The Trail Folding Camping Chair Is Rated for 100kg. Its Recent Reviews Suggest Sitting Lighter.

The listing says 100kg. Peter Massingham, who gave it three stars on 3 August after a music festival, puts the practical ceiling a lot lower: "No good if height greater than 180cm or over 80kg weight." That gap between what the label promises and what the seat delivers runs right through the 100 most recent UK reviews of the Trail Folding Camping Chair in pink, and it decides who should buy it.

The lifetime badge reads 4.4 stars across 3,616 ratings. The 100 most recent reviews, all UK and all verified purchases, average 4.08, with 66 five-star ratings at one end and 15 one-star ratings at the other. That is a wider split than the badge suggests. Fourteen of the 100 raise size or comfort, and 11 report something breaking, most often an armrest. Against that, 15 praise how light it is to carry and 10 mention the colour unprompted.

So this is a conditional buy. If you are a lighter, shorter camper who wants a 2.3kg chair for festivals, the touchline or the beach, it does the job for very little money. If you are broad, tall or over about 80kg, or you lean on armrests to stand up, the recent reviews say look elsewhere, and we name where at the end.

Nine Recent Buyers Call the Seat Small, and They Give Their Measurements

Start with the numbers on the listing, because they explain the complaints. The chair stands 85cm high, 80cm wide across the arms and 50cm deep, with a seat height of 40cm. That 80cm width is arm-to-arm, not seat fabric, and the seat itself is a sling hung between a scissor frame. Packed it is 87cm x 14cm x 14cm.

Nine of the 100 most recent reviewers say outright that the seat is small or narrow, and several give their own dimensions. Chris K., two stars in March, is "a 34" waist and find it snug", and adds that "the frame at the front projects inwards such that it sits under your thighs and digs in very uncomfortably - a cushion will be needed". Sampy, also two stars, is 5ft 9in and reports "My knees stick out really far". Kate gave five stars but still calls it a bit small for an adult (her kids love it), and Sarah Softley's four-star review warns larger people off it.

Add the reviewers who found it uncomfortable without mentioning size (the front bar digging into thighs, a back one buyer found too upright) and the size-and-comfort cluster reaches 14 of 100. That is the largest single complaint in the sample, ahead of breakages.

The counterweight is real too. CanveySue, who bought a second one because her cat kept pinching the first, says it fits well with plenty of room, and 28 of the 100 reviews use the words comfy or comfortable, most of them approvingly. The pattern is not that the chair is uncomfortable for everyone. It is that it suits smaller frames, and the listing's 100kg figure does not tell you that.

Six Snapped Arms and Four Fabric Failures in the Last Hundred

Six of the 100 most recent reviews describe an armrest breaking. The timelines are short: first use for three of them (one a buyer of two chairs, who had one arm bent and ripped), a first night's camping for HM, who "went to stand up and the arm of the chair gave way", two weeks for Kelvin Phayre, and six or seven uses for a three-star buyer whose second arm was also going.

Stephen Clayton's review is the most useful of the six because it explains the mechanism: "These chairs are constructed with thin walled tubing which easily bends or breaks if you apply weight to the arms when getting out of chair." Both of the reviewers who say what they were doing when it went were pushing down on the arms to stand up. AC's three-star "drink spiller 9000" review adds a related design note without a breakage: the armrests are held by grip tension rather than fixed to the pole, so elbow pressure lets you slide.

Fabric and stitching make up the rest of the failures. Matt, at 190lbs, had the material rip at one corner after limited use. D's frayed and came away from the frame within days. Amelia's back panel fabric broke after a couple of weeks, and one four-star owner suggests checking the stitching before you sit. With Mrs Christine Kerr's unspecified break after two uses, that is 11 breakage reports in 100, 6 of them arms, 4 fabric or stitching, 1 unspecified.

The practical rule these reviews add up to: stand up using your legs, not the arms. The frame is powder-coated tubular steel and the legs get no complaints at all; the arms are the weak point.

The 2.3kg Case for Buying It Anyway

Fifteen of the 100 most recent reviews single out how light and easy to carry the chair is, which makes portability the most repeated piece of praise in the sample. The listing puts the packed weight at 2.3kg in its drawcord bag, and the bag has a shoulder strap. Dave, five stars, says "I love the bag with shoulder strap so I can walk with it in my shoulder to the beach", and Rachel40 bought it to carry to wild swimming spots and reports that "after two vigorous uses it's holding up".

The setup is the standard scissor action: pull the arms apart and it opens, push together and it collapses. Nobody in the 100 reviews complains about it being hard to open or fold, and several describe it as popping open or easy to erect. Ten reviews describe it as sturdy or stable when sat in properly, which squares with the arm failures being about levering rather than sitting.

The polyester seat is described as canvas-style, splash-resistant and fast-drying, and it wipes clean. Angela Laverick confirms a soapy cloth shifts dust and dirt. The mesh cup holder in the left arm gets a mention from 3 reviewers, all positive, though at this size it is a can-or-bottle holder rather than a mug holder.

Two smaller notes from the sample: 5imon finds the bag a bit uncomfortable over the shoulder, and one three-star buyer says the strap was already failing. P&M had trouble with the bag but reports customer service sorted it immediately.

Festivals, Football Touchlines and Pebble Beaches

Read the reviews for where the chair is being used and a pattern emerges. Five reviewers bought it for festivals, three for football touchlines, and the rest scatter across beaches, guide camp, garden and cherry-blossom viewing. Almost nobody is describing a week-long pitch where the chair is sat in for hours every evening.

That matters because it matches the design. Peter Massingham's three-star review is the clearest statement of the trade: "Poor support all round as chair is really very compact without any cushioning. Only bought for music festival so given the price and weight for carrying, it did the job. Would not use as main camping chair." Shazi, five stars after "a 3 day camping festival", makes the same call from the other direction: "It's cheap and it works but not suitable for x large people."

The touchline crowd are the happiest owners. C York-Andrews bought it for taking her boys to football, Agnieszka titles hers "Football mum's favourite", Sharon Moonsammy took it to Brighton's pebble beach and found it "very comfortable and sturdy", and Julie Watkins bought it for her daughter's guide camp.

The colour is doing more work than you might expect. Ten of the 100 reviews mention it, all approvingly, and Rachel40 notes it matches her change robe. If you are buying for a teenager, a guide unit or someone who wants their chair spotted from across a field, that is a point in its favour. Note that one five-star review in the sample is titled "Trail Green folding chair", so Amazon pools at least one other colour into this review page; nothing in that review is colour-specific.

What Turns Up in the Bag, and Three Buyers Who Think It Was Used

Three of the 100 reviews suspect they received a returned or used unit. One three-star buyer found it dirty out of the bag with plastic already cracking, LW's arrived with "the number 900 written in a chalky substance on arm" and a tatty bag, and Jane Cooper's outer cover had holes. Two of the three kept it anyway because they needed it for a trip. Georgia's arrived with a scratch. That is 4 of 100 with an arrival-condition gripe, which is worth knowing when you order close to a departure date: unbag it the day it lands.

Returns are the other friction point. Mrs Christine Kerr's one-star review says she could not return a chair that broke after two uses because she was asked to pay return postage. Mr N Gettings, by contrast, got a refund and was told not to send it back. Two data points, opposite outcomes, so do not assume either.

The unused reviews are worth flagging because they inflate the score. Three of the 66 five-star ratings in the sample come from people who say they have not sat in it yet. Strip those out and the recent average nudges down further. We have not quoted them for any quality point.

What arrives is the chair, the drawcord carry bag with strap, and nothing else. There is no side pocket, no padding and no cooler pouch, which puts it a rung below the padded twin-pack chairs this blog has reviewed, but also explains the 2.3kg.

A 3.5 Verdict: Fine for Lighter Campers, the SUNMER for Everyone Else

Our score is 3.5 out of 5. The recent 100 average 4.08 against a 4.4 lifetime badge, so it is drifting; 17 of 100 gave one or two stars; and 11 of 100 report a breakage, 6 of them the same armrest failure. That is not a "do not buy", because 74 of 100 gave four or five stars and the complaints cluster around identifiable buyers and one identifiable habit. But it is well short of the badge, and it is why the score sits below the listing average rather than at it.

Buy it if you are under roughly 80kg and 180cm, you want a chair you can carry on a shoulder strap to a festival, a match or a beach, and you can train yourself to stand without leaning on the arms. At that weight and for that use, the recent reviews are mostly happy and the price is low enough that a second one for a partner or child is an easy add. Check the stitching and the arm sockets on day one, and if it turns up dirty or marked, photograph it and raise it straight away.

Skip it if you are broad, tall, over about 80kg, or planning to sit in it every evening for a week. The 14-of-100 size-and-comfort cluster is you, and the arm failures skew towards heavier users pushing up out of the seat. This blog has already reviewed the SUNMER Padded Camping Chairs, a two-pack rated to 120kg with padding and side pockets at 3.3kg per chair, and for a bigger frame or longer sits that is the better call: our SUNMER review is here. The Trail chair wins only on weight and pack size.

For the buyer it fits, though, it is a lot of chair for the money, and you can check the current listing for today's price and colour options.

Trail Folding Camping Chair with Cup Holder, Pink

A 2.3kg festival and touchline chair for lighter frames: light to carry, quick to open, and cheap enough to buy two.

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