Gear Post 2025

Oops, I was so proud of getting last year’s post out early, and then this year’s is the latest yet. I got a lot of positive feedback on the photos last year and it was difficult for me to schedule a time to get the new ones taken this year. But… it’s here!

If you’re new to my annual gear post, I travel indefinitely (often 30+ days at a time) with a small backpack, and I maintain a list of everything I travel with every year. I’ve been doing it since about 2008, and people on onebag have said that I was the first one to make this format.

A lot of my items are tea related, which is a specific hobby I have. However, almost everything else (maybe not the shoes…) is something I think you’re crazy not to have if you’re a frequent lightweight traveler. Many of these items have been refined and tested for 5-15 years and represent a lot of experience and consideration.

A quick word about how I choose my items. My criteria are generally the best possible item that is as light and compact as possible, with little regard for price. I carry so few things and each one is important enough to me that I find it’s easy to get the value from them. When I look at other peoples’ gear posts, I’m often surprised at how many slots are filled with items that have obvious superior alternatives. If you find one of those in mine, please let me know! Every year or two someone finds something that is a real improvement

I do get affiliate commissions from some of the products here, but it does not affect my recommendations. If you look year over year you’ll see that I often replace commission items with non commission items. Sometimes companies give me things for free, but that also doesn’t affect my evaluation. I think integrity is important and my reputation is far more valuable to me than free products.

Wool and Prince Merino Henley Perfect

This is my third year using the Henley instead of a more traditional button-down. I like both, but the Henley is so soft and comfortable that it makes a big difference when trying to sleep on planes or curl up and read a book. It also has a lot more stretch, so it’s better for active things. It also seems to be totally indestructible. I’ve never replaced it and it looks exactly as it did new.

Buy at Wool and Prince

Wool and Prince V-Neck T-Shirt

New year, back to gray! This might be the longest running item on the gear list, though I’m not sure. Maybe I should start tracking how many years everything makes it and it would be like a competition. As always, I love this shirt but wish it had a pocket for folded up boarding passes.

If you’re new to the gear post, this is probably a good time to say that the only reason I’m able to keep my packing so light is because I wear wool. I routinely wear this shirt 7-14 days in a row without washing it, and it stays fresh. Wool and Prince is my favorite wool company, but there are other good ones out there, too.

This is literally the only shirt I wear all year, even when I’m at home, unless I have to go to a wedding. I generally switch colors every year, which shocks the people in my life because they’re so used to seeing me in one color.

When I became the godfather to my friend Noah‘s daughter, he got a Wool and Prince V-Neck embroidered with “El Padrino” for me.

The v-neck is now less deep than previous years. I wish it was the old depth, but overall it’s about the same.

Buy at Wool and Prince

Wool and Prince Stretch Canvas Pants

These pants made it another year! They look like black jeans, have a really good amount of stretch, and are comfortable and durable… except the pockets!

I got a beta pair with redesigned pockets, and a few months later they started to break too. I’ve been going back and forth with Wool & Prince and they are going to replace the material next year. I have a large phone with much pointier corners than average, and those corners start wearing out the pocket material. That said, Wool & Prince has never had another complaint about them. Do I use pockets wrong?

These are 55% merino wool, which is higher than most wool pant blends. You need some material besides wool to keep it durable, but despite these being a higher amount they have been extremely durable. I’ve put them through their paces, worn them every non-warm day, and they’re in perfect shape.

These pants were gone last year, but apparently they were just out of stock. Phew!

Buy at Wool and Prince

Faherty All Day Shorts 9″ New

A year or two ago a reader (email me for credit if this was you) suggested Faherty shorts, and I was lucky enough to remember the name as I was looking for a new pair. And… WOW are these shorts great!

What makes shorts like these special is that they look good enough to wear every day as shorts, but they dry quickly and have a draw string. The draw string doesn’t serve a huge function if the shorts are the right size, but by tying it together and popping it over the waistband I feel like the shorts look like a bathing suit enough that you don’t look out of place swimming in them. All of the pockets have a mesh portion to drain.

The material is even better than rip curl, they look much less casual, and they seem to dry just as fast (I swam in a cold swimming pool in late November just to give them a full test).

I removed the “perfect” on these because the fabric started pilling after a couple years of moderate use. I still wear them, but it’s annoying that they don’t stay in better shape.

Buy at Faherty

Wool and Prince Boxer Briefs

The Icebreaker merino briefs are finally gone! I decided to try Wool and Prince again last year, and have made the switch back to them. I found that the Icebreaker ones would last a year (~180 wears), but no longer. A year later the Wool and Prince ones retain their stretch better and look brand new.

My one complaint is that the waistband wrinkles/folds over, unlike Icebreaker. Wool & Prince is trying to figure it out and thinks it may be due to laundry habits. I have a brand new pair that I’m being careful with and will figure out what causes the waistband to have issues.

I switched to trunks because every once in a rare while there’s some reason I need to be wearing my underwear in mixed company. This year I found myself jumping into the ocean in Greenland to swim to an iceberg in front of some bewildered cruise passengers.

Buy at Wool and Prince

Montbell Plasma 1000 Jacket (Japanese Version) Perfect

Earlier I said that my t-shirt might be the longest running gear item in the list, but this has been around for longer if you don’t count upgrading from the 800 fill count to 1000 fill count years ago when they started making it.

This is simply the lightest and most compact jacket that will actually keep you warm in any normal situation. Don’t be fooled by all of the marketing hype for synthetic down— they just don’t work as well. Neither does lower fill power down. Having a small jacket is such a key piece of being able to travel with a tiny bag, and this is the only one that I consider to be good enough.

This jacket has lasted for many years now, is nice and warm, and looks decent. If you buy it in Japan it will have pockets, but if you buy it in the US it won’t.

Adam Ruggle let me know that you can order it from the Japanese webshop (linked below) and it’s even cheaper than buying the US one at current rates.

Buy at Montbell or in Japan

Rab Cinder Phantom

I loved the idea of the windbreaker as a shell until I found myself running through a storm in Riga, soaking wet, desperately trying to find a working ATM so that I could get cash to get to the airport.

What I’ve learned about waterproof shells is that the lightest ones are made for bikers. This makes for a slightly shorter cut (in the photo it’s folded over, not super short), but they look normal enough for regular use. After a ridiculous amount of research I ended up on the Rab Cinder Phantom.

This is the second year I’ve had this, and I’m surprised every time it actually keeps me dry. It’s as light as tissue-paper, but has never worn or ripped despite a lot of use.

Don’t be tempted to get pullovers. You can save a tiny bit of weight but they are really annoying and have fewer options for temperature regulation.

Besides keeping you dry, a shell is critical for the coldest weather, as it traps the heat when worn on top of the Mont Bell plasma. Between the two you have a range of warmth ranging from unzipped plasma in the spring and fall to zipped plasma with shell for winter and snow.

The Rab Cinder is 3.5oz, which is a full 25% lighter than the last one, and it is definitely waterproof. The only thing I don’t like about it is the stuff sack is tricky to use and the hood doesn’t follow your head very well when you turn it.

Buy at Rab

FarPointe Alpha Wool Beanie New

I bought this because last year readers tried to convince me that Polartec Alpha is better than down. I did the research and it’s nowhere close, but I thought it might work as a hat. And… we’ll see how long this hat lasts in the gear post.

I keep it in my bag now because it truly weighs almost nothing (21g) and underneath my rain shell hood it provides a reasonable amount of warmth. I’m not convinced that the warmth/weight ratio is actually better than just getting a thin wool hat, but I do find myself putting it on all the time when it’s cold.

Buy at Farpointe

Relwen Flyweight Flex Blazer New

A European airline offered me an upgrade… and then took it away when they saw my t-shirt and shoes. I asked what exactly I needed to wear to get an upgrade, ran back through customs and security, bought the cheapest blazer and shoes that I could find, and then got on the flight.

And then something funny happened. I landed in Chicago and a Nigerian family struck up a conversation with me on the tram. No one ever randomly talks to me. I checked into my hotel and asked if I could borrow a phone charger (mine was broken), and then check-in guy said, “You know what… I trust you. I’ll just give you mine.”

I had a wedding coming up in Japan and I thought, “maybe I’ll buy the lightest blazer in the world”. Sure enough, people do treat me better when I wear the blazer, and it looks good enough that the bride didn’t complain about me officiating in it.

I like that it’s lightweight, looks good rumpled, and if the buttons are all buttoned it looks like a hunting jacket, not a blazer. It’s just bulky enough that I can carry it in my fully-loaded bag, but it makes things pretty cramped. My guess is that it will end up only coming with me when it’s either cold enough that I can just wear it all the time, or when I need to have a blazer.

Buy from Huckberry

Merrel Hydro Moc Next New

These shoes are similar to those I wore in prior years, but they have a real sole made of harder rubber. I tried them on a lark because when the other soles wear out they become very slippery. Unfortunately they’re already discontinued, so I guess other people don’t think they’re as great as I do.

I love these shoes and was tempted to label them as perfect, but I’m not sure that label can be applied to shoes that look like this. Then again… I did wear them to a wedding this year and wasn’t kicked out.

The point of wearing shoes like this is that you don’t need to wear/pack/wash socks, which is a hard requirement for me. Most shoes like this (e.g. Crocs) don’t quite have enough ventilation to never smell bad. These do. Unlike normal shoes, they can also be used as water shoes and they dry quickly and easily.

Buy at Amazon

Roav Eyewear Lennox Sunglasses with Transition Lenses New

These are the smallest folding sunglasses you can get. They look really good, weigh almost nothing, and have survived years of use without issues.

The only thing I don’t like about them is that the nose pads flop around too much.

I’ve always hated the case that these came with, since it seemed too big for the small amount of protection it provided. ROAV also sells a fake leather pouch that looked similar. Ever since I got them I wanted to make a custom pouch.

A couple years ago in Madrid some friends organized a leather making workshop where we all got to make our own projects, so I made this little case.

This year I switched from carrying glasses and sunglasses separately to carrying just one with transition lenses. It’s a compromise, but one I’m happy to make given how infrequently I wear sunglasses. If I was more of a sunglasses guy, I’d probably carry both.

I chose Transitions XTRActive lenses because they will darken even in a car and they seemed to be the darkest. I’d say in reality they’re just barely dark enough to make a difference. As normal glasses they work perfectly, so having sunglasses in a pinch is a bonus.

Buy at ROAV + Lenses at Lensabl

Seiko Astron GPS Watch Perfect New

Wow, the Breitling mechanical watch is gone after eight years of horological dominance! I wrote an entire article about this watch, but here’s the gist of why I switched:

I used to be enamored with traditional watchmaking (and still am, to an extent), but this watch really shattered some illusions. I believe this is the watch great watchmakers would make today, given that back in the 1800s they were using all current technology.

This watch syncs the time every day via GPS so that it’s always correct, can find your timezone and set the time anywhere in the world, remains charged via solar (and can survive two years in the dark), and looks and feels like a normal analog watch. It’s even titanium, so it’s very light.

I’d consider getting the newest model that has a stopwatch now, but I prefer how mine looks and don’t need a stopwatch badly enough to switch.

I linked to Chrono24 below which has ALL GPS Astron watches. My specific one is an SBXC117.

Buy on Chrono24

Minaal Daily Backpack

I’ve been back on the Minaal back for a couple years now, and the pros and cons still remain. The quality is a step better than you can find anywhere else, it’s light, and it looks great and unimposing. On the downside, it has truly terrible organization and despite everyone telling me the same thing and being close friends with the founders, I can’t get them to change it.

Buy at Minaal

Sea to Summit Ultra-sil Packable Daypack New

I had something like this years ago, stopped carrying it, and then went on enough cruises in a row that I really wished I had something I could easily take to the beach or on a hike. The bag is so small and light that it’s really a no-brainer if you ever use it at all. It’s perfect for a towel and for hiding your wallet, or for stuffing jackets into as you hike. Stuffing it back into the sac is very annoying, but given that I use it a dozen times a year or so, I like how compact it is.

Kem Vintage WWII Playing Cards New Perfect

These were made during WWII for US soldiers. You can’t tell very well from the picture, but the cards are tiny, maybe 1/3 the size of normal cards. I used to carry these around everywhere when I was practicing memorization, but then I stopped.

Now my wife, friends, and I are obsessed with this three-player Chinese card game called “fight the landlord”, so we carry these around to play.

Finding these cards is impossible now. I have a couple decks, but only one that has the jokers (necessary for our game). A reader once offered me a few decks he had collected, but I didn’t take him up on it. Huge regret!

Can’t buy anywhere…

Philips One Toothbrush

I like having an electric toothbrush, and this one is good enough. I wish it was more powerful, but this one is a big enough improvement over a non-electric that I’m happy with the compromise. Get the rechargeable one. I got the one that uses batteries but it’s very hard to replace them, so it sort of defeats the purpose.

My toiletry bag is from Swiss Air business class. A pro tip— search ebay for business class amenity kits. A lot of them are stupid, but in general they are the only toiletry bags that are small. I bought five of these on ebay and gave a couple to family members.

Buy at Amazon

Scissors and Nail Clippers Perfect

The nail clippers are my trusty Henckels Ultra-Slim Nail Clippers. This is the same pair I’ve had for six years and they’re still just as sharp and effective as ever.

The scissors are Tweezerman GEAR Scissors. I think that I actually bought some fancier Dovo Solingen ones when I thought I lost these, but to be honest I can’t tell the difference from a practical standpoint, so it’s better to just buy these.

Make sure you get the rounded tips. Most places don’t care, but I went through security three times in Australia recently and they were militant about checking to make sure the tips were rounded.

Keith Titanium Travel Tea Set Perfect

I know the portion of people reading a gear post who actually want tea gear is vanishingly small, but this is maybe my favorite item on the entire list. It’s an absolutely perfect tea set, made of titanium, and the next best alternative is SO much worse that I have a spare set just to make sure I never have to go without. I also bought an extra cup so that I can serve three guests instead of only two.

I modified the set by anodizing the titanium and cutting off the handle of the fairness pitcher. The titanium imparts no flavor and is virtually indestructible. If you love tea and you travel, you should have this.

The cups and gaiwan are double walled so they are never hot to the touch, and the shape and edges are ideal.

Even though I marked it as perfect, I wish there was some way for the interior of the cups and gaiwan to be white to better sea the color of the tea. I think it’s just not possible with titanium, though.

Buy at AliExpress

Kanpai Titanium 350 Thermos and 3D Printed Tea Containers Perfect

This is the lightest double wall water bottle you can get. I love the extra-wide mouth and the no-taper design that makes it easy to clean and to store things inside. It comes with three tops but I just use the hot water one. It’s absolutely perfect for keeping boiled water in. I replaced the noisy rubber seal with an o-ring, and it works perfectly.

As soon as I got my 3D printer I designed and printed a set of stacking tea containers designed to take up about 95% of the interior volume. I can now hold 50% more tea than I could before. They were hard for me to make, especially because they were the first time I tried to make screw threads, which took a lot of trial and error.

The tea containers hold NFC tags and made a script using Tasker so that I can use to electronically label the teas. You can download the files and print your own here.

Buy at Amazon

300W Immersion Water Heater

In case it’s not obvious, I put this in the Kanpai Thermos and use it to boil water. Often I’ll put the top on and wait until I’m in the air before I make my tea. You can also ask for hot water on the airplane, but it’s sometimes not very good because of mineral buildup.

The model with the switch is no longer available, but I might go without it anyway. I once had someone turn on the switch when it wasn’t in water and we almost burnt an airbnb down. Now I unplug it every time anyway.

It’s very important to get a model that can run on 120v or 240v. I suspect that all of them can and that some manufacturers just don’t bother to label it, but I don’t take the risk. In Europe (or on cruises) you can use 240v to boil 4x faster. 300W is a good compromise between size and speed of boiling.

Buy at Amazon

Carbon Fiber Money Clip Perfect

I still have my rather expensive Koolstof carbon fiber money clip, but there are cheaper options on Amazon now that seem to be identical, so I’m linking one of those instead. I can’t imagine why someone would use any wallet other than this. It’s super compact and light, doesn’t set off the metal detector, and is very easy to use. Mine has retained its springiness for over a decade now.

Buy at Amazon

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 NEW

Folding phones are just so good that I feel bad for all non folders out there. You have to get over the “but it’s thicker” factor, and have to fight against the Apple blue-bubble brainwashing, but once you do you’ll never go back.

I thought that I wanted the bigger screen for watching movies on the plane, and while it is noticeably better than a regular phone for that, it’s not the main draw. My favorite thing to use the big screen for is reading (it’s bigger than a Kindle’s screen) and web browsing. I barely prefer a kindle over it, and read way more while traveling now.

I used to hate browsing the web on my phone, but now I do it all the time because the size and shape feels like a normal screen. If I need to copy information from one app to another I just open them side by side and it’s like having two phones.

Everyone predicts that they will hate the crease in the middle of the phone, but you really don’t notice it. The inner display has no notch or even a punch-out (or, *cough*, a dynamic island), but instead has a mini screen that covers the camera when it’s not in use. If you look directly at it you can tell that it’s not like the rest of the screen, but when you’re watching a movie or something you forget it’s there.

When the phone is closed it is narrower than a normal phone but thicker. While I would obviously prefer a thinner phone, it’s a very manageable size and fits easily in tight jean pockets.

I’ve had every Fold from the 3 to the 6, and I tend to upgrade every year because they make it very inexpensive to do so and I’m happy for a brand new screen and battery. That said, there’s not much improvement in the 6 vs the 4, except that it’s a little bit smaller.

I didn’t switch to the Pixel Fold because Samsung DEX is a seriously underrated feature. It’s hard to explain, but it essentially runs a virtual computer and sends it to a screen. It’s not just mirroring your phone— you can use both independently at the same time. I mostly use it to play shows on TVs.

The only reason I didn’t label this as perfect is because I wish it had a 5-10X zoom. It’s close, though.

I use T-Mobile service with the Global Plus add-on, which gives me free LTE/5G everywhere. I happened to add it on during the <7 days where it offered unlimited LTE rather than a 15GB cap. Project Fi can be a bit cheaper, but T-Mobile includes free voice calls to and from every country with Global Plus, and I’ll definitely get a lot of use out of that.

Buy at Amazon

Lenovo X1 Carbon 11th Generation Perfect

The main story here is that the X1 Carbon is a perfect laptop. It has the best keyboard of any compact laptop, has a touchpoint (and a trackpad, but once you adjust to the touchpoint it’s SO much better), and has a great screen and other specs.

The X1 is very high performance, has a trackpoint, an excellent screen, the best keyboard, and plenty of other benefits.

Despite having a bigger screen, the X1 is 15% lighter than a Macbook Air. It can also have twice the RAM and a better OLED screen. I think if more Macbook people saw how good this machine is, they would switch.

The screen I chose was the 2800×1800 OLED that can run at 90hz. I’ve never had a laptop that can run at 90hz before, and it really makes for a buttery-smooth experience. I don’t miss 4k at all.

I run Arch Linux on my machine and all of the hardware works perfectly out of the gate. I stopped getting a laptop with a built in modem because It never worked perfectly with Linux and it’s easy enough to hotspot these days.

The port selection on the computer is perfect (2 USB A, 2 USB C, HDMI).

If I were buying today, I’d certainly buy the newest one (13th generation). It’s the first one in many years that is smaller and lighter (now under 1kg!)

Buy at Lenovo

Mogics Adapter MA1 Perfect

A couple years ago a reader recommended this travel adapter to me and it’s incredible.

It’s just a tiny cylinder that can convert any plug to a US plug. Unlike previous iterations, I don’t think that this could get any smaller.

It is slightly difficult to get. The only reasonable way is to buy a combo pack with a weird travel power strip on Amazon. It’s worth doing just for the adapter.

Buy at Amazon

Anker 30W Charger New

The new charger I got last year was amazing… until it just randomly stopped working. I bought another one, same problem. Then they came out with a newer model, which I assumed must have been to correct this issue… and it broke too.

The problem seems to be that when used on 240v it sometimes just stops working for a while (but then may later start working). I’m not sure if it’s overheating or shoddily made, but I need for my power source to be reliable.

Now I carry around two of these. I find 30w to be plenty for laptop and phone, and the second one just rattles around in the bottom of the backpack in case I lose the main one. I’m generally not big into redundancy, but I had just one too many issues this year.

I ordered a bunch of USB C cables and the best one by far was the Anker Powerline II. The newer III is worse. The II was the least bulky and easiest to coil. I would love recommendations on thin and easy to coil 2M cables. I have bought so many of them and don’t think any are great.

Buy on Amazon

1964 Ears Custom IEMs With AliExpress cable

Last year I tried to switch to something that’s easier for people to buy (Samsung Bud Pros), but these are just so comfortable that I keep going back to them. Because they are custom molded to my ears they don’t push on my ears at all, so I can wear them for a whole flight and barely notice that they’re there.

The audio quality is predictably excellent and better than I really need. The custom fit blocks a lot of noise.

They were originally wired, but you can buy all sorts of replacement cables on AliExpress that convert them to bluetooth. I like this style, which allows me to drape them over my neck so that they hang there when I have them out.

Buy at 64 Audio (Realistically mine are a totally different model that they don’t make anymore, so you may have to do your own research)

Incharge 6 Keychain XL Cable New

For those who aren’t familiar, this can connect any combination of USB A, USB C, micro USB, and lightning (or USB-C to USB-C). I use it for transferring files and for charging my phone while my laptop is plugged in.

I got a bigger one this year because the small one is just annoying enough to use that I find myself avoiding it. The only thing I don’t like is that the microUSB is shared with lightning, and it’s a little bit finicky. It always works in the end, but I’d rather get rid of lightning and just have a normal microusb.

Buy on Amazon

Summary

The only thing I got rid of this year was the Rokid Max. I loved it, but it felt like my vision was getting worse from wearing it. I actually assume this is not true and it’s just that dry air on planes + eye strain + being tired compound to give that effect, but it’s enough that I stopped wearing them.

The point of optimizing gear isn’t to nerd out about all of the items, but to enable me to have a small and light backpack that never gets in the way of doing the important stuff— traveling and having experiences with people who are important to me. It’s never a burden to carry, even if I have to hike up a mountain with it, and I’m prepared for anything.

As always, I’d love to hear if you have any suggestions. One thing that I strongly suspect exists is a good USB C-C cable. My favorite is the Apple 1m cable because it is very thin and easy to coil, but the 2m isn’t as good.

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Keep an eye on my YouTube. I’m in China now, but will try to do a Tea Time with Tynan soon! I can’t believe the last time I did one was a year ago.