Camping Rain Shelter Ideas

Canopy Tent

For a majority of people, camping is the best way to enjoy summer. If you are heading to your camping getaway, you need to pack all the essentials, including shelter from the rain just in case the weather changes. Camping tents are the most common and most practical ways to shelter yourself from the elements while outdoors. Basically, a good shelter should not only protect you from the rain, but also from the cold winds at night, direct sunlight and bugs. Below are some of the best shelter ideas to give you reliable protection.

Canopy Tent

Canopy tents are known by many names such as screen houses and outdoor canopies. They usually have a lot of headroom, making them very comfortable to spend time inside. They are easy to set up and have large windows and an opaque roof to keep the sun out and ventilate the living space inside. The best 10×10 canopy tents are the most common canopy tents and are used by most campers because they are large enough to fit a couple of friends or family inside.

Pop-up Tent

As the name suggests, these shelters just pop-up and erect themselves, leaving you with the task of only tying them down for support. They are small, lightweight and can be packed in circular bags, making them very easy to carry. These features have made pop-up tents very popular although most of them can fit a maximum of 2 people and have very little headroom.

Tunnel Tent

Tunnel tents, just like canopy tents, offer a bit more space to accommodate more friends or camping gear. They are characterized by a series of curved poles that create a tunnel-like a shelter once the tent is attached to these poles. They are easy to set up, requiring very little time if the rain shows up out of nowhere. Their size, however, means that they are quite heavy to carry around but the upside is that you get plenty of shelter space once it is set up.

Backpacking Tent

If you want to spend your summertime hiking, this is the perfect rain shelter for the job. Obviously, you would want light luggage to haul uphill and this tent is designed to be compact and lightweight for easy carrying. Due to fatigue, this type of tent is designed to be set up easily so that you can comfortably put up your rain shelter at the end of the day. The downside is that they are quite small, usually fitting a single person, and have very little headroom.

Inflatable Tent

Also known as an air tent, it is still a fairly new design and has not caught up with the masses mainly because of its cost. However, most air tents are designed to offer you a large living space inside, due to its canopy tent-like structure. The only difference is that they are not set up using poles for support, rather, they have hollow columns that can be inflated with air to become firm and support the whole tent. They can be quite heavy and require an air pump to fill up these hollow spaces. Because of this, they are more suitable for car camping.


Tents are the best form of shelter when camping and all these types give you the best rain shelter, leaving you warm and dry on the inside. However, each type has its own strengths and drawbacks, leaving you to decide on the one that suits your camping requirements. If you can move around with your car through the camping sites, large and heavy tents are the best option. If you want to go camping deep into the woods or up hills and mountains, light and compact shelters are the best options.