The Crua Quad tent is a large, high-end canvas tent that covers all the bases.
I was ranting and raving about just how good the Quad’s smaller sibling is in my Crua Tri review, offering exceptional comfort, build quality, and features. So, how does the Crua Quad compare? Is it still worth the price? Should you pick the Quad over the Tri?
Find out in my Crua Quad tent review!
Our Verdict on the Crua Quad
In my review of the Crua Tri, I boldly stated “The Crua Tri might just be the best tent I’ve ever used.” I was very impressed by the sheer quality of the materials and the thought put into the various features dotted around the tent. I often felt forced to pick between cool features OR canvas, but the Tri offered it all.
The Crua Quad continues this impressive trend and wins our Best Buy award.
The first difference between the Quad and the Tri is that the Quad is MUCH bigger. The tent features a sleeping space area, a lounging area, and a porch. If people were happy to sleep outside the insulated inner tent, the Crua Quad could easily be described as an eight person tent instead.
The Quad has all the same excellent characteristics that the try had. It has excellent build quality, durable materials, great waterproofing, and loads of comfort-friendly features. It also comes with a large awning on the front, like the Tri.
If you like camping or glamping, and you plan on staying in one place, I highly recommend the Crua Quad. Its primary drawback is that it’s very heavy and there are two bags that you’ll need to wheel to your camping spot, so do bear in mind that it is not the sort of tent you will want to have to carry far.
My ratings:
- Comfort: 10/10
- Weather performance: 8/10
- Durability: 10/10
- Ease of setup: 3/10
Who is the Crua Quad tent for?
✅ Glampers
✅ Campers
✅ All weather camping
✅ Campsite camping
✅ Well-behaved festivals
❌ Backpackers
❌ Wild camping requiring much walking
❌ Budget camping
Our glamping tent review criteria
[10/10] Comfort
The first thing to note about the Crua Quad is that this is a very comfortable tent. The inside of the tent is hugely spacious. Crua lists this as a four-person tent, but when you’re inside, it feels much more like an 8 person tent. You can see Fraser in the picture below standing inside the Quad before we’ve set up the inner tent.
The tent itself comes with three areas. At the back, you have the inner tent, the insulated blackout area for sleeping and feels super soft to the touch. I love that the inner tent comes with an adjustable room divider, meaning you can turn it into two bedrooms when you want a bit of privacy.
In front of this is a living space that could have camping tables, chairs, and plenty of space for equipment. This is ideal for when it starts raining, and you just want to sit inside with a good book or play some board games with the family. There are windows on both sides of the sitting room, and these can be covered or uncovered as you wish to control how much light comes into the tent.
Then, at the front of the tent, you have a vestibule area, which is good for sitting in or keeping your muddy boots. Because the door can be converted into a large awning, the vestibule area also gives you a great semi-sheltered area for hanging out during the day. It would also make a good space for a dog to sleep.
A unique feature of Crua tents is their inner tent design. The inner tent is made of a highly insulated material that feels like a sleeping bag. This has a number of benefits.
Firstly, it’s very soft and padded, making the sleeping area feel much more comfortable.
Secondly, it’s a blackout material that stops the sun from coming in and lets you sleep in for longer. The blackout material is actually so effective that Fraser and I had to take our photo during the day with the windows open so we had any chance of showing how it worked.
Thirdly, it slightly insulates from the sound outside. Now, don’t expect this to stop all sound coming in, but do expect a somewhat quieter sleep.
The tent is covered in various storage pockets, which are great for keeping books, sunglasses, flashlights, and any other nicknacks you want to avoid accidentally stepping on. The one drawback is that you will need to have the inner tent set up to use these storage pockets.
There is also an access port to bring electrical cables through to power any electronics, fans, or otherwise. This can be zipped shut when you’re not using it.
Last but not least, the two doors to the sitting room and bedrooms include mesh, which helps keep any insects out.
[8/10] Weather performance
The Crua Quad has been designed to work in all weather. This means rain, wind, hot weather, and cold weather.
The tent material is made of laminated polycotton fabric and has an excellent waterproof rating. If this isn’t enough, the tent also comes with a rain fly that can be set up over it to add an extra layer of waterproofing. I’m confident in saying that most of the time you won’t need this rainfly but it is a nice added touch. The seams have also been well sealed and the floor of the tent is nice and thick. The Crua Quad tent is a strong performer in the rain.
Tents of this size can often have worrying performance in the wind. But Crua has designed an aerodynamic shape, and the doors can easily be zipped up to make a more robust shelter from strong winds. There are plenty of guylines, and the structure of the tent feels strong.
Another common complaint with very waterproof tents is that they often have condensation issues. This is because very waterproof materials can make some tents less breathable. This is clearly an issue that Crua has tried to address. The Quad is covered in ventilation ports that can be propped open and should help avoid any of that raining inside the tent feeling.
The quad is well set up for cold weather. The inner tent is highly insulated with an r-value of 9. Yes, this means winter camping is on the cards. The tent itself is rated as four season.
The reflective rainfly also adds an extra feature in different temperatures. Put the reflective side facing the tent to help to keep warmth in when it’s cold. Put the reflective side facing outwards, and it will help to keep the sun’s rays out during hot weather.
There is a large awning at the front of the tent, which is great for hiding out when it gets too sunny during the day. My one complaint, however, is that this awning could be more stable when it gets a little breezy. Now, obviously, I have to be realistic here but I do think Crua could work out a more stable system.
[10/10] Durability
The Crua quad tent is clearly made of premium materials and has been designed in Ireland. Everything feels extremely high quality to the touch. The tent itself is canvas with an extra waterproof coating. The tent poles are made of high-end aluminum, apart from the fiberglass poles for the awning.
It comes with a set of decent-quality aluminum stakes. However, bear in mind that these stakes are pretty sharp. You’ll definitely want to use a mallet or rock to stake the tent down, or you risk getting cut.
It’s tough to find any fault in what is a very well-made tent. But I’ve tried my best, and I did find some loose threads in a few areas. It would be good if Crua could remove these because they could potentially snag in zips and lead to problems.
[3/10] Ease of setup
Large tents are rarely easy to set up, and this is especially true of canvas tents. The Crua Quad is a heavy canvas tent. It has loads of fabric and a fair few tent poles, too. Unsurprisingly, the Crua Quad scores low on ease of setup.
Make no mistake that this tent definitely requires two people for setup. It took us about 25 minutes to set up the Crua Quad for the first time.
Set up begins by laying the main tent out flat and inserting the tent poles through the sleeves. Thankfully Crua has color-coded their tent poles, which does make this a little simpler than it would have been otherwise.
You then need to align the tent poles with the metal hooks which tension the pole. This was a challenging task and required a lot of strength to get these poles into place. We had to use so much force that we were actually worried about damaging a pole.
Once your tent poles are in place, you can walk the tent back into position and start staking it out with the provided aluminum stakes.
I did like the small pockets that the guy lines came in, which lets you tidy the guylines away so your tent isn’t a tangled mess when you take it out of the bag. It’s small touches like this, which Crua is very good at including.
The provided stakes are good quality and are not just the standard cheap steel stakes that bend easily under pressure. Although I would highly recommend bringing something to stake them down with, like a mallet or a hammer. The top of the stake is quite sharp, and you can easily cut yourself if you use your hands. Fraser needed to do a little wound care after trying to force a stake in with his bare hands.
There’s one key difference between the Crua Quad and other canvas tents. The Quad is in fact two tents. Yes, that means you have to set up the main tent and then you also have to spend time clipping the insulated inner tent into place.
This is a trade-off in terms of the benefits and drawbacks. I would be tempted to sometimes leave the inner tent at home for short trips in the summer.
Overall, setup does take a while and it takes a decent amount of effort. This is a canvas tent, so Crua can’t do much to shorten the setup time. Still, I would recommend using this tent only if you plan on camping somewhere for at least a couple of days.
One change I would make to the Quad is to find a way require less strength to get poles into position. I suspect that some campers without much upper body strength might struggle.
What else should you know?
Portability
The Crua Quad is a campsite or glamping only tent. I haven’t, therefore, included portability in the ratings above. But you should know that this tent is heavy and difficult to carry.
I certainly wouldn’t want to have to carry it far. Thankfully Crua has included wheels on the bottom of both bags – yes, this tent is so large that you need two bags.
So I would recommend using this tent in campsites particularly when you can park close take the bags out of the car and set up the tent nearby.
Warranty
Crua offers a full two year warranty against defects for their tents. Crua has a good reputation and is rated 4.6 out of 5 on Trustpilot, so they are likely to try and do right by you.
Value for money
The discounted purchase price of the Crua Quad tent at launch in February 2024 was $1799 USD, with an expected retail price of $2499 USD.
While I know that many people equate value with ‘cheap’, I see value as measure of a product’s worth. In that respect, this tent offers great value. The build quality is excellent, and the materials are all top notch.
If you are considering this tent, you probably want a tent that will last for a decade or more, and I believe that this tent will serve you well for years to come if you take care of it.
Price comparison
| Retailer | Price |
| CRUA Outdoors | Check price here |
How would I use this tent?
I would personally choose to leave the inner tent at home during the summer just so there is less to carry. You don’t particularly need the insulation at that time of year, although you may wish to bring the inner tent with you if you highly value the black out feature.
Review updates
- 15 February 2024: Review published.
Final thoughts on the CRUA Quad Tent
Overall I thought the Crua Quad is an excellent tent. If you’re a seasoned camper and looking for something on the premier end that balances the benefits of canvas tents with all the extra features that Crua has packed in, I would highly recommend this tent.
Just be aware that this tent is not for everyone. If you like to be mobile or you’re on a budget you might want to look elsewhere.