Hilleberg Akto Review: The Best Solo Tent

Hilleberg, a small, unassuming Swedish company, has been quietly churning out some of the sturdiest, toughest, most wind- and weather- resistant, best-made backcountry shelters you can buy for decades. The Akto was first released in 1995 and has seen only one design change in all those years. This is why Hilleberg has something of a cult following. Hilleberg tents are also very expensive, which has always left me wondering, “Are they worth it?”

To find out, I had Hilleberg send me its iconic four-season, one-person, hoop-style tent—the Akto. With a retail price of $740 (though you can find it for less on sale), it’s not cheap, but after using it for nearly two weeks this fall and into winter, I think it’s absolutely worth the money. The Akto is the best tent I’ve ever used by a very wide margin. It’s not perfect, but it’s the best solo tent you can buy, and I’m pretty sure it’s the only thing made of nylon that might have a shot at making our Buy It For Life guide.

Think Different

The Akto was a groundbreaking tent when it arrived on the scene in 1995. (For reference, the name means “alone” in the language of the Sami, the indigenous people of northern Scandinavia.) Back then, almost no one was making four-season one-person tents, no one was using silicone nylon—now the standard fabric for lightweight tents—and no one was making hoop tents. Fast-forward to today, and while a significant portion of the outdoor industry now makes such things (e.g., Tarptent’s Scarpa 1), the Akto remains more or less the same tent. When something works, don’t mess with it. (Although technically, Hilleberg did add the little vent hood over the fly door at some point, and I’m glad they did. It might be my favorite feature.)

Enough history, let’s get into the tent. Unless you’ve been using cottage industry ultralight tents, it’s probably very different than most backpacking tents you’ve used.

There are two things that set Hilleberg’s Akto apart. The first is the hoop-style design. The other thing that makes this tent different is the fabric, which is tougher and lighter (albeit maybe not ultralight) than most other tents I’ve tested. More on that below.

The Akto is not freestanding. The design consists of a single curved pole in the middle of the tent, like the hoop of a covered wagon. The ends are then staked out from that curved center pole, with two stakes at each end. There are some advantages to a freestanding design, like being able to easily move the tent after it’s set up. But after spending time with the Akto and other non-freestanding designs, I have found that I’m fine with the trade-offs. Skipping the freestanding design gives you a lighter tent, with a great low-end wind profile, while remaining plenty strong enough should the wind shift in the night. It’s also easier to pitch.

To pitch the Akto, you thread the single pole through the rainfly sleeve (which is continuous and heavily reinforced). There’s no fitting on the other end; it just dead-ends into a sleeve, so you don’t need to walk around the tent to the other side when pitching. Then you stake out the ends to pull the tent taut. Technically you can stake it out with only four stakes, skipping the stakes that keep the bottom of the tent in place. I don’t recommend this, but I did do it one night when the ground was frozen solid and my only pitching option was to guy out to various trees and roots.

For additional strength, and to take full advantage of the Akto’s four-season design, there are two guy lines at each end of the tent with some very easy-to-use, locking tensioners for tightening up the fabric. Two more guy lines come off the middle of the tent, which you can stake out in windy conditions. Hilleberg’s stakes are decent too. Unlike many tents I’ve tested, I didn’t immediately reach for my MSR Groundhog stakes.

The Akto is a typical double-walled tent, meaning inner tent, then a rainfly on top. Pitching it is a little different—you start with the rainfly. Actually, there are two ways to pitch it, either all at once, with the inner tent attached to the rainfly, or, if it’s raining, you can pitch just the fly, climb under that and pitch the inner tent so it stays dry.

I never pitched the Akto in the rain (it was a dry autumn where I live), but I did test the process without rain and found that, while it’s a bit cramped to get under the fly and clip in the inner tent, it’s easy to do, and the inner tent should stay dry in the process.

Once the tent is up, you have a very low profile, minimal shelter with a generous vestibule. The Akto has a peak height of 36 inches. I am 5’11”, and sitting on a Nemo Tensor Trail air mattress (about 3 inches thick), I am just able to sit up in the Akto without pressing my head into the roof. I had just enough room to sit comfortably, write in my journal, and pack up for the day’s hike without feeling cramped. Honestly though, I don’t tend to sit around in my tent much. If you do, definitely check whether you can sit up in the Akto or not.

The floor plan is a slightly five-sided rectangle, with a little bit of extra space in the middle giving you a place to stash a water bottle or the like. Lengthwise, I had plenty of room, and neither my pillow nor the foot of my sleeping bag touched the tent walls. I also tend to put my empty pack inside my tent, which fit as well (the Hyperlight Southwest 40 in this case).

I really like the 8.6-square foot vestibule area. It’s plenty large enough to stash my pack, wet boots, and other gear, while still having enough room to cook when I needed to. At the top of the vestibule area, there’s a flap of fabric with a stiff but bendable wire in it that you can shape as needed. It serves as both a rain cover to keep errant drips from getting in the door when the tent is open, and as a vent cover if you zip down from the top to ventilate the tent on warmer nights.

Hilleberg calls the Akto a four-season tent, to which I would add, it’s four-season by the standards of a Swedish company. The Akto would do fine at the North Pole, Mount Everest, or, as I tested it, on the shores of Lake Superior in the dead of winter. I bring this up because there is also the Hilleberg Enan, which is a three-season clone of the Atko that might be a better choice for those not dealing with extreme cold climates. I should also qualify that the Akto is capable of handling weather extremes, but it is a single-pole tent. Pitching it on an exposed slope in 60-mph winds is not going to go well, although I did subject it to 40-mph winds one night and it came through unscathed, with no bent poles or other damage. It also isn’t the best shape for shedding snow.

Part of what makes the Akto four-season is that the outer tent walls (the rainfly) extend all way to the ground. This keeps out wind, rain, snow, and, well, the world generally. It also makes the vestibule area considerably warmer than the outside air in most cases, giving you some extra living space. The top half of the inner tent door has mesh, and there are mesh panels to vent the Akto at the front and rear, but these can all be closed up with fabric if needed.

While all that nylon keeps the weather at bay, it can also contribute to the one thing some users complain about with the Akto—condensation.

On average, you exhale around 130 grams of water vapor per night. This is what you sometimes see on the walls of your tent in the morning. Because of how well sealed a four-season tent is, especially one as robust as the Akto, some of that moisture can remain in the tent with you. You can minimize condensation by camping under trees, away from water, and by venting your tent properly. But if you’re camping on a barren lake shore and it’s –10 F out? You can throw all those recommendations out the window. You’re going to have to deal with condensation.

All that said, I spent several nights in exactly this less-than-ideal scenario and had only a tiny bit of condensation directly above my head inside the tent. There was a fair bit on the inside of the rainfly, but that’s not a big deal. That’s not to say that Akto would be my top pick for say, the Florida Trail in June, but I do think condensation worries with this tent are overblown. Any four-season tent is going to have more condensation than a three-season tent.

I should note that I did not open either of the foot vents that night because it was too cold, though I did open the rainfly vent slightly, which I consider the Akto’s most genius feature, as it lets warm, humid air escape without letting the elements in. (We’ve been happy to see similar features in Sea to Summit tents and some other brands.) This vent is also handy should you need to cook in the vestibule. I try to avoid cooking near my tent, since nothing draws nylon-chewing rodents quite like some delicious curry spilled in the doorway of your tent, but if you have to, the vent helps.

Another possible way to mitigate condensation is to use a ground cloth. While Hilleberg did not send one for me to test, were I to buy this tent (and I most likely will), I would pick up the fitted ground cloth. At 9 ounces, the Hilleberg ground sheet might be too much for those looking to go ultralight, but I like that it can be left in place and pitched with the tent all at once, which is easier to deal with than a piece of Tyvek or the like.

Buy It for Life

Life is long (hopefully), so I’ll be a tad conservative and say the Akto will likely last a very long time. The internet is filled with Hilleberg tent owners who’ve had their tents for 15, 20, even 25 years, and they’re still going strong. Naturally you have to take care of it, but properly cleaned and cared for, these tents last.

Part of what makes the Akto so durable is the Kerlon 1200 fabric, which is Hilleberg’s name for the 30D-tenacity ripstop nylon that makes up the outer tent (the rainfly portion). It’s silicone-coated on both sides, with a total of 3 layers of waterproofing, and it’s also treated for UV resistance. The inner tent is lighter and more breathable, made of 30D ripstop nylon with a SWR coating. The floor is the heaviest floor I’ve ever seen in a tent. The pole is a 9-mm DAC Featherlite NSL, which is pretty standard for a strong, light tent. In the end, you get a strong tent that’s going to stand up to life on the trail.

Hilleberg tents are also made in Europe (your tent comes with the name tag of the person who made it), which allows for a level of quality control you aren’t getting from cheaper, made-in-China tents. Throw in a lifetime warranty against defects in material and craftsmanship, along with a repair program should anything happen, and you have a tent that’s going to last the 20-plus years many users attest to.

The main complaint most people have about Hilleberg tents is the price. They are not cheap, but given the track record, and my experience with the Akto, I think it’s completely worth the investment. The Akto is the best tent I’ve ever used. It pitches fast, it’s bomb-proof, it’s roomy, it’s relatively light, and by all accounts it lasts forever.

Now there are some conditions where the Akto might not be the best tent for the job. Tropical settings come to mind, but then again, there is a mesh inner tent ($270) available that would extend the livability of the Akto to warm, humid climates as well.

The only other tent I’d consider for solo trips is the Hilleberg Enan, which is the Akto revamped for three-season use. The Enan’s outer fabric is lighter, and it lacks the overhanging fabric at either end of the tent. There’s also only one guy line, but otherwise the dimension and shape are very close to the Akto. For most of my use cases, this is probably a better choice, but personally—I don’t know what it is—the Akto has some difficult-to-define quality that just makes me want to use it. In the end, that’s the whole point of any kind of gear—to get out there and use it.