tested. Like competing chairs, the Chair One has a nylon and mesh seat and aluminum legs, which are linked with shock cord (the chair legs are made out of the same material as high-end tent poles). Generally speaking, the lightest chairs out there won't deliver as plush of a sitting experience as bulkier products that weren't meant to accompany you on backpacking adventures. If you're looking for a chair to take on the move, opt for something weighing under 2 pounds that can be stored as compactly as possible.
The Ozark Trail XXL Director chair is a good, if somewhat basic director’s style camp chair, offered by a company with a solid reputation in the market. While it does have a few shortcomings, these are generally easy to fix and easy to overlook. Owing to its extra-wide seat, the first thing you’ll notice about this oversized director’s chair is that it looks rugged and robust.
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