The Best Canopy Tent for Camping and Picnics Reviews by Wirecutter

The North Face offers a limited lifetime warranty on the tent, and will repair most flaws and damage at its discretion. Like our top pick, the Tungsten 4 comes with a footprint. The shelter has a 10-by-10-foot footprint—the most common size for tents of this type—and a peak height of 7 feet. It will shelter a standard-size picnic table, but with little room to spare. The ozark trail canopy is 13 feet long and nine feet wide, with a standing space that tops out at seven feet high.

I think you need to do some redesign on the doors, make them longer or something. We love the size of the tent and we used it for a week with no problems. The second time we set it up one of the poles snapped and now I can’t find where I can get replacement poles. If you want a six-person tent made with high-quality materials but a traditional profile, we recommend the similarly priced Big Agnes Spicer Peak 6, or Nemo’s Aurora Highrise 6.

The Screen House is spacious enough for six people, or more around a folding table in an uninterrupted 360-degree panoramic shelter. Decided to use it to go camping with my fiance and we were going to set up before we went. We put it back in the bag and said this is so stupid. I have found ozark trail chairs it takes two people to put this screenhouse together. I have two of them and the only complaint I have is that when they are up and you sip the doors shut the bottom is two foot off the ground. But for the most part we like it and take both of them camping with every time we go.

The sloping walls make the interior space feel much smaller than the generous footprint might lead you to expect. The mesh doesn’t seem particularly durable, and given the cap-like roof, the shade provided is much more limited than with our top-pick tents. One wall comes fully unzipped and stashes into an internal pocket. Like the REI model, the L.L.Bean tent has ample interior pockets, a lantern hook, and a roomy carrying bag, though the bag is of the typical drawstring-sack variety. The Woodlands Screen House uses six lightweight aluminum poles, just like the Screen House Shelter.

There we encountered mild temperatures in the 50s and 60s. A later check of the weather at nearby Point Mugu Naval Air Station confirmed top recorded wind gusts of 40 miles per hour. We later used the shelters on group trips at Wheeler Gorge Campground near Ojai, California, and at the La Jolla group campsite at Point Mugu, as well as on a trip to the El Mirage Dry Lake in the Mojave Desert. With all that in mind, we found more than a dozen tents that met our criteria. One mad idea often begets another, and that is how this $34.95 purchase came about.

Finally, these shelters feel noticeably smaller than any of our picks. We also tested and liked the Coleman Mountain View 12 x 12 Screendome Shelter; it was an also-great pick until Coleman discontinued the model. A full rain cover, two vestibules, and an extra-sturdy pole structure make this the best choice for families who want to get outside in any weather. The ozark trail chairs is 13 feet long and nine feet wide, with a standing space that tops out at seven feet high. The tent fabric roof provides shade for 46 square feet of the room.

We noted the recommended height range and the maximum ride weight for each bike (though admittedly we were not able to test with as wide a range of testers as we would have liked). We also assessed the ease of adjustability and noted whether a seat post, for instance, had easily identifiable markings to record our sizing. The water-bottle holders were the nicest among those on bikes in our test pool, sturdily made and positioned conveniently within the handlebars. The seat is a slim racing style, and although it didn’t differ drastically from most of the others we perched on, it wasn’t quite as comfortable initially (but we warmed to it). And you can unzip the front door, remove it, and neatly stash it into one of the tent’s internal pockets—a useful feature if you’re feeling sociable.

Had I have known that this particular screen house was so hard to find, I would have bought a kit and tried to repair it. If anyone reading this review has any idea where I can purchase another one just like it, please contact me at While the previous version of this tent used beachy-feeling aqua and orange, the current version is a drab olive green more typical of other tents. This doesn’t affect the functionality, but the brighter colors were something we previously praised. A handful of REI customers complain that the tent is not stable in strong winds. Though the previous version came with four guylines—the stabilizing lines that allow you to stake out the tent for added security in windy conditions—the current version does not, which is inconvenient.