What Size Hunting Pack Do You Need?

Short answer, before the detail: most hunters need 30 to 45 liters. A whitetail sit from a truck needs 20 to 30, a long day in the mountains 35 to 50, an overnight or a camp 65 and up, and carrying an animal out is a frame question rather than a capacity question. If you buy one pack, buy around 40 liters.

The reason this question is worth a page is that liters are the one specification in the category that means something, and they are the one almost nobody shops on. Packs get bought on pockets, patterns and brand, and the hunter finds out about capacity on the first hunt — either by not being able to fit a jacket in, or by carrying eighty liters of air up a hill.

And that second failure is the common one. Too big is worse than slightly too small, for a reason that is not obvious: a pack expands to fill itself. Give a hunter more room and they carry more, and every ounce of it comes up the hill with them. A pack that forces a decision about what matters is doing useful work.

One honest note on those ranges: they are conventional practice rather than measured findings, and they are offered as guidance. Every manufacturer's liter figure is measured slightly differently, and two 40-liter packs can swallow noticeably different amounts of gear depending on how much of the volume is in pockets you cannot stuff.

Torso length, not shirt size. A pack carries properly when the hip belt sits on the hip bones and the shoulder straps wrap without gapping, and that is a function of torso length. Any pack worth buying adjusts; a pack that does not adjust is a pack that fits one person by accident.

A hip belt that actually transfers load. The belt is what moves weight off the shoulders and onto the legs. A thin webbing strap is not a hip belt, whatever the listing calls it.

Compression straps. The feature that lets one pack work at two sizes. Cinched down, a 40-liter pack carries a half load without it sloshing around; without compression, a part-full pack swings on every sidehill.

Quiet fabric, and no rattling. Nylon that crackles against brush costs opportunities. So do a dozen loose buckles.

Access that suits the hunt. A top-loader is simple and strong. A panel-loading zip gets you to the thing at the bottom without unpacking in the dark, which matters more on a day hunt than it sounds.

Water, and where it goes. A bladder sleeve or bottle pockets you can reach without taking the pack off. A hunter who has to stop and unpack to drink stops drinking.

Three packs that sit at three of the four sizes above, with prices pulled live from Amazon.

We do not run a test lab. Every liter figure above is the manufacturer's own published capacity, cited below, and the capacity-by-trip ranges are conventional practice offered as guidance rather than measured findings. Nothing here carries a rating, a score or an award from us. Our method is on the how we choose page, and prices are pulled live from Amazon and stamped with the date they were captured.

Best hunting backpacks ranks the field, how to choose a hunting backpack covers fit and suspension once you have the size, and what to pack in a hunting backpack covers what goes in it. If the hunter is heading to elk country, best hunting backpack for elk hunting is the one page here where the frame matters more than the liters.