Best Dry Bags for Camping

Marchway's 20-liter carries the same load as our top pick and costs less, which is the whole argument for it. The tarpaulin shell feels burlier in the hand than the price suggests, the seams are welded rather than stitched, and the round bottom catches air as you roll the top down, so the bag floats when it goes over the side. On a float trip that's the difference between fishing a bag out and watching it disappear downstream.

That round bottom is doing real work: it traps a pocket of air as you roll, and a sealed bag with air inside rides the surface instead of sinking. The 20-liter also gets backpack straps rather than the single shoulder strap of the smaller sizes, which changes the walk from the put-in far more than a strip of webbing ought to.

We minded the hardware most. The plastic buckles and D-rings take the full strain of a tight roll and they're the parts that let go first, so check them when the bag arrives and pull the roll snug rather than cranking the buckle until it creaks. If you want a bag to hand down to someone else, pay more; if you want one to take into the rocks for a few seasons, this earns its place.

Eighty-five liters is hard to picture until you've filled one. It swallows a two-person tent, a camp chair and a canopy with clothing jammed into the gaps, the sort of load that otherwise takes three trips from the truck to the tent. Tighten the compression straps on a half-full bag and it carries like something much smaller, so the size isn't only for month-long expeditions.

The build is the same 500D PVC as the smaller Earth Pak bags, with a splash-proof zip running down the outside for things you want without unbuckling the roll: a headlamp, a map, a phone. There's another zip pocket inside for keys and documents, and the 6.5-inch IPX8 phone case comes in the box. The five-year warranty is the part that matters when you're spending this much on a bag you plan to keep.

Our hesitation is the straps. They're wide and stiff, and against a light load they sit on top of the shoulders rather than molding to them, which is fine on a boat and less pleasant on a long portage. But as a basecamp hauler that turns into a backpack when the canoe has to be carried, it's the most useful big bag here, and the only one of these with a warranty measured in years.

A duffel opens along its whole length, and that shape changes camp more than the capacity number suggests: you can reach a headlamp or a dry jacket without unpacking the bag onto the tent floor. The Gonex pairs that wide mouth with a shallow body, so gear sits in layers you can see rather than a column you have to dig through.

At 80 liters it's a basecamp bag, the one that goes from truck to tent and stays put. The 600D PVC takes a knock, there are three ways to carry it (side lift straps, a top handle, and a shoulder strap for the walk in), and the zipped pocket on the back panel has outlets so wet river shoes or a towel can ride along without soaking everything else.

The closure needs a word. A hook-and-loop strip holds the roll while you fasten the buckles, and it's easy to mistake that strip for the seal. It isn't. The roll is the seal, and a bag rolled once with a loose lip can let water in; roll it three or four times, buckle it snug, and the same bag shrugs off a day of rain in an open boat.

Where it earns its place is the family camp and the fishing trip, where volume and access beat light weight. If the bag is riding on your back for miles, take the Earth Pak backpack instead; if it's riding in a truck bed or a boat locker, the duffel is easier to live with.

Clear PVC is the reason to choose the HEETA over a solid bag of the same size: you can see the sunscreen, the headlamp and the phone without unpacking anything, which matters most when your hands are wet and the light is going. Five liters is a day bag, holding a bottle, a towel, a small first aid kit and a phone, and it carries on the shoulder strap or by the side handle.

The panels are where the corners were cut. The base is 0.6 mm and the sides 0.3 mm, and the sides are the part that creases, scuffs and eventually splits. Keep a stove, a lantern or a folding saw in a different bag or wrap them in a towel, and this one lasts the way it should.

The see-through body is the detail we didn't expect to care about, and it changes how you pack: everything goes in the order you'll want it. What it does best is the short trip, a float, a beach afternoon, a paddle where you want your wallet and keys on you rather than in the boat. Wipe it out, turn it inside out to dry, and don't ask it to be the bag your sleeping bag lives in.

Rectangular rather than round, 1.12 ounces, coated on both fabric and seams: the Osprey packs like a stuff sack and disappears into a backpack until the weather turns. The shape matters more than it sounds, because rectangles fill the corners of a pack where round bags leave gaps you end up plugging with loose socks.

Six liters takes a sleeping bag liner and a change of clothes, and the D-ring lets you hang it from a pack loop or a ridge line to dry. The roll-top closes with the same three-fold habit as the PVC bags, and the thin fabric dries in minutes rather than hours, which is the quiet advantage of an ultralight sack on a wet trip.

This is the sack we tuck into a pack for a rainy trip, and it's the best of these for backpackers counting ounces. It won't survive being punted along a rocky shoreline the way a 500D PVC sack does, and the coating is there for rain and splashes rather than a bag that ends up under the boat.

Three bags in three sizes, and the sizes do different jobs: the 5-liter takes a phone, a wallet, a headlamp and keys; the 10-liter takes a day of clothes; the 20-liter swallows a sleeping bag or a change for two. That division of labour is more useful than one bigger bag, because you can pull the small one out at lunch without unpacking the pack.

We rate the set for backpacking and canoe camping where the bag lives inside a pack. 190D ripstop nylon with taped seams and a coated face weighs almost nothing, 0.2 kg for all three, so it's weight you don't notice, and the D-ring clips to a pack loop or a thwart when you want it outside the bag.

What they aren't is river bags. The coating handles rain, spray and a wet tent floor, and a sealed sack with air in it floats, but these aren't what you trust if the canoe goes over and the bag ends up underneath it. Treat them as the second layer inside something tougher, or as the bags that keep a sleeping bag dry in a leaky tent.

Buying three sizes at once is the other reason to try them: you find out quickly which one you actually reach for, and the answer is almost always the smallest. The 5-liter ends up in a jacket pocket, the 20-liter ends up holding laundry, and the middle one does the work you didn't plan for.

Two liters, roughly the size of a folded rain jacket, and that's the point: this is the bag that rides on you, clipped to a thwart or a pack strap, with a phone, keys, a headlamp and a couple of bars inside. It isn't a pack liner and it isn't a weekender, and judging it against the 20-liter bags here misses what it's for.

500D PVC with welded seams is the same family of material as the big bags in this group, which means it shrugs off abrasion and wipes clean after a sandy day. The thick shell has a second use, too: it pads whatever is inside, so a lens or a small camera survives being set down on gravel.

The buckle and D-rings let you clip it where you'll see it rather than where it's convenient, which matters on a river where the bag you can reach is the bag you use. Sealed with a pocket of air inside, a dropped 2-liter comes back up instead of going under.

If you already own a 20- or 40-liter bag, this is the piece we suggest adding, the one that keeps your phone out of a pocket on the water. If it's going to be your only dry bag, buy bigger: two liters holds the essentials and nothing else, and there's no strap to carry it far.