Wild Country Helm 1 Compact review
The Helm 1 Compact from Terra Nova’s budget brand Wild Country is one of the most popular and beloved tents in the UK wildcamping scene. Espoused by wildcampers, thru-hikers and backpackers of all styles, it’s often touted as the best all-rounder out there, especially when you compare the price and durability against pack size and weight. But does the Helm 1 Compact really live up to the hype?
The Wild Country Helm 1 Compact
Ideal for: Wildcamping, backpacking, festival camping
Not suitable for: Fastpacking, bikepacking
The Wild Country Helm 1 Compact is a one-person dome tent designed to offer comfortable and flexible shelter in all of the varied conditions you might come up against in the UK. Solid in the wind, easy to carry, and roomy enough to offer a comfortable night’s sleep even on the longest winter days, it delivers phenomenal all-round performance for a tent at this price point.
The Good
Easy to pitch
Very roomy
Lightweight and easy to carry
Solid in the wind
Affordable
Comfortable
Small packsize
The Bad
Wild Country Helm 1 Compact review
The Wild Country Helm 1 Compact is a 1-person dome tent designed to offer flexible and reliable shelter from the elements, whatever your adventures in the UK throw at it. Designed and manufactured by the same people that bring you the more premium Terra Nova models, one of the UK’s most renowned and beloved tent brands, Wild Country tents are built to represent ‘the perfect balance between affordability and quality’ — and we’ve been impressed by everything we’ve tested from the brand to date. So, what about the Helm 1 Compact?
Weighing 1.99 kg, the Helm 1 Compact is reasonably lightweight for the shelter and protection it offers. Coming with only two poles, the tent is also remarkably small for the durability and reliability it delivers. This is due to the interesting design choice of having one spinal pole that extends along the length of the tent from front to back, and then one cornered central pole that hoists the tent up across the top of the sleeping compartment. Unlike many dome tents, however, this central pole comes right the way down to the ground on both sides, creating an almost exo-skeleton-like frame around the middle of the tent that adds extra strength and durability in strong winds. Fully exposed from the ceiling downwards, guy lines can be lashed around this pole for added strength, and various lash-out points are designed to keep the Helm 1 glued to the floor.
When bought directly from Terra Nova, the Wild Country Helm 1 Compact will set you back a mere £250. And while that still might be out of many people’s budget, we think this represents excellent value. In fact, due to the bang for your buck the Helm 1 Compact delivers, Trail Magazine awarded the tent both its coveted ‘Best Value’ award in 2022, as well as its ‘Gear of the Year’ award in 2023. And that’s not just down to price. Small, lightweight, roomy and reliable (as well as coming in at an affordable price) it’s long been said that the Helm 1 Compact offers UK wildcampers the best blend of benefits out of all the shelters out there. So what do GBAC members think? Let’s jump in.
Our experience using the Wild Country Helm 1 Compact from Terra Nova
We’ve had a Helm 1 Compact kicking around the GBAC gear room for quite some time now. This means that, by the time of writing, we were able to put it up against a variety of different conditions and test it in multiple parts of the country. And while we wouldn’t go as far to say that this article is a product of long-term use (yet!), we spent dozens of nights in the Helm 1 through the winter of 23/24, camping in it in driving wind and rain in the likes of the Bannau Brycheiniog National Park, the Peak District and the Lakes, testing it on numerous woodland camps across the Chiltern Hills and the Cotswolds, and putting it up against some of the most ferocious winds we experienced all season camped atop of Dartmoot’s ever unpredictable and oft-aggressive Yes Tor. And you know what? Every time — wherever we used it and whatever the weather threw at us — the Helm 1 Compact performed way better than we expected it to. At times, we thought the tent couldn’t possibly stand up to another gust, but the Helm battled on and lived to fight another day. And now, at the time of writing in May 2024, it still looks as good as it did on the day we took it out of the box.
Packability
The first thing we especially appreciate about the Helm 1 Compact is its packability. It’s in the name after all. And while this tent certainly won’t win prizes for having the smallest pack size (tents like the MSR Hubba NX, the Big Agnes Fly Creek UL 1 or the Robens Chaser 1 are substantially smaller), the Helm 1 Compact still packs down to a smaller package than it has any right to be. Packing away into something resembling a shoebox, the tent is easy to chuck into the bottom of smaller rucksacks (It easily fits into a 45-litre pack as part of a 3-season setup) and, if you pack the poles separately, it can be really be squashed down to a size that most of us should be more than capable of carrying — unless you’re a fastpacker or a thru-hiker committed to carrying a 30-litre pack or smaller, of course.
Pitching and packing away
When it comes to pitching the Wild Country Helm 1 Compact, this is another area where the tent stands out. Frankly put, it’s effortless. On still nights when we used the Helm 1 in calm woodlands or areas where we knew there’d be no wind, we only took 4 pegs with us and were able to get a good enough pitch. On nights when we were expecting a bit more pushback, be it from the wind or the rain, we pegged out all of the guy lines and the various lash-out points and still got it up in under 4 minutes.
As the tent comes with the inner already attached, pitching the Helm 1 is merely a matter of establishing structural integrity. This is achieved by two central poles that crisscross over and under one another via two easy-to-use and clearly labelled sleeves at the centre of the tent. The long central pole forms the spine of the tent, creating lift from the foot-end to the head-end of the tent. Then, the middle pole establishes height and strength, coming with two rounded corners that are easy to establish and a cinch to slide into place. What’s more, as this central pole extends all the way to the ground on both sides of the tent (both by the front door and round the back), the tent immediately feels sturdy and reliable, even before you guy out the various corners and lashing points.
Once up, the central pole remains fully exposed, which means you can wrap guy lines around it for extra stability in rough winds. This is something we took to doing when pitching the Helm 1 Compact in hyper-exposed or windy locations — or even when we simply weren’t sure whether or not wind was forecast to roll in overnight.
For one final piece of praise, it’s also worth noting that the inner and the outer come pre-attached straight out of the box. Naturally, in the UK, having a tent where you need to first pitch the mesh inner before draping over the fly (think something like the Big Agnes Fly Creek or the MSR Hubba NX) means that in a rainstorm, the inside of your tent is going to get very wet. That’s why, when we can afford it weight-wise, we always tend to opt for tents where both the inner and the outer can be pitched as one in the UK, which is another reason we love the Wild Country Helm 1 Compact. Whereas most ‘pitch-together’ tents first need to be attached, however, Wild Country take care of this for you in the factory. This means that when you pitch this tent for the very first time, you don’t need to hang the inner in after pitching the outer, as is usually the case with most other brands. Granted, this is a small note, but it’s still something that tangibly improves your experience as a first-time user — and further representation of the thought Wild Country/Terra Nova put into designing this cracking little shelter.
The following morning, packing away the Wild Country Helm 1 Compact is just as easy as putting it up. It’s simply a matter of removing the pegs, pulling out the poles and rolling it up. Thankfully, the bag provided with the tent can be opened super wide before being cinched back down tight, so even if you can’t roll the tent up into a tight little burrito the morning after (because, for instance, it’s raining and you just want to get a move on, or it’s freezing and you’re wearing thick winter gloves), you can still get the tent back in the back and strapped down tight — perfect for popping back into the bottom of your pack.
Wind and rain performance
The Wild Country Helm 1 Compact is an absolute powerhouse in both rain and wind. Seriously, this thing punches way above its weight when it comes to solid all-round performance in varied UK conditions, especially considering its £250 price tag and 1.99 kg pack weight. Now, that’s not to say that you should expect Hilleberg Soulo-like performance for pitching on Helvellyn in a winter storm, nor is it to say that you should use the Helm 1 like you might, for example, the Nortent Gamme 4. But for a 1-person backpacking tent that is easily carried dozens of miles over undulating terrain, there’s nothing better out there for £250 right now, in our opinion.
To guarantee this performance, the flysheet is manufactured out of a rugged 68 D polyester ripstop material which comes with fully taped seams and flawless stitching. And if none of that means anything to you, all you need to understand is that the fly is tough, burly and durable, as well as being very, very waterproof.
Thanks to the unique design of the Helm 1 Compact, the tent is also very capable of fending off huge gusts and sustained wind. When we used this up on Dartmoor’s Yes Tor, we camped in heavy gusts of up to 55 mph, and the tent stood up to these without issue.
Liveablity
For a 1-person tent, the Helm 1 Compact also comes with a remarkable amount of liveable space. The main bedroom compartment is an advertised 220 cm long, and as the flysheet rises rapidly upwards at both the head and the tail-ends, most of the mesh is kept away from your sleep system. That being said, we wouldn’t recommend this tent for people substantially over 6 feet tall as the space inside is limited to a regular-sized bed mat and sleeping bag. Granted, there is still some room to store other bits of kit around you, but as it’s only a narrow space, there isn’t much space to spread out diagonally in the Wild Country Helm 1 Compact.
For extra storage, there is also a porthole to the left-hand side of the sleeping compartment that can be opened from inside the tent. This opens up a space about the same size as the main vestibule outside the front door, in which you can store everything from boots and bags to the various bits and bobs you might want to hand through the night.
Regarding the vestibule, this is a relatively small yet useful space where you can comfortably fit your pack, boots and cooking set up. Additionally, the zip on the door is two-way, meaning you can open it from either the bottom or the top, which allows you to crack open a ventilation port when cooking in bad weather.
Ventilation
The Wild Country Helm 1 Compact comes with two ventilation ports that sit underneath the shoulder joints of the tent. These seem to deliver a good amount of airflow inside the shelter, and at no point did we note that there was a surplus of condensation in the tent in the morning. Naturally, with any tent like this, a certain amount of condensation is to be expected; however, we found that if we opened the door slightly, we could drastically reduce the amount of build-up.
Durability
Both the inner and the flysheet are manufactured from 68 D ripstop polyester, and the poles are 8.5 mm ‘Super Flex’ aluminium. All this is to say that the Helm 1 Compact is reliably durable, with both the poles and the material being remarkably robust, thick and confidence-inducing. And though we’ve only tested this for a matter of months at the time of writing, we’re sure that the average user would get dozens of seasons of use out of this, if not a lifetime’s worth.
Wild Country Helm 1 Compact FAQs
-
The Helm 1 Compact performs excellently in the summer. With a mostly mesh inner, ventilation and temperature regulation are very good, and the solid structure and shape of this tent still deliver excellent protection against strong winds and summer storms. Lightweight and easy to carry, the tent also lends itself well to lightweight adventures when the weight in your pack is at a premium, as well as being small enough to fit in smaller backpacks.
-
The Wild Country Helm 1 Compact performs surprisingly well in UK winter conditions, despite being listed as a 3-season tent. Truthfully, we’ve been comfortable every time we’ve used this in the winter, with the structure, design and strength of the materials able to put up with some serious wind and driving rain. Due to its shape, it’s also able to put up with quite a bit of snow load — or at the least the volumes a tent might have to contend with in the UK, at least. All in, we consider it to be an excellent all-round tent ideal for UK winter conditions, as long as you’re slightly more considerate about where you pitch it in the harshest weather.
-
The Helm 1 Compact performs excellently in the wind. We’ve personally tested this in gusts of up to 60 miles per hour, conditions that the tent more than stood up in. Due to the side poles that extend all the way to the ground, this tent stays strong in heavy wind. That being said, it’s not an expedition tent, however, nor can you double-pole it. Therefore, despite being super solid in the wind, we’d still always recommend that you pitch it sensibly, especially when using it in winter or during a storm.
-
Pitching the Helm 1 Compact is very easy. In the calmest conditions, you only need 4 pegs to get this tent properly set up, though a handful more is needed when setting up in harsher conditions. That being said, even pitching the Helm 1 Compact in the wind is more than doable on your own.
-
Absolutely. Costing £250 when bought directly through Terra Nova, we don’t think there’s a better value dome shelter out there right now at this price point.
Conclusion
Overall, we absolutely love the Wild Country Helm 1 Compact. To us, it represents an amazing compromise between reliability, weight and price, with all three of these things being spot-on in our eyes. In fact, we think Wild Country have created such a phenomenal all-around shelter in the Helm 1 that we wouldn’t change a single thing about it for fear of upsetting that delicate balance. Seriously, what Terra Nova has achieved in creating the Helm 1 Compact is a tent that checks all the boxes for year-round use in the UK, as long as you’re sensible in where you pitch it and how you put it to use. To us, no other tent delivers such value for money right now — at least as it pertains to versatile use in the UK — and we think the Helm 1 Compact is a phenomenal choice for beginner wildcampers, backpackers and thru-hikers alike. And who knows? Being so versatile, it might be the only tent you ever need.
