Berghaus Air 6 XL Inflatable Tent Review

The Berghaus Air 6 XL is not a new tent, in fact it has been ‘sort of’ available since 2017. I am saying sort of because the Berghaus Air 6 XL is more often not available, which is a shame, ’cause it is a great tent and a really good buy. It should be on everyone’s list who is out there looking to buy a 6-person inflatable tent. In this Berghaus Air 6 XL review I am telling you why.

Berghaus Air 6 XL Review – Key Features

• Excellent headroom, vast internal space
• 6000mm HH waterproof flysheet
• Fully sewn-in groundsheet
• Large bedrooms, versatility
• Plenty of organisers EVERYWHERE, two cable entry points
• Side door rain shelter
• Wheelybag for easier transport

In this review

• Who is it for?
• Pitching, transport
• Dimensions, layout
• Bedrooms
• Living area
• Porch
• Fabrics, weather protection
• Pros&cons
• Alternatives
• Where to buy?

Who is the Berghaus Air 6 XL for?

The Berghaus Air 6 XL provides excellent value for money. It’s a large tent with large bedrooms and a large living area, ideal for families up to 6. Thanks to its tunnel design, inflatable beams and above average decent pegs it can withstand the poorest weather without a drop of water seeping in, while the huge internal space allows for spending time inside without killing each other.

Pitching and packing away is a piece of cake, so even those who are not seasoned campers can bravely shove the Berghaus Air 6XL into the boot and head out for the weekend.

What Is It Like?

Pitching, Transport

The Berghaus Air 6 XL comes in a large and heavy carrybag – it weighs more than 35 kgs. Thankfully, there are wheels on the bag so you can easily pull it around wherever you’d like to. The only issue is with the boot space: the bag itself measures 87cm x 58cm x 50cm (wider than most). Putting it onto the roof isn’t easy either due to its sheer weight.

But once it’s at the campsite, pitching is really easy, even for beginners. There are plenty of videos on Youtube on how to pitch and pack away the Berghaus Air 6XL (or any other Berghaus tent).

It is recommended to get a footprint to protect the groundsheet, and pitching starts by pegging out the footprint first. Then you need to roll out the tent, secure the corners with the bespoke corner pegs.

The handpump is part of the package, you need to attach the nozzle to the air valves. These valves are not bad quality, but they are not as good as Vango’s AirSpeed Valves for example, and when I tried the Berghaus Air 4 the nozzle often came off as I was pumping. I ended up holding the nozzle with one hand while trying to pump with the other…it’s really awkward…so inflating is more of a two-person mission with the Berghaus. Alternatively, you can get an electric pump like this, which frees up you hands.

Overall, with a bit of practice and a bit of help, pitching should not take longer than 15-20 minutes.

Deflating is even faster, however you need to practice rolling the tent up to ensure that it fits back to the carrybag (bare in mind its weight, it is not something that you can easily fiddle with). The first thing that will tear is the carry bag anyways, so try not to force the tent into it if possible.

Once it’s up and you pegged the Berghaus Air 6 XL out with the high-visibility guylines, you are ready to enter. The bedrooms are pre-attached, however you’re better off de-attaching them before packing away, it makes rolling up easier.

Size, Layout, Dimensions

If you haven’t before, it is the moment when you face the sheer size of this tent.

The footprint is more than 27 square metres – 605 cms long and 450 cms wide. The Berghaus Air 6 XL is interesting from this point of view: it is wider and shorter than most other tents. It is also higher than most others, 220cms, which means that you have full head height across the entire tent. The only limiting factor is the slope of the side-walls, they are not as upright as the walls of other, more recent tents.

On the other hand, I appreaciate the attention to detail: there are inflatable brows over the side doors to prevent rain falling in.

Bedrooms

The bedrooms are large, much larger than any other 6-person tent in this price range. They are situated side by side, so you have three 140-cm wide bedrooms separated by toggled dividers.

You can easily remove the dividers, opening up the bedrooms into one large bedroom, or you can create a master and a 2nd bedroom as well. Or, even if there’s only four of you, you can sleep in comfort while you can have a large storage room.

Speaking of storage, storage space is one of the strengths of the Berghaus Air 6 XL as there are plenty of them. There are cubby pockets around everywhere, and there’s also an organiser hung between the bedrooms with 4 smaller pockets.

There are two cable entry points (again, typically there’s only one) and you can secure the cable by velcro to lead it up to the lantern hanging points.

The bedrooms are not ‘black-out’, and though they use dark fabric, they are slightly lighter than the fabrics used nowadays.

More on balck-out bedrooms, what are they and whether or not you need them: Air Tents with Blackout Bedrooms

Living Room

Another strenght of the Berghaus Air 6 XL is the living room. It’s more than 12 square metres, which is plenty to have a decent table with chairs plus other stuff, and still have enough room for the kids to play etc. if the weather chases everyone inside.

There are large panoramic windows, two side doors, one front door to the porch, and plenty of air vents to make a drought.

There’s only one downside: having a large living room is alright when you can’t be outside, but actually it is useless if you are out anyways enjoying the sunshine. And this large living room turns into a nice greenhouse as soon as the sun is out, despite the air vents.

In terms of easy access, thre front door can be rolled up and tucked away to the side. There’s only one wing, so there is not such versatility, but there is a full mesh screen as well to keep the bugs out. The doorsteps don’t drop flat, so that’s something you need to keep in mind (and I’m only saying this because most tents of a newer design have flat entry into the tent and into the bedrooms)

Porch

The porch has been sacrificed for the large living room. The porch of the Berghaus Air 6 XL is rather small, although you can still enjoy some space outside, relatively protected from sun or rain. Another quirk of the Berghaus Air 6 XL is that the porch is open, I mean, you cannot close it. There are no front doors.

Weather protection, fabrics etc.

The specs are really similar to the Berghaus Air 4XL. The groundsheet is fully sewn-in and the seams are taped – all of it is pretty much standard in this price range. I found little information on the flysheet, what is certain that it is made of polyester with an additional layer of coating on it that makes it waterproof. The coating has a 6000mm HH rating.

There is no information on how thick the flysheet is, or if it protects from UV lights.

In general, polyester does not have great thermal properties: will be hot inside in the summer, and will be fresh inside on a cooler autumn morning, so despite the air vents you can expect some condensation to build up on the inside wall of the flysheet in colder weather. This is something you’ll have to live with, although this ultra quiet dehumidifier may help a bit, or if you doing it analog, the familiar Unibond absorbers can help you out.

The bedrooms are made of 100% polyester but without coating, this keeps them breathable to minimize condensation.

There aren’t any of the inner tension bands that you can find on a Vango or a Lichfield for example, but the corner stakes are made of aluminimum to ensure that the tent stays on the ground in heavy winds. I am not aware of any official wind testing, but users reportedly survived winds up to 45 mph inside the Berghaus Air 6 XL (but bear in mind there are plenty of factors that affect the stability of a tent in high winds.)

In case of a leak or rip, there’s a defect kit inside the large carrybag.

Verdict, Pros & Cons

The Berghaus Air 6XL is a very-very good tent, great value for money IF you bear in mind that it is an older model, and you won’t find some of the features that other, newer tents have nowadays. This is however reflected in the price, as the Berghaus Air 6 XL is cheaper than most of its rivals, and oftentimes bigger & better at the same time.

The Berghaus Air 6 XL’s forte are the size of the bedrooms, the size of the living room and the 2 side doors.

If you’d prefer a bigger porch, or something that’s a bit lighter you need to look elsewhere.

Alternatives

There are plenty other 6-person air tents that you could consider, however, very few of them can beat the Berghaus AIr 6XL for that price.

One, quite recent, example could be the Lichfield Eagle Air 6, which is basically a Vango with a different logo, and it’s much cheaper. The bedrooms are smaller, but the porch is considerably bigger than the Berghaus Air 6XL’s.

Or, you could have a look at the Outdoor Revolution Cruiz 6.0TXL. It has 3 bedrooms (although they are not very large), and an enormous living space that’s more than 10 sqm including the porch.

There are some features that are not so great, compared to other 6-person air tents, but it’s still great value for money.

If you need a different layout – 3+3 for example, then the Outwell tents may be very interesting for you. There are a few 7 person air tents in their range, which means that you can sleep 6 inside and there is still plenty of space for storage.

Prime examples are the Ridgewood and the Greenburgh 7A inflatable tents, which share a 3+3+1 layout.

Another example could be the Quechua Air Seconds 6.3, that has a strange 2+2(+2) layout that I didn’t particularly like, but it could work for some people.

If I had to recommend an alternative to the Berghaus Air 6XL, one that has great living space, decent size bedrooms and good specs on the fabrics used, I’d recommend the Kampa Croyde 6 Air Tent (2019 model) or the very similar Kampa Dometic Croyde 6 (2020 model).

Where to buy the Berghaus Air 6XL?

You can find the Berghaus Air 6XL in stock at plenty of retailers. They all sell it at the same price, currently for £799.

Blacks or Millets or Ultimate Outdoors – they are historically the go-to places for Berghaus tents

GoOutdoors – since last year, GoOutdoors stock Berghaus tents too

Ebay – same price as everywhere else plus some second-hand deals, and you can collect Nectar points that worth a few £££s. Blacks / Millets / GoOutdoors all have eBay outlets. I would not expect any massive pricedrops this time of the year (beginning of the season when I am writing this post), but later in the year there might be a few bargains on eBay.

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