After having spent two years of close to full-time camping while I was highly chemically sensitive, I have a lot of opinions on tents! I tried a lot of different styles during that time.
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This article looks at different style tents and which ones are easier to keep mold-free, which brands are low in offgassing (and chemical odors), and which ones are free of flame retardants and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).
There are so many more options now than when I started!
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I bought a pop-up tent as my first tent. I went for one of the cheapest options here just to get started quickly.
I was able to use it after one week (with the doors all open at first for air), but it was about 1 month before I found it offgassed the chemical smell and I could close up the doors.
I was super sensitive at that time.
A number of brands have pop-up tents in this style which are super easy and quick to put up and have a decent design in terms of the amount of ventilation (more on the style I prefer with ventilation below).
Mine leaked in heavy rain so I didn&#;t like this style of tent for the long term.
The pros were the fact that it is very easy to pop up and if you get a good tarp over it you will be waterproof &#; I always put a tarp over tents now anyway, more on that later.
Anyone super challenged with putting up tents might want to start here.
For heavy rain, a tent with a really good rainfly is needed that comes down almost all the way to the ground like many of the REI or MEC brands and the NatureHike Backpacking Tent.
I also used the Winterial version of this style for many months and was very happy with it. (This brand claims no flame retardants).
When it comes to tents on the ground, this is the main style I look for.
Because this style is mostly mesh on the interior shell, this reduces your exposure to chemical offgassing and it helps to prevent condensation on the walls.
Technically you don&#;t need a tarp over it, but I always add one.
Water that soaks the tent walls will then soak anything that is touching the walls inside. The tarp is also helpful so you can get in and out when it&#;s raining.
I just don&#;t trust any tent enough to not put a tarp over top. More on setting up tarps later in the post.
For stealth camping on patios and balconies of hotels or AirBnbs, I have used a one-person tent like this Winterial brand.
I also like this Tenton brand (I like that it comes with straps to strap it to a camping cot below to raise it up).
That&#;s me all tied up on a balcony in a bevy tentYou can also look for tents called bevy tents.
I have tried just a mat with a mosquito net over it (that one is not treated with pesticides).
I have also strung up just the rain fly (with no tent) over a camping cot and sleeping mat when there are no bugs.
Never put a tent with a bottom right over outdoor tiles, bricks, or concrete for long, you will have a recipe for mold fast. (You can cut out the bottom of the tent if need be).
You can put up a tent on top of a camping cot like in the pictures of the Tenton one-person tent.
But to keep a low profile when balcony camping I prefer no tent &#; just the camping cot and then string up the rainfly or mosquito net so it does not go higher than the balcony rails.
I like putting tents in the sun to offgas them, smell them to test them, and also touch them to make sure they don&#;t cause skin irritation.
You may have to test them by sleeping in them to test for tolerance if you&#;re chemically sensitive.
Silicone-treated tents might be more tolerable for some, others may prioritize avoiding flame retardants (that list follows).
This list of low-off gassing tents is compiled based on tents that chemically sensitive people have done well with.
Very
Low In Offgassing (For the moderately to extremely sensitive):If you are too sensitive for any of these brands there are more options further down in this post for those who have to go more extreme.
Some who are trying to reduce exposure to chemical coating and offgassing wash the tents to remove some of the treatments, but this also removes some of the waterproof coating. That can still work if you have a good tarp over.
There is no single consensus on which single brand is the best for those with chemical sensitivities. Everyone is so different, no tent is perfect, and for some less sensitive there might not even be a big difference between the brands. You have to test them out for yourself if extremely sensitive.
Note: Tent Styles and Offgassing: Sometimes the rainfly smells stronger than the tent and sometimes it smells less. Sometimes a super beefy tent bottom is the hardest part to offgas. It depends on the brand. The more mesh you have the more airflow and the less exposure to offgassing.
The Moonlight TentIn October , the California state government changed the laws on flame retardants in tents. Flame retardants will no longer be required in California in synthetic fabric tents for under 15 people.
Because the previous law required flame retardants in tents in California we ended up with a nationwide norm of adding flame retardants.
This new law will move the industry, and it&#;s likely that the default tent design will no longer contain flame retardants in the US.
As of the beginning of , these are the brands that are clear about not containing flame retardants.
Some canvas tents do not have flame retardants. Cuben fibre from what I have seen is FR-free.
If you want to read about how to wash out flame retardants, see this post.
Other Camping Gear without Flame Retardants 2024
These tents have the benefit of insulation, and the aluminum coating reduces offgassing.
They don&#;t do well with humidity inside the tent if there is a temps inside.
WeatherHyde tents are insulated and the foil on the inside will also block most of the VOCs from the fabric on the outside.
They say you can sleep in them down to 0 degrees Celsius. They are 269 USD.
They do not have any mesh for ventilation which I imagine would be quite the problem for condensation and I do not know how you would get fresh air.
The Shift Pod is another version of an insulated aluminum tent made for Burning Man.
The benefit of the aluminum on the outside is it&#;s reflective of sun and heat. I would think it would have similar problems with condensation in most situations.
It&#;s pricey at USD.
For 18 USD you can get this aluminum-lined small sleeping tent (that might work for balcony sleeping or in an emergency, otherwise it&#;s difficult with a lack of ventilation).
The aluminum on the inside is more tolerable than the usual plastic.
Others have made homemade tents with materials they can tolerate like Tyvek, Reflectix, or XPS sheets. You can also make a more typical tent from untreated nylon.
You need to have mesh areas for air.
More info on these options in this post here.
Some folks who cannot handle the chemicals in the synthetic tents have tried canvas tents.
Some companies people like are Reliable Tent, Kodiak Tents, and Davis Tents.
Are they Mold-Prone?
These do not hold up well to rain and high humidity and I would not use them in rainy or humid conditions nor expect them to last very long at all.
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I have seen canvas tents, specifically, Davis tents hold up for quite a long time in a dry climate and with a woodstove inside.
It can take rain and even snow, as long as it can dry out.
For long-term living a gravel floor or a raised-up wooden platform is best.
Hemp Canvas Tents.
For those who don&#;t tolerate cotton or who want the tent to hold up a little longer than cotton canvas, you can make one out of hemp fabric, like this one.
You can expect cotton and hemp to last a short while in dry non-humid climates where you are expecting very little or no rain for a while.
If you are making your own tent out of canvas or nylon you can use the tube structure of a conventional tent and build it around that.
Wall tents can be canvas or conventional nylon/polyester.
They have straight walls and are generally larger.
Barebones makes a nylon polyester wall tent.
Often this type has more weather poofing and will have flame retardants because they are set up for wood-burning stores.
This can be a good solution for a longer-term camping tent. Though you should take care to keep the base dry (cut out or raised up) if you want it to last.
After throwing out many tents and then moving on to cutting out the bottoms, I finally found what seemed like the perfect tent: the Ozark Trail Two-Person Cot Tent.
Unfortunately, it was discontinued in . But Lowes makes a few similar styles.
This style of integrated camping cot tent (pictured above) is really the most ideal setup in my experience. This is off the ground so the bottom will not mold.
This brand had a very low odor rainfly and a brilliant design with the rainfly coming down way past the cot to protect water from getting in between.
Although I didn&#;t like the more common style of tent cot (I had trouble with ventilation and even dangerously spiked my C02 levels one night).
It was the Kamp Rite brand that I tried in this style. The Camp Rite brand does have a two-person version.
I quite like the Tenton tent that is made to strap onto their XXL camping cots.
You will, as always, want a tarp over this whole setup since this rainfly does not come past the cot (though on their website they sell a larger rainfly that would).
Cot Tents are Bulky
While I would never want to go with anything other than the raised off-the-ground tent again, this won&#;t work when I travel overseas.
When I travel I need to fit a tent, sleeping mat, and sleeping bag into a duffel bag.
The sleeping mats I use are huge and unless I can send a tent ahead I would have to go back to cutting out the bottom of tents to prevent mold.
I would use plastic bags to encase the sleeping mat, instead of the thick tarps I mention.
Cot Tents are Colder
It is cooler when you are raised off the ground. But I don&#;t find it any worse than cutting out a bottom and using a camping cot (in fact I find it warmer than tents with the bottom cut out).
The tree tents look interesting, as they are raised off the ground, but you have to keep in mind these are really just for sleeping as they don&#;t look very conducive to hanging out in all day.
I wonder how much they sag in the middle, and they are not as easy to put up.
For those who are less picky about their sleeping environment resembling a regular bed, the hammocks with nets are interesting options that are affordable and easy to travel with.
I bought a tarp for underneath to keep dew from getting the tent wet from below (also called a footprint), and later I added a tarp over the tent to stay dry.
At first, the bottom of my tent stayed nice and dry with the tarp underneath. I would take out and turn over the sleeping mat every day.
If the bottom of the tent gets wet you will want to dry it in the sun within 24 hours (flip it and then put it back and maybe move spots).
You can use the footprints made for underneath tents but tarps are generally cheaper (your tent may come with a footprint).
You want the tarp underneath to be a little smaller and tucked in so that it is under the tent. No water should get between the two.
Some people tuck it and then raise it a little with sticks or rocks so that no water gets in between. I tried that but in the end tent bottoms still went moldy on me when I had damp soil.
Putting a tarp overtop helped a lot. I found regular tarps from the hardware store have a strong smell but offgassed within a few days.
I now use a silnylon tarp which has a less offensive odor, and is more durable but is more expensive. Over most tents, you need 12 x 10 or 12 x 12.
Some people find they still do have to move the tent every couple of days due to condensation or the earth going funky underneath.
One of my many tarp setupsGenerally, you string up the tarp up in an &#;A shape&#; so that it&#;s touching neither the tent nor the ground, you can also string it up with a shed slant like the photo above.
Some people dig a small trench around so that the water that drips off does not go toward the tent.
Without a tarp, I had a lot of problems including saturation of the tent and water coming through especially where anything was touching the tent. I would not attempt camping without a tarp overhead again.
In a major storm, a larger tarp overhead helps, as well as a deep trench, and if things are going swampy you need to raise it up. I have used XPS sheets to raise up a tent in a storm before I found the cot tent style.
Corinne Segura is an InterNACHI-certified Healthy Homes Inspector with certifications in Building Biology, Healthier Materials and Sustainable Buildings, and more. She has 10 years of experience helping others create healthy homes.
I spent 2 years living outside in tents in order to bring down my chemical and mold sensitivities and get back into regular housing.
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