Durston X-Mid 1P Gen 2 Review (2024)

The upper crest of ultralight tents doesn't need an unattainable price. The Durston X-Mid one-person tent performs exemplary while being within the budget of most serious backpackers. It's still hard for us to believe that such an easy-to-set-up tent can be so delightful to spend camp time in while also being almost invincible to storms when the weather tries its best to make our nights not so bucolic. The secret is hidden in plain sight: a very well-thought-out pitch-out design using a two-pole offset mid-design and a rain fly made of no-stretch polyethylene-coated polyester. Add to that a separate interior mesh that wards off moisture from the ground and keeps bugs from penetrating your living space, and you've got a thru-hike-worthy winner.

Performance Comparison

Livability

The engulfing exterior rain fly is one of the most solid features of the X-Mid. With its two-sided entranceways, you also get two usable vestibule areas measuring over 11 square feet on each side – more than enough to store your pack out of the weather.

Clever features are found throughout the exterior add up to making this a tent that's a joy to stake up and spend some time in, including dual vents that can be toggled open and closed, double openings with waterproof zippers that can be staked on one side, and magnetic door toggles to stash them aside.

The X-Mid has ample interior space for one person to sleep comfortably at night. Bringing in a man's best friend would be a significant squeeze, and two people would be pleasant for neither.

We measured the interior area of the footprint at around 20 square feet, an average size for one-person tents. Headroom is also pretty average, with the tent giving you around 43" of ceiling space – more than enough for our 5'11" tester to do everyday tasks like taking off muddy shoes and warming up a brew while sitting down on their pad comfortably. The two poles do stretch the apex of the ceiling from one to two points, which is highly welcoming.

The interior mesh only touches the exterior rain fly at the tent's apex, making condensation issues far less than what you would see with a single-wall tent. The interior is mated to the exterior using two plastic buckles at the top, four guy lines that share stakes with the external rainfly, and two tiny clips on the side panels that help keep the mesh from falling inwards. All these little details add up to a very livable tenting experience — especially in the ultralight world.

Weight

The absolute weight is 1.96 pounds or 31.3 ounces for everything, including:

• Rain fly: 17.9 oz

• Inner mesh: 10.9 oz

• Stakes (6): 1.9 oz

• Stuff sack: 0.4 oz

• Stake sack: 0.2 oz

You'll have to provide the two trekking poles or an analog to put up this tent. We found the included stakes less than adequate — a significant and surprising oversight to an otherwise excellent design — so factor in the weight of perhaps heavier stakes. (As of early 2024, Durston has changed these faulty stakes out for ones designed to be stronger, although we haven't tested them ourselves.) Doubling up the responsibility of trekking poles to perform tent duties is a normal trick in the ultralight world and saves you the weight of having to bring a proprietary tent pole with you.

At almost 2 pounds, the X-Mid 1 won't be wooing ultralight purists — one can find tents of more exotic materials that weigh almost half as much. Much of the heft comes from its fantastic exterior rain fly coming in at 17.9 ounces, and using two tent poles does equate to their being more surface area to cover. Made of PE-coated polyester, the rain fly exhibits many qualities of much more expensive materials like DCF at a journeyman's price point.

We think it's a great compromise in getting good foul-weather performance out of wallet-friendly offerings. If everything about the X-Mid 1 seems attractive to you except the weight, Durston does make available a much lighter DCF version of this tent, the X-Mid Pro 1.

Weather Resistance

Spotting an oncoming storm on a long backpack may bring a wry smile to your face if you're packing the X-Mid. A standout when it comes to weathering the storm, it all comes down to its waterproof external PE-coated polyester rain fly and the offset two-pole mid-design. Once properly staked out – an easy and lightning-fast task – the outer rain fly swallows up the interior mesh, which can be quickly put up after the rain fly is staked down, all while you're inside and already covered.

Tent sides are relatively steep, making shedding off rain and snow an easy task and somewhat wind resistant. It's a major balancing act for a tent with this amount of canvas exposed. The catenary cut design of the rain fly reinforces the strength of the tent's structure and helps to keep a tight pitch. Getting staked in properly is vital as this tent — like many of the UL tents in our lineup – is not free-standing.

The solid bathtub bottom of the mesh is made of the same polyethylene-coated polyester material, being just as waterproof as the external rainfly. Although the tent can be put up with only four stakes, you can use two additional stakes to secure the sides of the tent and two more for one side of the tent flaps for particularly gusty nights.

Adaptability

We were stoked to see that the exterior rain fly of the X-Mid can be set up independently of the interior mesh, as sometimes we prefer to have a bit of room to stretch out underneath the canopy. You won't lose any pitch strength when you do so, as the interior mesh isn't critical to the tent's integrity. Utilizing an add-on also sold by Durston, the mesh may be pitched independently of the rain fly for bug-free star gazing opportunities.

Be careful when pitching out your tent — especially if you opt for only the four required stake-out points: if any of these stakes pop out, your shelter will come flopping down.

Guy lines allow for plenty of adjustment if you need to tighten your pitch, which you may also do by adjusting the height of your trekking poles. Since the exterior rain fly is made of a polyester fabric that does not stretch when it gets wet, this should not be required often during a rain storm, meaning you can stay cocooned in your sleeping bag during the night rather than futzing around with your tent.

The X-Mid is officially a three-season tent, but the steep angled walls of the exterior do shed snow well if you find winter surprising you with a knock on your tent flap door in the middle of the night with a few inches of the white stuff falling.

Ease of Set-Up

The X-Mid is a delight to set up: loosely stake out the four sides, prop up the ceiling with your two trekking poles, cinch the guy lines down, and your rain fly is all set up. If you decide to set up the inner mesh, which attaches via two buckles on the tent's ceiling, and guy lines at each corner that loop onto the corner stakes. Elastic loops at the bottom near the trekking poles and small hooks can be put into service to help keep the mesh from collapsing.

Pitching will take only a few minutes, which is a relief if the weather starts to break. You will need to find a somewhat larger spot to put up the tent than some other one-person tents, as the total area is also a bit larger, but adjustment lent to you by the guy lines and changing the height of the tent poles affords you some wiggle room for more awkward pitches.

The breakdown is a breeze. Just unbuckle the mesh from the fly, take out your trekking poles, remove the stakes from the ground, and stuff everything back into its sack. No dedicated tent pole saves another step of breaking the tent down and stowing it away. Once you get comfortable with the system, you can even keep the mesh interior buckled into the ceiling to save you an additional step when setting up.

Should you buy the Durston X-Mid 1P Gen 2?

With a reasonable price tag – especially for the ultralight market – a well-thought-out design, and almost perfect execution, the X-Mid is a fantastic one-person tent for weekend trips and thru-hikes. The ease of setup belies its talent to withstand wind, rain, and even a little snow. This is a seriously advanced backpacking tent that can be enjoyed by all enthusiasts, beginners included.

What Other Ultralight Tents Should You Consider?

If the price of the X-Mid 1P is still out of reach, consider the 3F UL Gear Lanshan 1 Pro, which is a good tent to introduce you to ultralight backpacking, but may not have as much runway once you figure out your preferences. Another tent comparable to the X-Mid 1P is the Six Moon Designs Lunar Solo, which has many stormworthy qualities and a larger living space underneath the mesh interior. It also employs a polyester fabric that doesn't stretch when soaked. If you want something much lighter, look into the Tarptent Aeon Li, which has a ton of floor space to keep your gear inside, rather than in a vestibule. It's more expensive, using a DCF fabric for a no-stretch rain fly, but at a much lighter weight.