The past year or two I’ve become a fan of at least on occasion, heading out on a trip every now and then that involves a day or two of backpacking into the wilderness with a particular destination in mind, then staying a couple nights exploring in that area. As a backpacker who’s also a fly fisherman, a secret lake in the wilderness is often involved on these trips. In contrast to the more typical backpacking trip of packing in the miles and moving daily, these types of excursions allow you to really learn the nuances of a specific area, with plenty of time for side trips with a lighter pack to bag a peak, find a secret meadow, or to explore in between the contour lines of your map without the pressure of having to make the miles.

Many years ago I took the Alite Monarch Chair on one of those trips and it makes for a great way to relax in camp, when you have more time to do so. However, while light and comfortable, the 2 legs of the Alite don’t quite allow for a complete don’t-even-think-about-it lounging experience. The Helinox Ground Chair offers this, as you’d expect, with a weight penalty. But if you’re already packing light a little extra weight can sometimes be worth it if it’s not slowing you down. And though I’d originally thought that a chair is only valuable when you’re staying multiple nights in the same location, I’ve found they’re starting to be thrown in on all my trips – whether an out and back to stay at an alpine lake for 2 nights, or sometimes even on an extended trip pushing the mileage daily if I feel it won’t slow me down.

Although it's not the lightest chair on the market, the Helinox Ground Chair provides class-leading seating comfort as long as you like a more relaxed, lounging position.

Helinox Ground Chair Design & Specifications

The Helinox Ground Chair is supported by a DAC aluminum, shock-corded pole structure with 4 plastic feet doubling as a hub for the pole system. The entire pole structure and feet are in effect one piece, and when assembled 4 sections point upwards and fit into corresponding, color-coded, reinforced pockets on the chair’s seat. The seat is a ripstop, heavy-duty fabric with lighter mesh, breathable side panels. The chair supports up to 265 lbs. A stuff sack is included, and disassembled, the chair will pack down to a fairly compact listed size of about 11.8 x 4 x 5 (inches). Listed weight is right around the measured weight per Helinox, but be aware that many retailers have the chair listed as several ounces lighter.

Measured Weight in Ounces:

Pole System: 14.05
Fabric Seat: 7.7
Stuff Sack: .75
Total: 22.5

The fabric seat slips easily onto the pole system; silver side goes up.

In Use and on the Trail

Assembly seems complicated with so many parts, but it’s pretty easy to figure out in about a minute, and if you forget Helinox has been kind enough to even print the instructions right on the bottom of the chair itself. One thing you’ll want to be sure to do is to fully insert each pole into its housing for maximum strength. Although the cross bars at the bottom of the chair don’t rise too much, I’ve never had an issue with interference from uneven ground or rocks. The feet will however, sink into soft soil, but in general if the ground is good enough to setup camp, you should be fine…for example while the soft, volcanic soil in Craters of the Moon National Monument did pose some issues, I’ve never had any problems with the typical ground found in the mountains.

Using the chair is a comfortable experience – it’s even doubled as extra seating at home on a few occasions – and you can either choose to sit more upright with your feet closer to your body or lounge in a legs-extended manner. After a long day, it’s definitely easy on the back. In all cases the chair proved to be quite stable, and never felt tippy when used on flat ground. Use on sloped ground isn’t ideal though, and if there’s no flat ground available you’ll probably want to keep the Helinox packed away, but again in a campsite that would normally be chosen, it should work well. While the chair does sit low to the ground, getting out of it doesn’t require a lot of effort or any difficult balancing and timing. The Ground Chair is more of a lounger (which I prefer) compared to other options on the market with a more upright seating position, although something like the NEMO Moonlite Elite – you can find our full review in Issue 56 – aims to provide the best of both worlds via an adjustment system.

I’ve found the chair to dry quickly as well, giving you a dry place to sit after a rain. Packing is quick, and I’ve used both the stuff sack or have left it behind to save a little weight, wrapping the poles within the fabric of the chair. While hiking, I’ve both stowed the chair inside my pack as well as in an outside pocket.

The Helinox Ground Chair packs up quite small, and I'm typically able to find a place to stow it inside my pack, or secure it on the outside without any issues.

Conclusion

Overall the Helinox provides an easy to carry, easy to setup / breakdown, stable, and comfortable back-supporting solution for lounging in the backcountry. The only real problem I experienced with the chair was some sinking in soft ground, but that ground was so loose it wouldn’t even hold a tent stake – perhaps I should have chosen a better campsite in the first place. Whether the weight is worth it is up to you, however with my pack already light enough to not be a burden, the only time I’m concerned about weight these days is on a long trip where taking a lot of food poundage is required, or on trips where I need to carry a lot of water.

That said, if you're set on taking a backpacking chair but are looking to do so for less of a weight penalty, the Helinox Chair Zero and the REI Flexlite Air Chair are worth a look, both having a more upright seating position when compared to the Helinox Ground Chair. Note that the Chair Zero's seat will fit the Helinox Ground Chair's pole system, and can save you a few ounces via its lighter weight fabric.

Regardless of weight, for shorter trips and overnights, there’s nothing like watching the sunset from the comfort of a chair during dinner, or watching the sun rise over coffee the next morning. While I wish and feel the chair could be a little lighter, and it would be nice if the price were a little lower, the comfort of the Helinox Ground Chair is hard to beat in this weight range.

The Helinox Ground Chair retails for $130. You can find it here at CampSaver and here at Amazon. For a wide selection of packable camping and backpacking chairs, you can also check out this page at REI.

Editor's Note: This review originally appeared in TrailGroove Issue 23. You can read the original article here for additional photos, pros and cons, and our rating of the Helinox Ground Chair.