Still, as you add insulation thickness and rigidity to improve performance, those benefits start to diminish. It’s hard to gauge how stiff or user-friendly a soft cooler might be from a product description since few manufacturers list the thickness of their cooler’s walls in their specifications. Many longer-lasting soft coolers weigh between 5 and 10 pounds, which gets heavier as you add heavy liquids and ice. Consider how long you need a cooler to retain cold and how far you might be carrying it on an average outing as you balance weight and performance concerns in your purchasing decision. Because of their size, lightweight construction, and other features—like being equipped with padded handles, bottle openers, or backpack straps—soft coolers offer more flexibility than traditional hard-sided coolers.
For the ultimate in portability, soft-sided backpack-style coolers are the way to go. The designs borrow heavily from hiking daypacks, sharing features like shoulder straps, padded backpanels, and exterior pockets for added gear storage. Additionally, backpack coolers are fairly expensive considering their modest storage capacity and all-around performance (the Day Escape is pretty average in this category at $200). But if the approach to your favorite picnic spot or fishing hole involves walking more than a half mile or so, it may be worth the investment. For more on the topic, check out our article on the best backpack coolers. Before diving into the finer details, it’s important to point out that soft coolers come with some inherent compromises.
The Icemule Pro essentially combines the two into an insulated, durable dry bag perfect for a day on the water. Like a good dry bag, the Icemule Pro has a roll-top closure that it claims will not let water in or out and allows igloo soft cooler you to trap air inside for extra insulation. Our testers noticed a bit of a leak from the roll-top closure when inverting the cooler. It also has the added benefit (significant on the water) of making the bag float.
When compared to other soft coolers in our guide, a few design choices—like placement of the side handles under the hook point for the strap making it feel very cramped—knocked a few points off. We packed the coolers with the stated capacity of cans (when possible); we also filled the coolers with ice once the cans were packed. Once the coolers were full, we began testing for portability and durability by carrying the coolers around the lab and up and down steps and pushing them off tables onto a concrete floor.
To keep the weight down, this Pelican soft cooler’s insulation measures only half-an-inch thick. It kept its interior below 40°F for 27 hours—one of the lowest of any of the soft coolers we tested. A tough, reliable soft cooler can keep your food and beverages cold igloo trailmate while you hike, take a day trip, picnic, or tailgate. Best of all, unlike a hard-sided cooler, many of the best soft coolers can be collapsed down for easy storage when not in use. Dry bags are a staple of river trips, as are heavy, bulky hard-sided coolers.
Despite looking like a Yeti—and having thicker insulation on its lid (by half an inch)—it didn’t quite have the same performance as the Yeti Hopper. At the end of our 24-hour ice test, the Orca had no remaining solid ice, while the Yeti had some. And where the Yeti’s inner temperature igloo trailmate increased by about 6 degrees over 24 hours, the Orca’s went up by about 13 degrees. Still, if you’re looking for a cooler that has the aesthetics, design, and durability of a Yeti but don’t want to spend quite the amount (we don’t blame you), the Orca is a solid alternative.