Rainleaf Microfiber Towel Review

What’s in the box

A thin, soft microfibre towel of 122 × 61 cm in army green, with green piping around the edges and a hanging loop with a press stud in one corner. It comes in a black zip pouch with a mesh panel to let it breathe and a carry loop on top.

Quick Specs

Size and feel

For a towel that packs this small, the size is the surprise: 122 × 61 cm covers you from shoulders to knees, so it works as a shower towel and a beach towel. The fabric is thin but very soft, almost like suede, and kinder on the skin than some of the rougher microfibre towels we’ve used. The stitching around the edges is tight and even, and after many washes and trips there’s no fraying.

Drying and hanging

Microfibre works best if you pat yourself dry rather than rub, and the Rainleaf soaks up a lot of water that way. What we like most is how fast it dries again. After a morning wash with our camp shower, we wring it out and hang it up, and it’s dry enough to pack away a short time later, without the stale smell of wet cotton. That makes a real difference when you’re moving camp every day.

The hanging loop helps: it closes with a press stud, so you can clip it around a branch, a guy rope or an awning pole without it blowing away.

Packing and sand

Folded into its pouch, the towel takes hardly any room: ours lives in a corner of the drawer in the back of the Prado, and at 255 g with the pouch it’s light enough for a backpack too. The pouch does the job, but it’s thin and doesn’t feel premium. At the beach, sand doesn’t stick in the smooth fabric the way it does in cotton, so a quick shake gets most of it out before it goes back in the pouch.

Rainleaf or a bigger brand?

Rainleaf isn’t a big outdoor brand, but in use the towel holds its own. It’s bigger and cheaper than most branded travel towels; the Sea to Summit Tek Towel feels more like a normal towel but costs more. Our camping towels guide compares all four we’ve tested.

Here’s how the four towels we’ve tested compare (weights on our scale, with the pouch or case where there is one):

	This oneRainleaf Towel	Kathmandu Towel→	Airlite Towel→	Tek Towel→
Size	122 × 61 cm	90 × 40 cm	120 × 60 cm	120 × 60 cm
Feel	Thin, soft	Soft, looped	Very thin	Thick, soft
Comes in	Zip pouch	Zip pouch	Stuff sack	Zip case
Weight	255 g	107 g	67 g	303 g
Price paid	$26	$40	$30	$40
Our score	8.9	9.3	8.6	8.7

Conclusion: Rainleaf Microfiber Towel

The Rainleaf microfibre towel solves a real packing problem: it’s big enough to dry you properly, folds into a small pouch and weighs 255 g. It’s soft, dries fast and hangs up with its press-stud loop. The pouch feels cheap and the thin fabric won’t keep you warm like a thick towel. For $26, it’s a very good full-size towel for camping and travel.