Hammock Camping: A Practical Setup Guide for Beginners

01Is a Hammock Right for Your Trip

A hammock solves one specific problem: ground that is rocky, root-covered, sloping or wet. It swaps the search for a flat pitch for a search for two sound anchors at the right spacing. In dense forest that is a good trade, and almost everywhere else it isn't.

Look honestly at where you camp. If your trips are mostly treed campgrounds and forested backcountry, a hammock will work most nights. If they include open shoreline, ground above the treeline, prairie sites or serviced campgrounds planted with young trees, you'll be carrying a shelter you can't pitch.

The other differences are about weather and cold. A tent has rain and wind protection built into the fly, while a hammock needs overhead cover that you buy and carry separately. A tent sits on ground that draws heat away, which an insulated pad solves, while a hammock keeps you off the ground but leaves air moving on every side. Many people end up owning both and choosing by destination rather than preference. If most of your trips point the other way, our range of ground tents and shelters is the better starting point.

02Read the Packing List

Most first-time buyers find this out on the trip instead of before it. Two hammocks at the same price can arrive in very different boxes, and the title rarely says which is which. One may include everything you need to hang it. Another may be the fabric body alone. The three hammocks in the ARWE range show the difference.

If a listing doesn't confirm suspension, budget for it as a separate purchase and treat it as essential. Wide polyester webbing is what you want, because it spreads the load across the bark instead of biting into it. Cord tied straight around a trunk is no substitute, and in many protected areas it isn't permitted.

Insect protection works the same way. Sleeping suspended leaves your face and the whole underside exposed, and in blackfly and mosquito season that is the difference between a night out and an ordeal. If the hammock comes with an integrated net you don't need a separate bug shelter. If it doesn't, plan for one.

03Getting the Hang Right

Comfort in a hammock is geometry, not padding. Four figures serve as the usual starting point, and moving toward them fixes most complaints about back pain and shoulder squeeze. Aim for them. You don't need to measure every pitch to the millimetre.

• Strap angle: about 30 degrees from horizontal. Pulled tighter, the sides close in on your shoulders and the load on the straps and anchors rises steeply.
• Lowest point: about 45 cm above the ground with you in it. Higher makes entry awkward and a fall worse. Lower and you touch down once your weight settles.
• Anchor spacing: roughly 3.5 to 4.5 m for most camping hammocks. Closer forces the straps very low, and further forces them high and steepens the angle.
• How you lie: roughly 10 to 15 degrees off the centreline. Lying straight down the middle folds your back and pinches your calves.

The instinct almost everyone has is to pull the hammock tight so it looks flat. It's the wrong one. A deeper sag lets you lie diagonally, and lying diagonally is what makes the surface feel flat under your back. Hang loose, then lie across.

You don't need a tape measure. Set both straps at roughly head height on trees about four paces apart, clip in, and sit down slowly in the centre. If your weight brings the seat to about knee height, the hang is close enough. Adjust one strap at a time and recheck instead of changing both at once.

04Staying Warm From Underneath

A sleeping bag works because its insulation traps still air in a lofted layer. Lie on it and your weight crushes that layer flat, so the insulation beneath you stops doing anything. In a tent this barely registers, because an insulated pad sits between you and the ground and takes over. In a hammock the same compression happens, but the air below moves freely on every side and carries heat away.

That's why people report being cold in a hammock at temperatures they sleep through comfortably in a tent. It isn't a flaw in the hammock. It's the absence of anything under the compressed layer.

The purpose-built fix is an underquilt, which hangs outside the hammock so nothing compresses it. The simpler and cheaper one, and where most people start, is an insulated sleeping pad inside the hammock underneath you, because closed cells and trapped air resist compression instead of relying on loft. For a first setup, pick a pad wide enough for the hammock. ARWE's inflatable camping sleeping pad (190 × 70 cm, integrated foot pump) is wide enough for the job, but its listing gives no R-value, so treat it as a mild-weather option and read our sleeping pad R-value guide before you rely on it in the cold. Get the pad into position before you climb in. Pads slide around inside a hammock, and one that has migrated to a side is worse than none, because you end up lying half on it.

As nights get colder, what's under you matters more than the rating on your sleeping bag. The same principle governs sleeping on the ground, and our guide on how to stay warm while camping works through it for tent sleepers. If you can only upgrade one thing before the season turns, upgrade what's beneath you.

05Weather, Trees and the Rules

Most camping hammock listings publish no water-resistance or UV rating at all, and the gap should be read literally. The fabric body is a suspended surface, not a weatherproof shell. Rain protection comes from a tarp pitched above it, and that tarp is a separate item on almost every hammock purchase, whatever the photography suggests.

Pitch the tarp before the hammock whenever the forecast is uncertain, so the hammock never gets wet during setup. Run a ridgeline above the hammock and angle the sides down far enough to cover both ends, because rain rarely falls straight down for long. The tarp also blocks wind, which matters more in a hammock than a tent since nothing surrounds you. A few habits are worth getting right the first time: look up before committing to a spot and reject any dead branch overhead, sit slowly and let your full weight settle before you lie down, clear rocks and stumps from the side you get in and out on, and pack the hammock away dry. Hang it once in a garden or park in daylight before the trip. Ten minutes with the straps turns a frustrating arrival into a five-minute setup.

Two questions decide whether you can hang where you want: can the trees take it, and does the site allow it. Narrow cord concentrates the load into a thin band of bark. The U.S. National Park Service sets out the mechanism in its guidance on hammocks, rope swings and tree damage: rope cuts into bark, opens the tree to bacteria, insects and fungi, and can interrupt the flow of nutrients, while the combined load can bend trunks and bring down limbs. Wide webbing spreads the same force so the bark stays intact. Choose healthy, mature trunks, and never hang from a dead or leaning tree.

There is no single national rule for hammocks in Canada, which is why you'll find confident but conflicting answers online. Parks Canada's national visitor guidelines set the frame, not the detail: camping is permitted in designated campgrounds only, the permit holder is responsible for the site, and collecting or damaging plants and other natural objects is prohibited. Individual parks, provincial systems and private campgrounds add their own conditions, and some limit how many sleeping structures one site may hold.

06Frequently Asked Questions