No matter what season it is in your current camping location, you need to ensure that you have an efficient source of heat.
A small camping wood stove is ideal as it can be used to heat up your tent when the weather takes a bit of a turn or – more importantly – to cook some food during your holiday, and it’s convenient to use.
What’s the best small camping wood stove? You don’t want to have to lug a camping stove around with you, so portability is key, and some stoves can even be folded up or taken apart for greater convenience.
The best small camping wood stove on the market is the stainless steel backpacking stove by Ohuhu and I love it because of how versatile and practical it is. Read on to discover 5 best small camping wood stoves: camping made comfortable.
Quick Overview
- Ohuhu Stainless Steel Backpacking Stove: Best Mini Wood Stove For Camping, Winner
- TOMSHOO Camping Stove: Best Mini Wood Stove For Camping, Runner Up
- REDCAMP Wood Burning Camp Stove : Best Small Foldable Camping Wood Stove
- Lixada Camping Stove: Alternative
- Camp Chef Alpine Heavy Duty Cylinder Stove: Small Tent Camping Wood Stove
Best Mini Wood Stove For Camping, Winner: Ohuhu Stainless Steel Backpacking Stove
Tech specs
- Size: 5.3 x 5.3 x 5.3 inches (13.4 x 13.4 x 13.4 cm)
- Weight: 0.8 pounds (362 g)
- Portability: Yes -collapsible
- Assembly: 8 inches (20cm) in height
Benefits
- This backpacking stove is your must-have stove for camping. It’s made out of stainless steel and has three-arm base support so that you can cook in a variety of conditions and rest it on any terrain without worrying about it not being up to the task at hand. It won’t wobble or make you worry that it’ll tip over.
- You don’t have to worry about carrying alcohol or fuel to make use of this camping stove. You can use natural fuel in the form of pinecones, wood, leaves, and twigs. I love that this camping stove burns brightly and for a long time – just make sure you have a pile of sticks or other material at hand so you can keep the fire going.
- This stove isn’t just lightweight, but also very compact and collapsible, making it easy to carry and transport. It comes with a mesh carry bag included for even greater convenience.
- However, it doesn’t burn too hot on the bottom that it burns the grass underneath it or is too hot to handle. It maintains a cool bottom so you can pick it up if you need to move it around while cooking, which makes it very versatile, practical, and safe.
Drawbacks
- When the pot is burning and you want to refill it with twigs or leaves, you’ll have to completely remove it off the fire to be able to add more fuel. A small opening or hatch would have been useful here.
Extra Features
- When you’re in the great outdoors, you never know if you’ll be able to find dry twigs and leaves, especially if you’re surprised with rainy conditions. But that doesn’t mean you can’t use this camping stove – as an alternative to using natural materials to light it, you can use solidified alcohol tablets.
Buying Advice
This best camping wood stove is the easiest to carry. You can carry it around with you everywhere, whether in its carry bag or your backpack, and you’ll love being able to have a heat source wherever you go.
It’s been designed with eco-friendliness in mind as it offers fuel versatility without damage to the ground where you’re camping in the form of burned grass from hot pots. It’s a must-have in everyone’s camping backpack, whether you’re a seasoned camper or a complete beginner.
- Stable even in windy conditions
- Lightweight and easy assembling
- No fuel canisters or alcohol needed
Best Mini Wood Stove For Camping, Runner Up: TOMSHOO Camping Stove
Tech specs
- Size: 5.55 x 5.51 x 3.35 inches (13 x 13 x 8.5 cm)
- Weight: 1.19 pounds (539 g)
- Portability: Collapsible
- Assembly: 6.9 inches (17 cm) (height)
Benefits
- This camping stove is constructed out of stainless steel but it also has a windproof serrated cross stand that not only provides you with a strong and stable cooking platform but it enhances the stove’s contact with heat. This means it burns more effectively.
- Linked to the above, it’s got a double wall on the interior that heats up cold air as it enters the chamber. This makes the most of its burning efficiency.
- This camping stove collapses into a compact, portable size – just 5.4 inches by 2.8 inches (13.7 x 7 cm), so you can easily pack it in your backpack. It also comes with a mesh carrying sack so you can carry it around when you’re not using your backpack. This is ideal if you want to take it with you when hiking.
Drawbacks
- It’s extremely tiny: this camping stove is about the size of a medium-sized hand! While that definitely works to make it portable and easy to pack in your bag, it does reduce the type of food you can make on it. If you’re hoping to cook more food on a camping wood stove, then you’ll want to choose the next product on our list.
Extra Features
- This camping stove comes with an alcohol tray (you can use it with natural items or solid alcohol fuel), a BBQ grill net, and the mesh sack. I love the BBQ grill net because it means you can enjoy lots of tasty food wherever you are.
Buying Advice
- Sturdy & Stable construction
- Foldable & Lightweight
- Efficient burning, less smoke
If you’re looking for a quick and easy way to cook while being outdoors, especially if you’re hiking or backpacking, this is the most practical solution. The addition of the BBQ grill net is a nice touch to make the stove even more useful.
Best Small Foldable Camping Wood Stove: REDCAMP Wood Burning Camp Stove
Tech specs
- Size: 11.3 x 8.62 x 2.32 inches (28 x 21 x 5 cm)
- Weight: 5.5 pounds (2,494 g)
- Portability: Foldable
- Assembly: 8.3 x 5.9 x 5.5 inches (21 x 14 x 13 cm) (unfolded size)
Benefits
- This is the best portable camping wood stove because you can easily fold it up. It’s folded size is 10.6 x 7.8 x 1.5 inches ( 26 x 19 x 3.81 cm), and it only weighs 5.5 pounds, so it’s the easiest way to carry a camping stove without a hassle.
- This camping wood stove is made out of durable stainless steel but it offers greater durability and stability by offering an upgraded grid-backing plate that connects to the stove and doesn’t come off easily.
- You want a camping stove that’s versatile enough to allow you to cook with a variety of fuels so you don’t feel stuck without heat. You can use various fuels, such as leaves or charcoal.
Drawbacks
- It comes covered in thin blue plastic that has to be removed before use, but it can be time-consuming to remove it, especially when you’re outdoors without many tools at your disposal.
- It doesn’t have a folding lid – this would have been a design enhancement to help the stove maintain more heat.
Extra Features
- This camping stove makes your life easier because it has an ash pan that slides in from the side, similar to how a toaster will collect crumbs on a tray underneath it, and it’s therefore really easy to clean.
Buying Advice
This foldable and portable camping stove got nice extra features to make using it and cleaning it a breeze, such as the ash pan, but what I like about it the best is that it’s very versatile when it comes to the fuels you can use with it. This means you can use it anywhere, even when wet conditions have made using natural material impossible.
- Crafted with high quality stainless steel
- Carry bag included
- Guaranteed money back
Alternative: Lixada Camping Stove
Tech specs
- Size: 3.66 x 2.98 x 0.71 inches ( 9 x 7.5 x 1.8 cm)
- Weight: 1.19 pounds (539 g)
- Portability: Yes
- Assembly: Can be taken apart
Benefits
- This is the ultimate mini camping stove because it can be disassembled into seven pieces that you can store in your bag. Perfect for taking with you to wherever you want to go! It also comes with its own storage bag to make it even easier to transport.
- It’s really easy to put this stove back together – it should take you half a minute or less! This means you’ll save time when you want to start cooking, like when you’re hungry after a long day of hiking.
- It’s large enough so that you can cook food in a small-to-medium pot, which is more than enough for enabling you to cook a variety of foods without taking up too much space.
Drawbacks
- While the camping stove might be easy to assemble, this isn’t necessarily the case for everyone so instructions would have been nice if they’d been included.
- It’s a good idea to wear gloves when assembling or disassembling the stove as people who’ve purchased it have reported that it’s really easy to cut your hands on its steel pieces.
Extra Features
- One of the worst things to have to deal with when cooking during camping is the smoke that’s produced by camping stoves. But this one prevents a lot of smoke, thanks to its vent holes that are located near the top of the burn chamber. This works by letting preheated oxygen in to fuel the flame so that the fire can be hotter and produce less smoke.
Buying Advice
This portable wood stove for camping is a uniquely designed stove that you’ll like carrying with you when you’re headed into the great outdoors.
Whether you want to quickly heat some food or make some from scratch, it’ll help to keep you feeling satisfied. It won’t burn your pocket, providing an easy and beginner-friendly solution for hot food on the go.
- High quality stainless steel
- Lightweight and easy collapsible
- Storage bag included
Small Tent Camping Wood Stove: Camp Chef Alpine Heavy Duty Cylinder Stove
Tech specs
- Size: 24 x 20 x 22.5 inches (60 x 50 x 55 cm)
- Weight: 74 Pounds (33,500 g)
- Portability: No
- Assembly: N/A
Benefits
- This small camping wood burning stove has been designed with a flat top surface, which results in a convenient area on which you can cook your food. As a nice extra feature, its flat top is welded on, so it won’t tip over when you’re trying to use it.
- It comes with adjustable legs. This means that you can ensure you have a stable cooking platform even when you’re standing on uneven ground.
- When you purchase this stove, you also get extra items to make using the stove much easier straight out of the box: a spark arrestor, accessory shelves, a damper, an internal log grate, and a five-piece nesting pipe. These all conveniently fit inside the stove, along with its removable legs so you don’t have to worry about losing any of them when you carry the stove around.
- This camping wood stove has a fire grate located in the bottom to protect its base from overheating.
Drawbacks
- This camping stove isn’t that easy to carry around because it weighs 74 pounds, so it might not be the best choice for you if you’re looking for a compact and portable stove.
- This camping wood stove isn’t sealed well, which makes it difficult to regulate and maintain its temperature. This also makes the stove burn through wood very quickly.
Extra Features
- I love that this camping stove comes with a shelf or drying rack. This can be used for a variety of purposes, such as storing items, drying your clothes, or drying your dishes. As you know, you always need extra storage space and places to put things when you’re camping so this is extremely handy.
Buying Advice
This gas-powered camping stove might not be that easy to lug around, but it’s got tons of features that make camping much more convenient, such as its drying rack that can be used in a variety of ways depending on what you need. This camping wood stove is an investment, especially if you’re a regular camper and outdoorsy person.
- Made of steel
- Adjustable legs
- Chimney pipe with 5'' diameter
Small Camping Wood Stove FAQ
What is the smallest wood burning stove available?
Generally, you’ll find that the smallest wood stove for camping that’s available on the market has a heat output of 4kW as this is where stove manufacturers will start their stove ranges.
While you might encounter companies that offer 3.8kW or around that amount, these tend to be categorized within the 4kW range.
When we talk about small burning stoves, we also mean how small in size they are because having a compact, portable camping stove is ideal. On our list of reviews, the smallest camping wood stove is the Ohuhu stainless steel backpacking stove.
It only weighs 0.8 pounds so it’s easy to carry around and transport without a hassle, which is perfect for when you want to be able to heat your food and get some warmth on the go.
How do you keep a small wood stove burning all night?
To keep a small wood stove burning all through the night, you need to keep coals near the air inlet in the front of the stove and try to keep the coals as close to the door as possible in a rectangular shape that takes up about half of the stove’s space.
To keep a small wood stove burning all through the night, you need to keep coals near the air inlet in the front of the stove and try to keep the coals as close to the door as possible in a rectangular shape that takes up about half of the stove’s space.
Once that is done, add more kindling to the stove if the fire’s been burning for a while as this will help to reignite it. Be smart about the type of wood you use – oak, pine, and hickory all burn slowly and so are more conducive to keeping a fire going overnight.
Put the largest piece of wood at the back of the stove so that it will burn last. Place smaller pieces of wood around the large log, with some covering it, to insulate the heat. After adding a new load, you should open the stove’s air vents for about 20 minutes so that oxygen can help to fuel the fire.
When the outer pieces of wood have a layer of charcoal on them, this is a sign you should close the air inlet slowly and finally leave it slightly open. Avoid completely closing it as you don’t want the fire to go out!
Can you put a wood stove in a tent?
Known as hot tenting, keeping a wood stove in your tent is something you can do and it will keep your tent warm while giving you cooking options. However, you need to take some important precautions.
- Always have a fire extinguisher handy!
- Place a flame-retardant mat around the stove in case any hot embers make their way to the ground.
- Make sure the tent has enough ventilation. This should take the form of having the door open when the stove’s hot. The toxins from the burning stove will be released by the stove itself so you want to ensure that the tent isn’t airtight. And, you want to ensure that the stovepipe is leaving the tent away from the prevailing wind so that the smoke can’t blow down back into the tent.
- Don’t leave the wood stove burning all night in your tent. It’s just not safe to do so in such a small space and while you’re not awake to attend to it. Save it for when you’re pulling an all-nighter.
What happens if the wood stove gets too hot?
It’s important to regulate the temperature of the stove because a wood stove that gets too hot for long periods of time can be dangerous to the stove itself. The heat can damage some of its components.
Generally, wood stoves have a temperature of between 110 and 250 degrees Fahrenheit. But, by controlling the airflow, you can regulate how much air gets into the stove and therefore choose how quickly or slowly you want the wood to burn.
Can you use charcoal or coal in a wood burning camping stove?
It’s always best to check the specific camping wood stove instructions and user manual to be sure of what fuel you can use with it. Generally speaking, you can use charcoal but it’s good to remember that burning wood gives food more flavor.
As for coal, it does tend to last longer than charcoal but it releases lots of gas when heated. A good way to ensure it burns clean is to start with wood and then slowly add coal to the fire until the stove is full.
Conclusion
Having a camping wood stove is essential, whether you’re camping during the hotter or colder months.
Purchase the TOMSHOO camping stove if you want a quick and compact cooking platform that enables you to enjoy warm meals on the go, like when you’re backpacking through a forest, but opt for the Ohuhu stainless steel backpacking stove if you like to go on camping trips regularly.
It’s the better all-round choice for the serious camper because of its fuel versatility and extra features, like how it only weighs 0.8 pounds and how it can be handled safely while hot.
In this buying guide, we’ve also featured three other camping wood stove alternatives, so you’re sure to find the best way to stay warm and prevent hunger attacks.
