The Gossamer Gear Whisper: The Lightest Tent We’ve Ever Tested

The Gossamer Gear Whisper is one of the most impossible-looking tents I’ve ever seen. It’s a veritable palace for one person that packs up to the size of an oversized nalgene. There is also something unnatural about its appearance; several testers mentioned that it looked more like a spaceship than a tent. 

The Whisper was designed by Gossamer Gear co-founder Glen Van Peski for a specific purpose, and only 500 were released as an initial limited run — perhaps, at first glance, it didn’t seem like a tent with widespread appeal. But it flew off the shelves, and Gossamer Gear ended up making it a permanent part of their offerings. 

Among backpacking tents, even ultralight tents, the design of the Gossamer Gear Whisper stands out as unusual. It’s basically a sheet of DCF with a mesh skirt that uses two trekking poles — one short, one long — and seven stakes to create a structure. You start by fully collapsing a Gossamer Gear trekking pole and placing it upside down so that the pointy end is captured by the reinforced pouch on the short-end of the tent. This is important because, while Dyneema is extremely tough for its weight, excessive tension against the main tent body will result in tears in the fabric.

You then start staking out the tent, starting with the three stakes at the foot and moving around the backside to the head of the tent. There are two stakes that pull out at irregular angles on the backside of the tent — if you’re used to backpacking tents having a certain streamlined aesthetic, you may be disappointed. At the head of the tent, you’ll insert the second trekking pole, set to 130 cm, and pull the guyline for the second to last stake taut. Then you complete your circumnavigation to the front of the tent, inserting the final stake that pulls the door out.  

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With a tent like this, geometry is king, with the exact dimensions of the DCF, the placement of the pouches for the trekking pole and the guylines for the stakes making or breaking the tent. The backpacking gear testing team had checked out a tent with a similar design — the Kuiu Summit Star — on a previous trip, but were stymied by a difficult setup that wasn’t offset by significant weight savings. 

At a glance, the biggest difference between the Gossamer Gear Whisper and the Kuiu Summit Star is that the Whisper is made from DCF while the Summit Star is made from a high-quality ripstop nylon. This material change is important for two reasons. 1: It basically doubles the cost of a tent. 2: It makes it dramatically easier to achieve a taut profile. 

How We Tested the Gossamer Gear Whisper

Before I even headed out on the backpacking gear testing trip along the Pacific Crest Trail in the Goat Rocks Wilderness, I took a moment to read Glen’s stream-of-consciousness directions on the Gossamer Gear site under the FAQ (which I definitely recommend), it took me less than 10 minutes to set up on my first attempt. I imagine with a bit of practice, I could get this tent up about as quickly as any other trekking pole tent. 

Other testers had similarly positive experiences with the setup. Experienced thru-hiker Jac “Top Shelf” Mitchell called it “quick, easy, and self-explanatory,” noting that the DCF makes it easier to create a taut silhouette than you would get with silnylon. Traditional backpacking Diana Helmuth and OL associate editor Ashley also both got the tent up without too much trouble after I provided a recap of the recommended strategy.

Testers’ feelings about actually sleeping in this tent varied dramatically. “It feels like my first tent,” said Top Shelf. “Just enough of what you need and nothing you don’t.” Thess did not have similar warm fuzzies, stating that she wouldn’t trust this tent in any kind of weather. And Helmuth opted to forgo sleeping in it at all, swapping with Steady on the third night of our test. That turned out to be the windiest night, with several testers set up in more exposed locations reporting their tent structure being compromised. So it was notable that Patrice “Steady” La Vigne, set up with some tree protection, came away impressed with the structural integrity of this tent, giving it a 4, the highest rating of our testers.

“I felt the wind blowing in through the mesh bottom part, but I wouldn’t have known it was windy (maybe 10 mph) because the rest of the tent body was as tight as a trampoline,” she said. “You could bounce a penny off it.”

When I tested this tent on the final night of our trip, I had the chance to experience this firsthand. The tent looked like it was standing up with pixie dust, which didn’t make me feel as secure inside of it as I wanted. But the actual structure was so rigid and taut that no matter how many times I knocked into the center pole, it didn’t move at all. 

Gossamer Gear doesn’t opine on how many people this tent will fit, but our take is that, while it just barely fit our two gal testers, it’s really a roomy fit for one. While there is technically space on both sides of the center pole for two sleeping pads, the logistics of cramming in any extra gear or, heaven forbid, the person on the far side needing to use the restroom in the middle of the night, makes this a no-go. 

What the Gossamer Gear Whisper Does Best

By rights, more backpackers should use tarps than do currently. They are lightweight and easy to configure to a number of unlikely camping locations. But between knots and tension, the learning curve is steep, and much of it only comes from experience. And then there are the bugs.

Which explains the popularity of single-wall trekking tents. They protect you from the bugs; they are a lot easier (if not exactly easy) to set up. But they are heavier, and often fussier about being pitched on a just-so site to achieve an ideal profile. 

The Gossamer Gear Whisper combines the best of tarps and the best of trekking pole tents into one. It has the weight-savings of the former, but the setup is closer to the latter. I have never considered using a camping tarp, but I would absolutely take this out with me. 

What the Gossamer Gear Whisper Does Worst

The lack of a dedicated floor is sure to be a turn-off for some people. Most of my testers used the polycro sheet so that they weren’t sleeping directly on the ground, but setting this up was arguably more time-consuming and irritating than the actual tent. 

Part of this is the nature of polycro, which is prone to picking up dirt and sticking to itself. I would recommend either just going without, or picking up some Tyvek and cutting it to the right shape for your needs. It’ll add some weight to the kit, but you’ll still be well under a pound total and you’ll pull out less of your hair in the long run. 

The Whisper is also going to struggle in certain kinds of inclement weather. While our testing showed that the tent actually does pretty well in windy conditions — as well or better than other ultralight tents, the mesh skirt at the bottom is exposed to both sideways wind and rain and backsplash in especially rainy conditions. In those conditions, you could shorten the poles and pitch the whole tent closer to the ground, but that would quickly become very stuffy and could result in serious condensation if left that way overnight. 

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The final ding against the Gossamer Gear Whisper is the price. Like all DCF/Dyneema tents, this tent costs about twice what you think it ought to. Neither the stakes nor the trekking poles are included. If you have trekking poles on hand already that you plan to use, check that the poles extend to 130cm (not all do), and collapse to around 60cm. 

Final Thoughts on the Gossamer Gear Whisper

More than any other tent, trust your gut on this one. If you’re an old hand at trekking pole tents or tarp-curious, this could be just what you need to really drive that base weight down. But if the idea of forgoing a floor and having the bottom four inches of your tent be nothing but mesh gives you pause, then go with another ultralight tent. 

 

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