Coleman Coastline 3 Plus: Reliable Tunnel Tent or Leaky Bargain?
This is the most divided verdict on Shopbam. Four UK campers rate it 5.5 out of 10 and split almost exactly two-and-two — two of them love it, two abandoned it in the night. A detailed gear blog gives it 8.6. The disagreement is not random, and it points at one specific part of the tent.
Where the reviews line up
Three sources, three different kinds of evidence: four owners writing on UKCampsite, a long-form gear review by Mountains For Everybody, and a block of buyer ratings at Military.eu. Unusually, they do not converge — and the shape of the disagreement is the most useful thing on this page.
On the tent's shape and value, everyone agrees. It pitches flysheet-first in about ten minutes by one person, which in British weather is the single most useful thing about it — the inner stays dry while you work. The space is real: 4.2 m² of bedroom plus a 3.8 m² porch, three entrances and good ventilation. Nobody disputes the 3,000 mm flysheet fabric itself.
The split is about water getting in around the door zips and the stitching, not through the fabric. The two one-star reviewers describe rain coming through zip tracks and hot-glue holes, with storm flaps they judged inadequate. The two positive reviewers report the opposite experience, one of them through 60 mph winds and freezing temperatures. Read together, that looks like build-quality variation on a long-running budget SKU rather than a design that always fails — but it is a real risk, and it is why we would not tell you this is a safe buy.
Weight is the other honest limit: around 7 kg. This is a car-camping and touring tent, not something to carry far.
The three reviews this summary is built from
- UKCampsite.co.uk5.5/10 from 4 member reviews, 2013–2017. Polarised — and the most useful source here.
- Mountains For Everybody8.6/10, updated April 2023. The most detailed write-up available, by a named author.
- Military.eu4.6/5 from 7 buyers. A tiny, all-positive sample, used mainly as a spec cross-check.
Specification at a glance
| Spec | Figure | Confidence |
|---|---|---|
| Sleeping capacity | 3 person, one bedroom | Comfortable for two adults plus kit |
| Type | Tunnel, flysheet-first (dry) pitch | Confirmed by Coleman and the gear blog |
| Pitching time | About 10 minutes, one person | Two UKCampsite reviewers agree, including one who disliked the tent |
| Packed weight | 7.0–7.3 kg depending on source | Coleman UK says 7 kg; others say 7.01, 7.2 and 7.3 |
| Packed size | 66 × 18 × 18 cm | Identical across every source |
| Flysheet | Polyester, PU-coated, 3,000 mm hydrostatic head, taped seams | Coleman "WeatherTec" |
| Groundsheet | Welded, fully integrated bathtub PE in the bedroom; removable PE in the living area | A 5,000 mm floor rating appears on one aggregator only |
| Floor area | 4.2 m² bedroom + 3.78 m² porch = 8.0 m² | Consistent |
| Peak height | Around 140 cm — sitting height, not standing | Some listings say 150–155 cm, probably measured outside |
| Doors | 3 external entrances, 1 inner door, large window | One listing says two windows; most say one |
| Blackout bedroom | No | Coleman's own spec table answers "No" — ignore any darkroom claim you see elsewhere |
| Poles | 3 fibreglass, shock-corded, external sleeves with grommets | Colour-coded |
| Typical UK price | Roughly £145–£180; historic RRP £129.99 | Availability is patchy; Coleman UK lists it out of stock |
UKCampsite.co.uk
This is the most useful source on the page precisely because it is the most damning. Two reviewers are enthusiastic: one praises the room, the materials and how quickly one person can get it up; another, scoring 9/10, reports it standing through winds over 60 mph, torrential rain and freezing temperatures, and calls it a cracking tent worth every penny.
The other two are as negative as reviews get. One scored it 1/10 after it "leaked everywhere on the first night", blaming poor stitching, hot-glue holes in the flysheet and material worn through where the guy ropes bear — while still conceding it pitched in about ten minutes. The second, also 1/10, describes rain pouring through the door zip tracks in no more than moderate conditions, judges the storm flaps inadequate and gave up on the tent at 2am. Read across all four, the pattern is specific and worth knowing: nobody complains that the 3,000 mm fabric wetted out. The complaints are about zips, seams and finishing. A positive reviewer independently flags the same area, calling the corner zips awkward and the plastic hooks a weak point. Four reviews is a small sample — treat it as signal, not statistics.
Watch: Coleman Coastline 3 plus tent - family review UK
A UK family reviewing the tent in use — the closest video match to the everyday-usability questions the UKCampsite members are arguing about.
Watch on YouTube ↗Mountains For Everybody
This independent blog treats the Coastline 3 Plus as what it is — a good-value three-season tunnel for touring, not a lightweight backpacking shelter — and it is the only source that explains why the pitching order matters. Because the flysheet goes up first, you can set the tent up in rain without soaking the inner, which on a wet arrival is worth more than any spec on the box.
It rates ventilation highly, and unusually it says why: roof vents in the vestibule plus one at the rear, a breathable inner and a genuine air gap between shell and canopy. On space it gives 4.2 m² of floored inner and 3.8 m² of vestibule with a removable bathtub-style floor, and 140 cm of headroom — sitting height. Construction is listed as fibreglass shock-corded poles with grommets, a 185T polyester fly, polyethylene floors and no-see-um mesh. Its only real criticism is the 7.01 kg weight, which it calls a bit heavy while arguing the weight-to-area ratio is reasonable for the class. Two caveats we would attach: this reads as a specification-led review rather than a field test, and it does not engage at all with the leak complaints raised on UKCampsite.
Watch: Coleman® Coastline 3 Plus - Touring & Weekend Camping Tent
Coleman's own product film. Manufacturer-made, so it is the layout walk-round rather than a verdict — useful for seeing the three entrances and the porch.
Watch on YouTube ↗Military.eu
We would rather have shown you a UK retailer's rating block. We could not: Amazon UK, its reviews page and the usual UK price trackers all refused to load, and several UK comparison sites list the tent with no ratings at all. So this is a continental European retailer, seven customers, all positive, with no review text and no dates. That is the weakest kind of source, and a clean 100% from seven people tells you far less than UKCampsite's divided four.
Its real value is corroboration on the specification, independently of Coleman's own marketing. It confirms the 66 × 18 × 18 cm pack size, the 3,000 mm hydrostatic head, a fibreglass frame with external lashings, a PU-coated polyester fly, a waterproof polyethylene groundsheet, a breathable mesh polyester bedroom, three entrances, UV-guard coating and fire-retardant treatment. It also gives the heaviest weight figure any source quotes, 7.3 kg, which is why the table above shows a range rather than a number.
Watch: The Tent Every UK Moto Camper Needs - Coleman Coastline 3 Plus Review
A UK motorcycle-camping review — the best video for judging pack size and whether one person can handle it alone.
Watch on YouTube ↗Strengths and weak points
What holds up
- Flysheet-first pitching keeps the inner dry when you arrive in rain.
- Eight square metres of floor across bedroom and porch, for two adults in real comfort.
- Three entrances and proper roof vents — ventilation is rated well by every source that mentions it.
- One person can pitch it in about ten minutes, agreed by reviewers who disliked the tent.
- Bathtub-style welded bedroom floor, and a removable porch groundsheet you can lift and clean.
What people complain about
- Water through the door zip tracks and seams — two of four UK reviewers, one severe enough to abandon the tent overnight.
- Reports of poor stitching, hot-glue holes and wear where the guy ropes bear.
- Around 7 kg. Fine in a car, not something to carry any distance.
- 140 cm headroom — no standing up, despite the size of the footprint.
- No blackout bedroom, whatever some listings imply. Early summer mornings will wake you.
- Patchy availability, and prices now above the old RRP.
Who it actually suits
Buy it if you drive to the site, want a genuine living area rather than a sleeping pod, and value being able to pitch alone in the rain without soaking the inner. For two adults touring, or a couple with a child and a lot of kit, the layout is very hard to beat at this money.
Think twice if your camping is mostly wet-weather and you cannot check the tent before a trip. The failure the negative reviewers describe is not gradual — it is a bad night at 2am. If you buy one, pitch it in the garden, run a hose over the door zips and check the seams and the guy-rope points before you rely on it. Anyone carrying their tent, or wanting a dark bedroom for children, should look elsewhere.
What we could not check
- No UK outdoor magazine appears to have tested this tent. We looked specifically for Camping magazine, Practical Caravan, the Camping and Caravanning Club and the mainstream tech titles, and found nothing for this model. Reviews of the Coleman Cobra 3 and Kobuk Valley 3 Plus exist and are different tents.
- Amazon UK's star average and review count could not be read, so no Amazon figure is quoted here.
- Peak height is given as 140 cm by three sources and 150–155 cm by two. That is probably inner versus outer measurement, but we could not confirm it, so the table gives the conservative figure.
- Window count — one source says one large window, another says two. Unresolved.
- Warranty length and guy-line count are not published on any source we could reach.
- Whether the build problems are current. The negative reviews date from 2013–2017 on a long-running SKU. We have no way to tell whether the finishing has changed since, and we are not going to assume either way.
Sources last checked 31 August 2026. Own one? If your experience of the zips and seams differs, tell us — a fourth data point either way would improve this page.