ZPacks Duplex Classic Review

Livability

The impressive interior space of the Duplex Classic is immediately noticeable, especially if you're used to spending nights in much smaller shelters. Two people can sleep side by side on 20-inch-wide pads, with enough legroom to comfortably fit people six feet tall or even taller. Trekking poles are in the entrance ways, which opens up prime real estate. The 4-foot ceiling height at the peak is high enough for most people to sit up straight and face each other for late-night card games.

Bug protection is the care of the integrated mesh inner tent. There are two mesh doors on opposite sides, so one can easily crawl out to use the bathroom in the middle of the night without waking their sleeping tentmate. One flaw is that there is no way to stow away the inner mesh door when it's unzipped – it just rests on the floor of the tent.

The rainfly overhangs the side doors by a few inches, allowing condensation to build up and drip onto the ground rather than into the tent. One can slightly raise the bathtub floor at the ends to increase protection against puddles. But curiously, there is no attachment anywhere to do the same on the door sides, and left on its own, the floor is a bit loose, especially when the door is unzipped.

Rather than being discrete components, the exterior rainfly doors pull triple duty as doors, vestibules, and ventilation. For simplicity and durability, the rainfly doors have no zippers, so it's either open or closed – no fine adjustments like a zippered door. We often pulled one door closed for a gear closet, and left the other one open (at least partway) to improve ventilation.

One side of the exterior door is being used as the vestibule, while the other side is rolled up and stashed away. The mesh inner door is also unzipped down.   Credit: Justin Simoni

A small pocket is located at the bottom of each door.   Credit: Justin Simoni

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Weight

The Duplex Classic weighs 19 ounces (539 grams) without the Freestanding Flex Kit, or 29 ounces (821 grams) with the accessory kit. This total weight includes the tent body – with integrated bug netting and a bathtub floor – eight pre-cut and in-place guylines, and the Dyneema stuff sack.

Here's the breakdown of the full package:

• Tent: 18.7 oz / 529 g
• Stuff sack: 0.3 oz / 9 g
• Flex Kit poles: 9.8 oz / 278 g
• Flex Kit pole bag: 0.2 oz / 6 g

This net weight does not include the 6-8 stakes you'll need to pitch the tent successfully — factor in an additional 0.35 ounces (10 grams) per high-quality ultralight stake you add. And remember, if you decide not to use the Flex Kit, you'll need two trekking poles or a comparable alternative.

If you're comparing the Duplex Classic with other competitively lightweight tents, keep in mind that many may lack features that come standard with the Duplex Classic, such as a floor or bug netting. Even when normalizing for all these features, it's evident that this tent is extremely light, especially considering the amount of built-in protection.

Full Tent (plus Flex Kit): 29.0 ounces / 821 grams   Credit: Justin Simoni

Tent: 18.7 ounces / 529 grams   Credit: Justin Simoni

Tent stuff sack: 0.3 ounces / 9 grams   Credit: Justin Simoni

Flex Kit poles: 9.7 ounces / 276 grams   Credit: Justin Simoni

Flex Kit pole stuff sack: 0.2 ounces / 6 grams   Credit: Justin Simoni

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Weather Resistance

The tent fly is made out of .55 OSY Dyneema, which makes this a highly effective shelter, even in a downpour. Dyneema is inherently waterproof, so unlike DWR coatings on nylon or polyester, its waterproofing won't wear off. Dyneema also doesn't absorb any water, so it doesn't stretch or sag, even after days in the rain.

The edges of the tent extend six inches beyond the interior bathtub floor, providing plenty of space to store your backpack, even in driving rain. The bathtub floor is made of thicker, stronger 1 OSY Dyneema and is integrated into the tent fly. The bathtub floor rises eight inches above the ground, a seemingly ideal height to protect against mud or splashback from heavy rain.

The outside doors are made of two overlapping flaps that easily roll back and are secured with a simple toggle rather than a zipper. The toggle is more bombproof than a zipper, but we admit a zipper would offer more ventilation options.

As long as your stakeout points are secure, the Duplex Classic is stable in high winds. The catenary (U-shaped) cut of the fly makes it easier to tension it effectively, minimizing flapping in the wind. It also has two extra guy-out points on each side of the fly to add stability in especially heavy weather. That said, it's still drafty inside, much like a single-wall pyramid tent where the fly doesn't reach the ground.

Adaptability

Coupled with the optional Flex Kit, the Duplex Classic is adaptable in ways that's hard for other trekking-pole tents to match. Trekking pole tents usually falter on hard ground and uneven ground, where it's difficult (or impossible) to stake out a tent evenly.

However, the Flex Kit is an upgrade, and aside from the extra expense, there are a few caveats to note. The most common issue was that this ultralight tent tended to blow away in the slightest breeze before we were even finished setting up the Duplex Classic with the Flex Kit.

Even with the Flex Kit, the Duplex Classic isn't the bona fide freestanding tent it's advertised to be. To have a habitable tent with functional doors and usable vestibules, you still have to stake it out on either side. Even under the tension of the extra poles, the tent doesn't naturally splay out. Instead, it crumples a bit in the center, and we needed to bring extra stakes to achieve the same rigidity as when setting it up with trekking poles.

Ease of Set-up

While the Flex Kit makes this tent more adaptable for camping on sandstone slabs and beaches, it's still the easiest to set up the Duplex Classic using two trekking poles and six stakes. With a little practice – and we highly suggest practicing setup before setting off – setting up this tent is much easier than you might expect.

Good site selection always makes setting up a tent easier – try to find a relatively flat spot with soft enough ground to drive the stakes in. We timed ourselves setting up the Duplex Classic in only a few minutes, and speed is important when a storm is looming on the horizon.

Pitching this tent with the Flex Kit may actually be harder than setting it up with just trekking poles. Instead of just two poles, this system has four that you have to fit into a criss-cross pattern that's not exactly intuitive. While we were able to figure out how to set it up on our own, you'll notice it's much more involved than the classic setup.

Aside from expanding tent-site options, the Flex Kit doesn't add much to the Duplex Classic. The poles pull the tent sides out slightly, providing marginally more volume inside. We needed to wrestle with the Flex Kit poles to get them to conform to the tent body's unique geometry, which felt like more work than necessary. In the end, most of our testers agreed that the classic setup, with two trekking poles, is the way to go.

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Should you buy the ZPacks Duplex Classic?

The Duplex Classic will cost you a pretty penny, plus a little extra if you want to add on the Freestanding Flex Kit. Despite the price tag, it's still one of our favorite ultralight tents and an investment that will pay for itself over years of service. It's a bomber 2-person shelter that's ideal for wet and dry climates alike, with or without bugs. It's the perfect option for couples who want an ultralight tent with a bit of extra space, and for solo travelers, it feels like a personal palace.

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