If you want to get the entire family under one roof in the outdoors, large family tents are the way to go. You don’t need anything fancy, as long as you are just doing some casual camping, but if you’re going to be carrying your large family tent for any length of time, you’re better off with two smaller tents. Large tents tend to be rather heavy, heavier than the combined weight of two smaller tents is generally going to be, unless you choose particularly heavy smaller tents.
Large Family Tents
What to look at when reviewing large family tents.- Partitions and Doors – With a large group sleeping on close proximity, things like noise and midnight trips to the bathroom are going to wake people up. But with partition walls to keep noise down, for example, and multiple doors to allow people easy entry and exit, everyone can get a good night of sleep without too many interruptions.
- Capacity – Large family tents, obviously, come in a few different sizes, depending on exactly how big your family is. But not all 6 man tents, for instance, will be the same size, so beyond the official capacity, it can be useful to compare the floor space of different tents, so that you know how much space you’re getting.
Best Large Family Tents
Some of the very best large family tents for getting everyone under one roof.- Big Agnes Fly Creek UL 4 - If you can squeeze the whole large family in to a 4 person tent, then the Fly Creek UL4 is an ideal choice. It's a backpacking tent, meaning that it's lightweight and easy to carry, which is never a bad thing when backpacking. More specifically, it weighs 4 pounds 1 ounce, or 1.84 kilograms. Of course it takes superior construction and materials to get the weight down that low, so it's no the cheapest tent. But if you have to carry a tent, you're best served by a lightweight tent.
- Marmot Halo 6 - The Halo is more of a reasonably priced camping tent, with room inside for 6. It also 2 doors, along with 2 large vestibules so that you can easily get your gear out the weather at night. It also has a total of 100 square feet of floor space, which is plenty of room for 6 people. The whole thing weighs 19 pounds 7 ounces, or 8.81 kilograms, however, so definitely not a tent you would want to have to carry in a backpack, but a good choice for a little recreational family camping.
- REI Kingdom 8 - This is a big, sturdy camping tent with room for 8 inside. It features a dividing wall to separate it in to two rooms, plus a door for each room, though only one side has a true vestibule. It's also a rectangular design, so easy to lay everyone out inside. The whole thing weighs 19 pounds 14 ounces, which is 9.02 kilograms, so again not the kind of tent that you would want to carry very far in a backpack. But the price is definitely right for a large family camping tent.