The easily recognizable logo has been seen by nearly everyone at youth soccer tournaments or beach vacations in recent years. We wanted to do an in-depth review of this popular instant shelter and ultimately give our recommendation as to if this value brand tent is worth the lower price point vs. the higher quality but more expensive competition. Like the REI and L.L.Bean canopy shelters, this Clam tent has a generous fabric skirt at its base that is designed to keep determined insects—and pooling rainwater—out.
Though the Clam Quick-Set Escape lacks the versatility of our other picks—it has only a single doorway—its heavy-duty materials and construction make it more durable and likely more appropriate for people who regularly camp in windy or rainy weather. It’s constructed with heavy-duty 210-denier poly oxford walls and the heftiest bug-blocking no-see-um mesh we’ve encountered in any tent. The thicker, darker netting also makes the whole structure shadier, even without the optional side panels.
A lower roof makes this shelter feel notably smaller than our top pick, but it’s also durably made and ready to pair with a superior rain fly (sold separately). The Coleman 15 × 13 Instant Screenhouse is essentially a larger version of the Coleman 10 × 10 Instant Screened Canopy, and it has similar shortcomings. 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.
The innovative frame is powder coated steel with central hub locks for the frame and push button locking height adjustments. The 300D polyester top provides UV protection and is water and fire resistant. Four included walls have mesh panels with curtains and one of the two end walls rolls up for easy access under the canopy.
Ozark Trail helps you and your family create everyday adventures with gear and accessories built with you in mind. From backpacks to tents, they re rugged, dependable, and priced to be practical. A frequent reader of our site put the lightweight Cool Cabana pop up beach canopy to the test during a West Coast vacation.
We used the shelters for sun protection, setting up camp chairs inside one and a play mat and toddler toys inside another, and placing the large Clam shelter over a picnic table piled with markers and coloring books. It’s made with reinforced polyester and heavyweight no-see-um mesh, and it comes with the strongest stakes we’ve seen on any tent. The Clam also sets up and folds down with remarkable speed—we timed the process at 60 seconds. However, this model is too big to fit in ozark trail canopy the trunks of most sedans, and the muted colors look good when it’s sunny but can feel a bit gloomy if it’s already rainy out. It’s worth highlighting that despite the advertised dimensions of the 10×10 Ozark Trail, because this is a slant leg shelter the top only measures 8×8. The benefit of the slanted legs is that these tents are more stable laterally which can increase the stability of the frame and make it less prone to toppling, an important benefit if on a windy beach.
Getting our hands dirty with the top-rated 9×9 Neso Grande lightweight beach canopy tent. We explore the lightweight beach canopy that’s powered by the wind to see if its worth its hefty price tag. The L.L.Bean Woodlands Screen House has a much more consistently glowing history of online reviews than does the REI tent. A handful of REI customers complain that the tent is not stable in strong ozark trail canopy 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. The Screen House Shelter packs into a reasonably roomy drawstring bag with a strap that makes the canopy tent much easier to transport than tents, like the L.L.Bean, that lack a strap.
Two shorter aluminum poles cross to support the roof while four longer poles join to the roof poles at the top of the tent and slide into pegs at the ground. The tent roof is made of polyester taffeta treated with a DWR (durable water repellent) coating. The walls are made of fine no-see-um nylon mesh edged with polyester taffeta.
We typically see pyramid frames built with flimsy trusses and thin struts and reinforced (if you want to call it that) with cheaply made plastic joint connectors, and unfortunately this 10×10 Ozark canopy is no different. The biggest issue in all of this is the inability to withstand any rotational pressure during medium and high impact weather conditions as the joints become unstable and collapse at the mid points. In windy conditions high stress is applied to each side and the frame begins to break down at the unreinforced joint connectors. That is why we always recommend tents with a full truss structure as they are able to withstand rotational pressure since the cross section of the main support runs through the tent’s center as opposed to outer perimeter. 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.
Although we always recommend using anchors such as weighted sand bag or stakes with guy lines attached to the top corners. Though all of these shelters are self-standing and staking them may not be strictly necessary in calm weather, it’s wise to always do so in case the wind picks up unexpectedly. Before staking out a tent, make sure all of its doors are zipped closed to avoid staking it too tightly and straining the zippers. Like regular camping tents, these camping gazebos are not intended to be left up for extended periods, as the fabrics are susceptible to UV damage.