Published March 7, 2024

Every great adventure begins with a proper night's rest. Our Gearheads spent numerous nights crawling into camp in search of the best sleeping bags, and they unpacked the details that make up a well-rested refresh in the wilderness. Read on for the best types of sleeping bags for backpacking, car camping, and more, and visit our Camp Guide for more top picks.

If you’re planning on primarily using your bag for car camping, bag weight and packed size become less of a concern. We recommend burrowing into quality, comfortable options like these since cars have a little more room to splurge on coziness.

The Trestles is a great option for cold-weather car camping, and it’s versatile enough to fit in a pack if you decide to venture off the beaten path for a night. We love the hardy shell material that weathers tears and snags, and its roomy footbox that keeps our lower extremities nice and toasty.

When we’re exploring with our beloved camp-anion, we appreciate an option that lets us cozy-up together. This bag integrates with one 50in sleeping pad, or two 25in pads, and its built-in pillowtop brings the comforts of home to the road. We also love the DWR-treated shell fabric and synthetic insulation that lets us post up near the campfire with the crew or find our own place to stargaze without worrying about a bit of moisture dampening our sleep quality.

The Bozeman bag balances warmth and wiggle-ability beautifully, hitting a sweet spot that traps heat without making us feel trapped in. Recycled synthetic, Thermal.Q insulation helps us soften our environmental impact and holds up well even if it happens to get a little wet. And we love its stuff sack that doubles as a fleece-lined pillow.

When we’re heading out for multiple nights, packed size and weight become key considerations for happy travels on the trail. We recommend down insulation for backpacking because it keeps trail weight down and won’t take up tons of room in your pack, and it delivers an unmatched warmth-to-weight ratio.

Lightweight but packed with warmth, this down bag checks all our boxes. It packs snugly into our backpack and leaves room for more essentials, all without sacrificing a comfortable night’s rest. This bag will easily take you through three seasons of backpacking and can even be pushed into some winter excursions.

This bag’s 650-fill down has been given a Nikwax hydrophobic treatment, making this a great pick for backpacking in high-moisture regions. It also has Therm-a-Rest's SynergyLink™ connectors that wrap around our sleeping pad to ensure we’re not slipping off our pad and losing heat throughout the night. And with its extra warm footbox, a toe-tally awesome night’s rest is likely.

A proper choice for extra chilly evenings, this three-season bag brings the heat through trapezoidal baffles filled with lightweight 550-fill down insulation. Its weather-resistant coating means we can lay out under the stars without worry that the insulation will get bogged down by moisture, too. It’s a great budget-friendly pick that delivers enough versatility for well-rested nights most times of year.

Low on bulk, but high on loftiness, Rab designed this 800-fill down bag to meet all our coziness and packability needs. Its tapered mummy design and angled footbox let us find a more natural position so our home for the night feels closer to the full-time dwelling we’re used to. We love the waterproof storage sack, so it can easily join our paddle or bikepacking trips, too.

When we’re looking for a sleep setup to supplement our off-road vehicles, we turn to extra comfortable options that fit nicely in our truck beds or rooftop tents. We’ve found that these double-wide bags and versatile options deliver homelike sleep quality that adds an extra sweet dose of home to our rigs on the road.

The Doublewide bag is twice as much fun as a normal bag, with plenty of comfort control options for both parties. Two built-in blankets beneath the top layer offer extra warmth, while the top layer easily removes for warmer nights. It’s perfect to post-up wherever your sleep system lives, and roomy enough to snuggle up with the pup, too.

Another spacious option suitable for two, this 650-fill down bag brings the lofty lightness of down and soft, homelike fabrics to our rig on the road. It features moisture-wicking properties that boost warmth and longevity, and we love the interior fabric loops that let us integrate our bag liners on extra frigid evenings. It’s a versatile bag that packs down especially small and easily integrates with all our vehicle-based travels.

Extra roomy and budget-friendly, we love the simple yet efficacious aspects of the Wawona. It fully unzips to dump heat or serve as a bed liner or blanket, making it a useful option for sleeping or hanging out. Recycled materials fused throughout the bag lighten our impact without lightening warmth, and it’s designed to combine one bag with another for a double-wide setup.

Unpacking the industry's sleeping bag-related lingo helps us decide which bags are best for our adventures. Here’s some terminology to be aware of when narrowing in on your own pick.

• Fill Weight: The weight of the insulation in the bag.

• Fill Power: A number that indicates the relative quality of down. Higher fill power numbers indicate greater loft and insulating efficiency for the weight.

• Double Bags: Sleeping bags designed for two people to share.

• Mummy: Refers to hooded, snug-fitting bags, tapered from the shoulders to the feet.

• Temperature Rating: Indicates the coldest temperature at which a sleeper will still feel comfortable. This number can occasionally be misleading, and the fill weight is often a better warmth-level indicator.

• Draft Tube: An insulated flap on sleeping bags that runs along (and behind) the length of its zipper.

• Draft Collar: An insulated flap on sleeping bags that runs along (and behind) the user’s neck to block out cold air and wind.

Down is a natural material that comes from ducks or geese and has a great warmth-to-weight ratio. Down bags are usually lighter, and generally insulate better than synthetic insulation. However, they’re usually more expensive.

Synthetic insulation is a human-made alternative to down. While it may not have the same warmth-to-weight efficacy, it offers some advantages that make it a popular choice for campers.

Q: What’s the best sleeping bag for backpacking?

A: We suggest down sleeping bags with high fill power and high warmth to weight ratios like the Western Mountaineering UltraLite Sleeping Bag for backpacking because they keep our trail weight low and pack down small.

Q: What’s the best sleeping bag for car camping?

A: You can car camp in almost any sleeping bag. We prefer synthetic, roomy sleeping bags like the Marmot Trestles Sleeping Bag because they’re cost-effective and still deliver great warmth and comfort.

Q: What’s the best sleeping bag for overlanding?

A: We look for bags like the Kelty Tru.Comfort Doublewide Sleeping Bag that fit nicely into our rooftop tents or truck beds and integrate with sleeping pads and air mattresses like the NEMO Roamer Double Sleeping pad.

Q: What’s the difference between down and synthetic insulation?

A: Down insulation is all-natural animal plumage, while synthetic insulation is a human-made mimic comprised mainly of polyester fibers. Down insulation tends to be lighter, and packs down smaller, while synthetic insulation tends to perform better in wet conditions and is usually less costly.