Gossamer Gear’s The Two Ultralight Tent – Reviewed & Tested

When it comes to ultralight tents, how light is too light? At what point do we just duct tape some garbage bags together, save the thousand bucks, and call it a day? Jess had many such thoughts after reviewing The Two from Gossamer Gear.

 

In preparation for an upcoming bikepacking trip (and to lighten my load on frequent hikes) I’ve been narrowing down my options for an affordable ultralight tent. The Hyperlite Unbound has been at the top of my wishlist for years, but at over $1000, it’s been out of my budget. Gossamer Gear’s The Two Tent weighs the same (without the pegs and packing bag), but is only ⅔ of the price. Is this the dream combo of quality plus bargain I’ve been searching for?

The last time it fit this nicely in the bag

Why I’m the Right Person to Write This Review

Ultralight hiking is my preferred way to hike. I find it more comfortable, and I get great satisfaction from the process of researching and acquiring new gear that shaves grams off my previous setup. My gear closet is organised by weight, and what I take is dependent on how long I’m going and how pedantic I feel that particular weekend. I split my time between solo trips and hiking with friends, which means I’ve tested shelters under a range of real-world use cases: wet weather, exposed sites, and the never-ends-well ‘We’ll definitely fit in this, right?’ gamble.

I’ve camped in everything from a cheap one-person Naturehike tent I got on Amazon in the middle of the Covid pandemic when I couldn’t get to the shops, right through to a heavy-duty Southern Cross canvas tent suitable for six. As a fan of the Mont Hypermid Ultralight Tent (coming in at 1173g), the idea of shaving hundreds of grams off that weight with Gossamer Gear’s The Two was kind of mind-boggling. Is that even possible? Was it going to be like camping in Glad Wrap? How?! Naturally, my research started immediately.

Part of the fun of ultralight is obsessively comparing gear

Quick Specs

• Type: Single wall hiking pole tent
• Capacity: 1-person (or 2 if you buy the full inner)
• Weight: 680g (shelter only), 803g with all accessories, bags, and pegs included
• Materials: 
  • Tent body: Custom 10D Nylon Ripstop SIL/PU fabric waterproof to at least 1800mm
  • Tent floor: Custom 10D Nylon Ripstop SIL/PU fabric waterproof to at least 1800mm
• Floor dimensions: 213 x 122 cm
• Footprint dimensions (including stakes & cord): 343cm x 297cm
• Packed dimensions: 28cm x 13cm
• Height: 109cm
• Price: $642 AUD (but factor in $299 if you’d like the Gossamer Gear Carbon Trekking Poles, or $58 for the Two Tent Pole Set) + shipping from the US if you can’t find an Aus dealer.

Buy Now

Crinkly little home away from home

Performance

Setup

Gossamer Gear has leaned so hard into the ultralight feature that they decided to omit an instruction sheet to accompany the tent. If you’ve never set up a single-wall tent before, I highly recommend visiting their website to watch the setup video. While it’s not impossible to figure out, it’s not a logic test you want to give yourself for the first time at the end of a tough day of hiking while you’re racing the fading sun.

The ideal way to set this up is by using tent poles set at 125cm in height. I used the carbon fibre Gossamer Gear ones and they worked an absolute treat (as they should!). Despite being fit for purpose, setting up a tent with hiking poles solo requires a bit of a knack, and it might take you a few goes to figure it out.

Adjustable poles like these can be set lower when pitching then extended to add tension

I certainly haven’t mastered the perfect pitch, nor am I likely to. If the tent is secure and standing, I’m not too concerned about a fancy finish. There are plenty of reflective guy lines and tensioners included if that’s your jam though. Remember to allow for a decent area around the tent so you have space for your lines. Miscalculating and stretching into bushes to try to secure your pitch is not fun.

One of my more sorry attempted pitches – it can be tricky!

Overall, it’s relatively quick to set up, but it is more fiddly, and you may need to adjust tension multiple times. Compared to my freestanding Big Agnes Copper Spur or single pole pyramidal Mont Hypermid, it takes longer to get standing.

Pack up is pretty quick, but when you’ve got condensation on the inside or the bottom is wet, it takes longer to dry out than tents with a separate fly and inner tent. I also found it ridiculously problematic to get it small enough to pack back into its carry bag. On multiple occasions, frustration has won the game, and I stuffed the whole thing into my pack to deal with at home instead. I’ve got an old sleeping bag case I’m considering subbing in as its new carry bag to avoid ongoing irritation.

Pegs

The tent is supplied with eight aluminium pegs, which, after multiple setups, I can confirm are not enough, unless you’re happy letting the four interior corners of the footprint hang loose (this is ok if there’s one person, but can make it feel a bit more claustrophobic for two people).

The tent is a single-wall tent with the interior attached to it, so on the first setup, it can be a bit confusing if you’re used to tents with a separate inner and fly.

Not pegging out the tent itself can sacrifice limited internal space

Assuming you peg out the four corners of the interior, the remaining four allow you to peg the four corners of the fly, but leave none to use any additional guy lines on the side walls to secure the tent. Even with only a mild breeze, I found the high profile of the tent caught the wind like a sail, and it moved around a lot.

In windy weather, I need to allocate all eight pegs to the fly to ensure it stays grounded, and because I don’t like leaving the interior four corners unpegged, I just have to carry more pegs, extra weight be damned.

Durability

Even Gossamer Gear has acknowledged that the fabric used to construct The Two, while high quality, is thin and won’t withstand rough treatment. The tent doesn’t come with a ground sheet, and after a handful of uses, I’m pretty keen to get one organised. So far, I’ve been lucky with grassy sites but the last one I went to had a tonne of blackberries, and I had to meticulously comb the ground to ensure no stray spikes were lingering, ready to destroy my tent.

While clearly high quality and meticulously crafted, the tent components all feel light and delicate. If you want this tent to last more than a few years (or a few trips!), you need to undo the zips with care, be deliberate about how tightly you tension the guy ropes, and be careful not to let it snag on trees or blow away when you’re laying it out for setup or packing down. This isn’t a reason not to get the tent, but if you need your gear to handle rough treatment, this definitely isn’t the tent for you.

Anything but a grassy campground will require care to avoid damage

Comfort

Like just about every so-called ‘two-person’ tent, Gossamer Gear’s The Two is ideal for one person and a bit of a squeeze for two. My hikes are pretty fairly split between solo and hiking with one or two others, and my general rule is to take a two-person tent for solo trips so my pack fits inside the tent with me, or to take a three-person tent so both a friend and our packs can fit. The way the tent designers want us to do it is to put packs in vestibules overnight, but on rainy nights, I’ve found they inevitably end up wet, and it’s not a pain point I enjoy dealing with.

Room for two tapered 25″ (63.5cm) mats and nothing else

The Two Tent surprised me with just how small the interior was, though. It was spacious and comfortable for me alone, but fitting two mats side-by-side literally took up all the available floor space, with the mats hitting both ends of the tent and right up against the doors. Understandably, shaving off every gram of weight has to result in some sacrifices, but it feels a bit cheeky to call this suitable for two people. To be fair, the vestibules are substantial and big enough for packs, but they do make getting out for a toilet run in the middle of the night a bit tricky to navigate.

What I did like was that the tent is relatively tall, so there was plenty of space to get changed easily.

Ventilation

Wowee, this tent has ventilation dialled in! There’s a mesh strip that runs around the base of the tent, just above the floor tub, which allows a constant draft of air just above floor level. The downside is that this is also neck height when you’re lying down on your sleeping mat.

Every night I’ve used this tent has been quite chilly with a breeze, and I had to wear a hoodie and beanie to prevent the wind chill from keeping me awake all night. I’m sure with a little tweaking, the exterior wings could be adjusted to offset this or block more of the wind, but after a day of hiking, being finicky about my tent pitch was the last thing on my mind.

Airflow is maximised everywhere to help avoid condensation

Overall, the breathability is excellent, but in very cold weather, you will still get some condensation inside the tent. As a very thin, and insubstantial (in the best way) tent, this isn’t one to take in the snow, but it’s fine for shoulder seasons if you’re prepared with good thermals, a high-rated sleeping mat, and an appropriate sleeping bag. Gossamer Gear has a guide on their website with tips to reduce internal condensation, which is worth a quick read, as it’s generally more challenging with single wall designs.

Design

Storage

Given the huge weight savings this tent offers, I wasn’t expecting to have the luxury of any pockets, but was pleasantly surprised to find two decent-sized mesh pouches inside each door of the tent. In addition, there’s an interior clothesline and a flashlight loop, which can also double as another place to hang damp items to dry overnight if you’re savvy with a carabiner.

Even ultralighters need some creature comforts

Layout

The Two tent has a door on each side so each sleeper can exit the tent without climbing over the other person. I’d argue you’re sleeping so close together that the other person will be disturbed regardless, but perhaps I’m being too cynical. The doors are a round design and shaped such that you get out of them right where the hiking pole is supporting the roof. Care must be taken not to knock this over as you exit.

What I do love about this feature is that the large vestibules on both sides can be rolled back and secured so that each side of the tent is open and exposed to the night sky. This is a feature I haven’t been able to achieve with my other lightweight tents. It also means you get a great breeze on warm nights and a good daytime shelter to escape the flies if need be.

I also like that there are heaps of attachment points for extra guy lines to adjust the pitch and create more space inside the tent. I really liked being able to pull the walls out further but just remember that you’ll either need convenient trees nearby or more tent pegs to allow this.

Sustainability

Gossamer Gear’s mission is to make high-quality gear so that people buy less often. The brand is also on a mission to encourage people to take less overall and do more with what they’ve got. You’ll notice their ‘take less, do more’ slogan on just about every one of their products.

While they’ve started using recycled fabrics and PFAS-free coatings on some of their packs, they’ve yet to bring this adjustment to the Two Tent so it’s not as sustainable as it could be. Likely the development of recycled fabric that can perform as well as the current custom ripstop nylon will result in a much higher price, and potentially reduced performance. Given this, I can understand why it might be taking the brand longer to implement the use of more sustainable materials in their shelters.

Fun fact: Gossamer Gear was struggling financially before it was heavily invested in by the CEO of Whole Foods who’s an avid ultralight hiker. Whole Foods banks $17 billion and is owned by Amazon, so they can probably make some room for environmental initiatives, but the company itself is still very small

That being said, there are no specific goals, targets or third-party accreditations on their sustainability page. They do donate 1% of all web sales to partner organisations, like search and rescue and trail-focused social causes, but there isn’t a strong focus on sustainability like we might expect.

Price

Priced at $642 AUD (at time of publishing), the Two Tent isn’t a cheap acquisition. If you’re not chasing the weight savings, it simply can’t compete with non-ultralight tents in the same price bracket in terms of durability and ease of setup. But, given it weighs less than a full one-litre water bottle, and provides a fully enclosed, relatively spacious shelter, it’s more than worth it for those of us counting every gram and willing to compromise.

The Two is tiny and weighs significantly less than this bottle of water

Read more: 15 Best 2P Bikepacking & Hiking Tents in Australia 2025

Using the Gossamer Gear Carbon Trekking Poles makes for a cohesive set and is a great option if you like to hike with poles and want to invest in a high-quality, low-weight pair. They weigh just 139g per pole and are beautifully comfortable to hold with reliable twist-lock adjustment. However, $299 for the pair, is pretty steep.

For a cheaper option, you can buy a tent pole set from Gossamer Gear for just $58. The set includes two 125cm poles (collapsible), which weigh just 81g each. This would be my preferred option to keep costs down. If you’ve already got adjustable hiking poles you can get away with only buying the tent.

Final Thoughts

Gossamer Gear’s The Two isn’t perfect, but if you’re looking to shave weight, it’s damn close. It does everything required to protect you from the elements and has great ventilation, adequate pockets, and plenty of headroom. Sure, it’s a bit tight for two people, and you’ll need to baby it a bit to protect it from twigs and rough handling, but in the world of ultralight gear, it’s a triumph.

Pack some extra pegs, tell your mate to BYO their own shelter, and float along carrying far less than you ever have previously.

The Two is a roomy shelter for one that can weigh under 1kg with the tent pole set

Gossamer Gear The Two Tent FAQs