Outdoors · Head-to-head
Therm-a-Rest Z Seat vs Big Agnes TwisterCane BioFoam Hiking Seat
Which should you buy? Our verdict on both, pulled from our full The Best Sit Pads: 4 Compared (and One to Skip) comparison.
The Z Seat is thicker and lighter than everything else here and adds a reflective face, which is the most insulation per gram in the group even though Therm-a-Rest never says so. The TwisterCane is the one that tells you what it does, and 1.7 is a real number you can plan around.
Therm-a-Rest Z Seat
Buy itThickest foam and lowest weight in the same product, with a reflective face and no published R-value.
- 0.75 inches of cross-linked closed-cell foam, the thickest here, at 57 grams, the lightest here.
- Reflective aluminised face, which returns radiated heat rather than only resisting conduction.
- Accordion fold rather than a roll, so it packs flat against the back panel of a pack and never re-rolls itself.
- Closed-cell foam cannot absorb water, puncture or go flat, so it has no failure mode at all.
- No R-value published anywhere on the product page, which is the figure the product exists to deliver.
- The product description is a single sentence, so the specification table does all the work.
- Accordion panels trap grit in the folds and the pad gets grubby quickly.
Big Agnes TwisterCane BioFoam Hiking Seat
Buy itThe only sit pad here that publishes an R-value, and it publishes a modest one.
- States an R-Value of 1.7 alongside thickness, length and width, which no other product in this comparison does.
- 59 grams, within two grams of the lightest pad here.
- EVA foam containing more than 60 percent sugarcane biomass, with the carbon story made specific rather than vague.
- Textured on one face and smooth on the other, so it grips a sloped rock instead of sliding off it.
- 0.5 inches thick, the thinnest pad in this comparison, and thickness is most of where insulation comes from.
- An R-value of 1.7 is genuinely low, which is useful to know and not especially reassuring.
- No reflective layer, so it resists conduction without doing anything about radiated heat.
Side by side
| Therm-a-Rest Z Seat | Big Agnes TwisterCane BioFoam Hiking Seat | |
|---|---|---|
| Our verdict | Buy | Buy |
| Best for | Backpacking and cold ground, where grams matter and you want the most foam for the fewest of them. | Anyone who wants to know what they are buying, and is willing to trade a quarter inch of foam for it. |
| Price tier | $ · budget | $ · budget |
The bottom line
Our overall pick is the Therm-a-Rest Z Seat - Thickest foam and lowest weight in the same product, with a reflective face and no published R-value. Choose the Big Agnes TwisterCane BioFoam Hiking Seat instead if anyone who wants to know what they are buying, and is willing to trade a quarter inch of foam for it.
Want the full picture, including the other options we compared and the popular one we'd skip? Read the complete The Best Sit Pads: 4 Compared (and One to Skip).