5 Reasons to Own an Air Tent

If you aren’t a proud owner of an air tent yet, here are five reasons why it’s a smart move!  

Firstly though, a bit of transparency; I work for Zempire. While I naturally have a bias towards the Zempire brand and can talk first hand about the quality and performance of the products I work with, most of what I mention can be applied to air tents in general.

That being said, here are my 5 reasons to own an air tent.

1. Exceptional Wind Performance  

Don’t worry, they’re not like bouncy castles that will fly away when the wind picks up! Social media content coming out of New Zealand last summer showed first-hand how Zempire air tents handled the cyclones that hit the country’s east coast.

🎥See how well Zempire’s air tent holds up during a cyclone in this video.

Much of wind performance is down to the tent’s shape and aerodynamics. However, when you compare an air tube that is 10-15cm in diameter with a fibreglass pole that is 8mm in diameter, it’s obvious which will create the more robust structure to handle wind! In extremely high winds air tubes are known to bend when under severe stress and bounce back into shape. There’s absolutely no risk of snapping a steel or fibreglass pole, or even bending it out of shape permanently (both of which could also damage the fabric of your tent).  

Setting up in windy conditions is also easier, especially with tents that feature single-point inflation. There’s less disruption from the wind when you don’t have to thread poles through sleeves, Zempire air tents have their flies attached making setup even easier in comparison to tents that have them detached. Pack-down is also much more straightforward in high winds; the tent simply collapses in a matter of seconds to then be folded, rather than requiring poles to be pulled through the sleeves with the tent flapping around!

Easy Tip: You can increase your wind performance purely by directing the front of your tent away from the prevailing wind.

2. Quick Set-Up & Pack Away 

You’ll be amazed at the time you save not having to refer to an instruction manual every few minutes to check what pole goes where! The fastest inflation time we’ve recorded with a Zempire air tent (our Pronto 4 V2 – no longer available) is 17.33 seconds! Pumping up an airframe instead of solving a pole puzzle saves a huge amount of time and brain power, as the air tubes are already attached to the tent. Even some of our largest polyester tents, like our Evo TXL V2 (sleeping up to 8 campers), can be inflated in under two minutes.  
 
Packing away is even faster. Simply undo the Boston valves or air-release taps and watch the air tent collapse in a matter of seconds. Ever been in a situation where you spent a bit too long at the beach and feel the rain coming in? An air tent’s simple deflation process takes the stress out of pack-down and sends you on the road much faster. More than anything, it’ll have your camping holiday off to a good start, and packing everything back into the car a lot easier!

3. Simple and Convenient – You’ll Go Camping More Often! 

The majority of Zempire air tents are a one-person task to set up, and you don’t need to be a camping expert. It’s literally as simple as rolling the tent out, pegging it down, and pumping it up. In fact, the hardest part may be choosing whether you want to manually pump it up, or use an electric pump like our Supercell to do the work for you.  
 
If you’re camping with your family, an adult can look after the kids while another can solely take care of setting up the tent. If it’s raining, only one person needs to step outside to pitch an air tent while the rest stay dry in the car. Convenient, right? Camping excursions are supposed to be relaxing, and air tents make that possible. You’ll naturally go camping more often, feel more confident with setup, and enjoy your time in the outdoors even more.  

4. Durable and Easy to Maintain 

Don’t you hate it when you open a tent bag and loads of different pieces fall out? Not only do you then have to figure out what each one is, you also must solve what goes where. A Zempire air tent has minimal extra components inside the tent bag, usually just the pump and the pegs, while many of our new designs feature an integrated roll out bag making it even easier to manage. This massively decreases the risk of losing any equipment crucial for your campsite, and makes it easy to maintain. Sure, you may need to remove some dirt from your pegs, but you will avoid the endless supply of poles to clean too!

If you need to dry your tent after a camping holiday, it’s a lot simpler to do this with an air tent since they’re so fast to inflate. Taking care of your tent to increase its longevity is easy, so you can camp in comfort for years to come. Zempire air tents are easy to maintain and also feature highly durable materials – so you can camp with confidence knowing they’ll hold up in less-than-ideal conditions. The lowest waterhead rating on a Zempire polyester air tent is 3,000mm. It only goes up from there!

Read our Blog post for more information on waterhead ratings, or tune into Ep. 16 of The Snowys Camping Show.

5. They’re Fun (and Known to Save Relationships!)  

We hear time and time again from our Zempire Family that our air tents have saved relationships and marriages! While we take it with a grain of salt, it’s true that there is less time and reason for campsite disputes when you have an air tent, in comparison to more traditional models.   

They’re also fun… so technically that’s six reasons! There is a unique novelty to watching an air tent pop up after inflation and collapse on deflation. It never gets old undoing the Boston valves to see the tent deflate quickly with a flick of the wrist!  We’ve also found that most kids jump at the chance to have a turn at pumping up air tents, and are quick to put their hand up to deflate them too!

There you have it. If you were looking for a reason to become an air tent owner – now you have five!