Whether you’re jetting off on a summer holiday or hitting the festival circuit, travelling light is vital. The right travel bag can make all the difference, offering flexibility, value for money — and even savings on flight costs.
We’ve tested five different travel bags to help you find the perfect match for your needs and budget. From sun-soaked getaways and music festival campouts to spontaneous road trips, our top picks will have you covered…
Helly Hansen Canyon Duffel Pack 35L Backpack
£75
The Canyon Duffel Pack from Helly Hansen is an extremely lightweight backpack with ample space for everything you’d need for a weekend away, or even a week in the sun if you tend to pack light.
This compact carry-all weighs just 500g and folds neatly and easily into an attached storage bag when not in use. At 56.5×22.5×32 cm, it’s small enough to be accepted by most airlines as carry-on luggage without any issues. Its fabric construction means it will fit easily into overhead lockers when space is limited — we took it on a rather full BA flight and found it easy to slip the bag into the overhead bin in a slot that a wheeled case stood no chance of fitting into.
Once unfurled and ready for use, the storage pouch becomes a handy internal pocket, keeping things like toiletries in easy reach. Inside the main flap is a mess pocket secured with a zipper, which is a good size, although not quite deep enough to house a laptop.
The shoulder straps are neatly zipped away in a dedicated pocket on the outside of the main flap and are attached by clips if you want to use the rucksack configuration. Alternatively, you can carry it as a duffel bag using any of the four handles on the webbing strap, which is securely fixed all the way around the bag.
This is a great option if you’re travelling with more substantial luggage and want a compact rucksack to throw in for use once you arrive. It’ll take up very little space in your main case and add an insignificant amount of weight, but it will give you a good-sized day pack to use once you reach your destination.
+ Pros: Very lightweight, and made using Helly Tech fabric which is waterproof and hardwearing.
– Cons: No protection for electronics as it is a purely fabric construction making it easy to compress.
Cabin Max Manhattan 44L Hybrid
£79
Manhattan from Cabin Max is a cabin bag that can be used as either a wheeled suitcase or a rucksack, easily converting between the two. The hybrid nature of the luggage makes it a very versatile choice for travellers, covering their needs in different situations without investing in more than one bag.
To use it as a wheeled case, simply unzip the cover concealing the extendable handle, press the button to extend it to the full height, and you’re good to go. To carry it as a rucksack, just release the zips at each side of the back panel, fold the panel down and secure it with the attached Velcro. This gives you access to the fully adjustable rucksack straps and keeps the wheels covered and away from your clothing. The back of Manhattan is well padded, so carrying the bag as a rucksack is pretty comfortable — once you have the straps well adjusted — even when the bag is fully loaded.
Inside the Manhattan, you have 44 litres of storage available, and a compression panel to keep everything neat and orderly. This panel has three smaller pockets on the top and one larger pocket underneath, all of which zip closed, for storing smaller items safely.
On the inside of the suitcase-style opening flap is a well-padded panel with two pockets, perfect for storing a laptop and a tablet. They are held securely in place by an elasticated strap but can still be easily accessed through the zip opening without fully undoing the bag.
The outside of the Cabin Max Manhattan offers even more storage, with four pockets in the front of the bag of various sizes and a water bottle slot on the side.
One of the great strengths of the Manhattan is that it is perfectly sized—55x40x20 cm—to be acceptable as cabin baggage for most airlines, including Ryanair and Easyjet. It also has enough capacity for most people to easily manage a few nights away.
+ Pros: Excellent value for money for a wheeled suitcase, with ample space for a weekend away.
– Cons: At 2.9kg unloaded, it is relatively heavy due to the wheels and handle configuration.
The North Face Base Camp Duffel, Small 50L
£125
The North Face’s Base Camp Duffel is available in sizes from 31 to 150 litres. It’s rugged and water-resistant, making it a good option if you’re heading for an outdoor-based break. We tried out the 50-litre small version and found it to be a nice size for our summer travels.
Despite being a duffel bag, the sides and top flap are fairly stiff, at least for the first few uses. This gives the bag a good amount of structure and body to protect the contents from being easily crushed. The zip holding the suitcase-style flap closed was very stiff to begin with, making it a little awkward to get into, but that should loosen up with more use.
Under the closing flap, you’ll find a zipped mesh pocket for storing smaller items safely and in easy reach or to keep the fully detachable rucksack straps in if you’re not using them. There is also an external pocket under one of the side-mounted grab handles — there are four handles, one on each side — which is secured with a zip and covered with a small flap to help keep it as watertight as possible.
On each side, you’ll find two compression straps, allowing you to adjust the size of the duffel bag and keep the contents from slipping to one end when carrying it as a rucksack. Not only does that keep things nice and neat inside the bag, but it also makes it much more comfortable to carry. You might need to spend some time adjusting the straps to make them comfortable, but once you get that right, it sits nicely against your back, making it easy to carry.
The 50-litre version we tested is accepted onboard many airlines as cabin baggage, with dimensions of 33x54x33 cm. We boarded an Easyjet flight with it and had no problems at all.
+ Pros: It’s available in a great range of colours, and has a good, stable structure for what is essentially a fabric duffel bag.
– Cons: The initial investment is a little high, but the quality means that it should last well, making the return on investment more palatable.
Jack Wolfskin Traveltopia Cabin Pack 30L
£150
The Traveltopia Cabin Pack is a stylish, understated-looking bag with great benefits for travellers. It’s compact and lightweight but still provides space for 30 litres of luggage. We’ve taken it as cabin baggage on several different flights and encountered no issues with the size, and at 50x35x23 cm, it should pass muster for most airlines — and even squeezed onto an Aer Lingus Regional flight with stringent (and stingy) limits.
It’s made from recycled materials and has been assigned a Bluesign Product label to confirm its environmental status. It’s also water repellent, so getting caught in a rain shower shouldn’t pose any problems.
Unzip the clamshell top, and you’ll find a relatively shallow space that can hold a surprising amount if packed neatly. There are no dividers or compression straps to keep anything in place, but inside the flap, you’ll find a full-sized zip pocket that can be used to neatly store shirts or other garments to prevent excess creasing in transit or to separate your laundry from your fresh clothes.
There is also a small zipped mesh pocket on the inside of the bag’s lid, which is handy for small items or toiletries. On the outside, there’s another good-sized zipped pocket, but if you carry the bag on your back in a crowded space, this could be vulnerable to pickpockets, so avoid putting anything important or valuable in there.
On the back of the bag, there are dedicated slots into which the rucksack handles can be stowed if you’re using just the side or top handle or slipping it over a larger suitcase handle using the attachment loop.
If you’re carrying a laptop with you on your travels, there is a well-padded space that is the perfect fit for your hardware, and it’s stowed nice and securely against your back when carrying the Traveltopia as a rucksack. Access is via a single zip at the top of the bag, just in front of the straps, and opens the full width and depth to give ample space. There are two other smaller mess pockets in the space, which are ideal for storing your personal items, such as money, travel documents and passports.
+ Pros: It’s a nice design and has a dedicated and secure laptop and electronics storage section.
– Cons: The lack of structure inside can make packing a little tricky if you’re not using the full capacity, as things end up crumpled at the bottom. Packing cubes would be beneficial, just to keep things as crease-free as possible.
Saloman Outlife 45L
£91
The Outlife 45 duffle bag is a versatile travel bag with stowable rucksack handles and a handy shoe storage pocket. It’s the largest bag in our test, and at 65x35x28 cm, it won’t be accepted as cabin baggage, but if you’re not flying this summer — or are prepared to take a gamble — it’s still a candidate worthy of consideration.
The body of the bag is made from durable, water-resistant, rip-stop fabric, and it has robust zips to keep everything dry and secure. The opening is long and slightly narrow, but that doesn’t hamper packing your gear. Inside, there are two compression straps to hold things in place.
There are two internal mesh pockets. The first is under the opening flap, with the zip straight down the middle. It isn’t the most practical pocket to begin with, being only 18 cm deep and 43 cm long, and the full-length zip down the middle doesn’t help. The second pocket is much more useable and incorporates a key hook within easy reach of the zip.
The well-proportioned shoe pocket is what differentiates the Outlife 45 from all the other bags we tested. It’s big enough to house a pair of wet and muddy walking boots or trainers, keeping them tucked away from your other clothes in a waterproof section accessible via an external zip. If you don’t have any shoes to stash, it makes a handy laundry storage section, or if you swim just before travelling home, your damp clobber can be thrown in to deal with later.
When in use, the shoe pocket does eat into the space inside the bag, but helpfully, when it isn’t in use, it squashes out of the way nice and easily.
Along with the rucksack straps, Outlife 45 features grab handles on three sides, making it easy to manoeuvre from any angle, even when fully loaded.
Since we tested Saloman’s Outlife 45, we have learned that it is being replaced by a new model, Prolog 40, which has many similar features, including the shoe pocket. As a result, Outlife 45 is available at a discounted price, while stocks last.
+ Pros: Comfortable to carry with lots of space which is easily accessible.
– Cons: Other than the shoe pocket, there are no externally accessible storage pockets for travel documents etc.
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