Headlamps

A headlamp's job is hands-free light matched to your task: a wide flood for camp chores, a focused spot for trail finding, and enough runtime to finish the trip. The specs that matter are ANSI-rated lumens, beam distance, runtime at usable brightness, battery type, and IP water resistance.

The ten headlamps below cover 1,000-lumen trail-running beams, ultralight thru-hiking lights under an ounce, and dependable camp models. Lumen and runtime figures are manufacturer ANSI FL1 figures where published; remember that maximum lumens are usually a burst mode, not an all-night setting.

Two features separate trail-worthy lamps from drawer lights. A lockout mode stops the lamp switching itself on inside your pack and arriving at camp dead, a failure every backpacker meets exactly once before checking for it forever. And a red mode preserves your night vision and your tentmates' patience: it lights a map or a midnight exit without resetting everyone's eyes to daylight. Weigh those against raw lumens when you compare the picks below, because the brightest lamp is rarely the one you reach for most.