Osprey Farpoint 40 Backpack Review - 1 Year Test | Popular Travel Pack | Women’s & Men’s Perspec

Hi, I'm Tom from Pack Hacker and in this video we'll look at the Osprey Farpoint 40, both the large and small versions. Here at Pack Hacker we share our

travel

tips and tricks, share guides, and do

travel

gear

review

s like this one. So if you're new here, consider subscribing. Nathan, our video editor and contributor, and also 'Always a Friday' vlogger, has been traveling with the Osprey Farpoint 40 along with his partner Rebecca for about the last

year

. So we put our heads together and came up with some thoughts about the Osprey Farpoint 40. Let's move on to the

review

.

If you've ever searched the internet for the "best travel

back

pack

" or wandered into your local sporting goods or camping store, chances are you've come across the Osprey Farpoint series before. It is one of the most

popular

bags among travelers due to its availability. The Farpoint now comes in four different sizes: a 40-liter

back

pack

, a 55-liter backpack, a 70-liter backpack, and a massive 80-liter backpack. Now the ones we have been

test

ing are the 40 liter versions. They are the only ones that meet carry-on luggage specifications. And since we here at Pack Hacker want to travel as light as possible, these bags made the most sense.

At five foot four, I chose the ML version or the medium/large version. And Rebecca, who is five foot seven, opted for the SM version or the small/medium version. Now they are both exactly the same bag, but the SM version is a little shorter and has two liters less capacity. And I'll bring Rebecca in a little bit later in the video so she can come and get her opinion on the bag and the little differences between them. Now, after traveling with both packages for over a

year

, we think we know them pretty well. So let's get into it.

The Osprey Farpoint looks like a travel backpack and that's okay because well, that's exactly what it is! It comes in three different colors with the obligatory fancy names: volcanic grey, jasper red and Caribbean blue; That is, gray, red and blue. This package weighs 3.17 pounds or 1.44 kilograms. And in maximum dimensions, this pack is 21 inches long, 14 inches wide, and 9 inches deep. So, the main material of this bag is 210D Nylon Mini Hex Diamond ripstop. And that basically means it's a pretty durable lightweight fabric. The ripstop material on this bag basically means that it is resistant to tears and tears, but that doesn't mean it's impossible.

Now, the ML version of the bag we had performed incredibly well without showing any signs of wear. But the SM version of the bag has some very, very small tears and basically small nicks. We now attribute this to the fact that we searched this bag in the hold of an airplane several times and the way they throw them and they go on belts, etc. While in this one we didn't and that one is done absolutely well. Now, these bags are obviously designed to be carried as carry-on luggage, so I wouldn't worry too much about that. And the good thing is that this ripstop material has basically meant that the small types of nicks in the material have stopped and have not increased in size.

So that's good. Now, this bag doesn't claim to be waterproof, but we found it to be very, very waterproof. That said, though, if you have laptops and notebooks in the front of this thing, you'll still want to bring a rain cover. And what this will do is go all the way around the front of the pack and save it from any potential downpour that it may find itself in. Now we only use this maybe once or twice a year, but it's great to know you have it in your bag if you need it. At first glance, it doesn't look like Osprey Farpoint has a lot of fancy stuff going on, but there's actually some really neat stuff here.

Now, one of our favorite things about this bag is that the back, harness straps, and hip belt all zip together at the back of the bag. So you untangle this thing here, fold it over your back and basically tie it up. And what this does is everything is hidden in the back of the bag and basically nothing comes loose. And this is very useful when, for example, you are at the airport and you get on a plane, or you want to save it. And obviously you can have the straps in the back, but it makes it much easier for them to be tied and hidden.

And we really like this feature. For added security, the zippers on this bag are lockable, which basically means that when you zip them together, they will provide you with a small hole to thread a padlock through. Now, these zippers are not YKK, but we found them to be really durable. As we said before, we have had this bag for over a year. We had the bag super full and we pulled the zippers a lot, and we haven't had any problems with any of them, so all good. To add even more security to this backpack are the compression straps on the front of this thing.

Now, what happens here is that when you tie this on, what it does is basically pulls a little bit of material over the zipper. That means that when this thing is zipped up you can't undo the zipper, which is really cool. And they also help with a little sturdiness when you put something in the front of this bag. We like to put our tripod in the front here and that will go under one of these straps and secure it a little tighter. That said, with the mesh pockets on this thing, when this bag is really full and all the space is compressed inside, there's not too much room here.

It's hard for you to put a hand in. But it works with small bottles, but with anything too big, when this bag is full, you probably won't be able to fit it in. Now, the shoulder straps on this thing are comfortable and just fine. padded and has a hip belt and sternum strap for greater comfort when lifting loads. Now, when the lap belt is not locked, it doesn't flap around too much and the sternum strap doesn't sag either, so anything solid wins in this department. Now, this bag has a top handle and also a side handle.

Now they are very nice and well padded, but they are rarely used. And they also put a shoulder strap on it, which is this thing here. It attaches to these two points here, but if you have this bag, a 40 liter bag with all its weight, you don't want it hanging off your shoulder. But they still gave it to us. We've never used ours, but you can if you want. Now, the main compartment of this thing has a large clamshell design. And what that means is that it opens completely so you have access to everything inside at once.

And Osprey sums this up nicely on his website by saying that it carries like a backpack but packs like a suitcase. Now with this bag, because it has a clamshell design, you don't necessarily need packing cubes, but we still highly recommend them for added organization. Now, in this main compartment you have a large mesh pocket. And while you can't put anything too bulky in there, we found that it works great with our Cocoon Grid-It. And that will just slide in there and you can close the zipper very easily. And also on the inside you have some compression straps, which basically means that when the bag is full you can put them on top of everything and just compress everything down if necessary.

In addition to the main compartment, there is also this front compartment here. Now at first glance it looks quite big. And when it's empty, you can probably think that a lot of things fit in there. But when the main compartment is full and you have everything as tight as possible, what happens is that this front compartment compresses a lot and the same goes for the mesh straps in the front: you can't really fit in that. a lot here. That said, however, the laptop compartment, which fits a 15-inch laptop very easily, is really good. There is a little bit of filling, not an exaggerated amount, but ours has been completely fine.

There's also another mesh pocket here and that's good for, say, tablets or smaller laptops, and we found it good for notepads and scraps of paper too; It's really useful. However, one of the downsides of this backpack is that the laptop compartment is on the front. That is, when there is a laptop here, it is usually quite heavy and sits quite far from your bag when carried on your back. Which means the weight distribution isn't as good as it necessarily should be. There is one last little pocket on this thing and this is this little one on the top front of the bag.

Just a small zipper pocket. You don't fit too much stuff in here, but it's good for quick-grab items like passports, maybe hand sanitizer, pens, and things like that. Great for when you're passing through an airport and just need to throw things away really quickly. That little pocket is very useful. And also one last thing you should know about this backpack is that the straps here, when they're fastened, you don't actually have access to the zippers. I mean, if everything is fixed and you need to get something out of the main compartment, you have to undo these little straps here and then put them inside the bag.

Again, one of the main reasons why this little pocket on the front is really useful. We have been using these 40 liter Osprey backpacks for just over a year. We've had them in the mountains of Nepal, on the beaches of Cambodia, even on the back of a scooter in Myanmar and we've relied on them the entire time. Although we've only had a couple of rips and tears on this pack here, Osprey offers what they call an almighty warranty. Now, it sounds great at first and will cover you for the life of the bag. That being said, it may not last as long as you think.

Now Osprey determined something called a "reasonable shelf life" and with these bags in particular, they say they are used every day, which means the reasonable shelf life may be shorter than you might originally think. Now we're not entirely sure how long they'll spend with these bags, maybe a couple of years, but definitely not a lifetime. Now I'm going to turn to Rebecca, who will give us a quick overview of the two different bags and also her quick overview of everything. Hello! So Nathan had the ML bag and I had the SM. I'm about five foot seven, Nathan is about six foot four and we found the limit to be about five foot eight.

One thing that is very important to note is that although it is called the Farpoint 40, the SM is actually only 38 liters. Now, in comparison, I noticed a really big difference. You wouldn't have thought you would, but at full capacity I found Nathan's bag really too heavy for me and the actual size was also too big for my back. So if you are five foot eight or shorter, I recommend getting size SM. So what I really loved about this bag is that the zippers are fantastic; There were no problems with that. And I love that you also have so many pockets (inside, outside, laptop sleeve).

They were very useful and I also hung my boots on them. I mean, yes, I love this bag so much. Now on to some of the pros of this pack: We found the longevity to be really good, even after a year of pretty intense travel they have held up very well. Although we just had a couple of small tears and nicks on this one, due to the ripstop material they haven't gotten any bigger. The straps, harness, and hip belt on this bag all zip away, which is very convenient and creates a low-profile carry when getting on a plane or storing this bag.

This bag is also very comfortable even at full capacity, which is great because when you travel, this thing will be on your back almost all the time. Now let's move on to some of the cons: When the main compartment is full, when you have everything crammed in there, it limits the space in the front compartment and the front mesh pockets. The laptop compartment is on the front of the bag, which means that when it's on your back it's quite far away from the body, which isn't ideal for weight distribution. And finally, the questionable "reasonable shelf life" guarantee.

We're not entirely sure how long Osprey will cover this bag and it gets a little confusing if something goes wrong. Thanks for checking out our review of the Osprey Farpoint 40. If you're not there already, visit packhacker.com and you can check out the full review we've done in text format. We sometimes add extra details in there, and we will always keep track of everything on the usage timeline as this continues to hold up and we use it longer. Also be sure to check out Nathan and Rebecca in 'Always a Friday'. They are traveling very well in Japan, Malaysia and now they travel a lot in Europe.

So be sure to follow them for some tips and tricks and just general travel guides. Thanks for watching this, see you in the next video. The daze, daze. Hello! I just arrived, hello very British. Longevity...longevity...