Partner: kayak gear reviews

Ken's got two more inflatable kayaks to compare: the Intex Explorer vs Sea Eagle 330! Check out this full, in depth post on these bargain kayaks.

Ken Whiting heads out on the water to test and do a Melker Rodloga review. Ken walks you through the kayak and tests it on the water.

Ken Whiting reviews the Decathlon Intiwit X500 inflatable kayak on a trip through the Okefenokee swamp. Check it out!

Jameson Redding walks you through a comparison of two popular NRS inflatable fishing kayaks – the Pike Pro vs Kuda 126.

A good quality inflatable kayak can be an excellent vessel to fish from. Which is exactly what the NRS Pike inflatable fishing kayak is.

If you are a kayaker who is interested in fishing, or an angler who wants to give kayaking a whirl, then investing in a solid fishing kayak will bring a magical synergy between these two pastimes.

When you're getting into kayaking, the sheer number of choices can feel overwhelming. There are sit-on-top and sit-inside boats, hardshells and inflatables, stable slowpokes and tippy speed-demons, and then of course, price comes into play.

Inflatable kayaks have been advancing in both popularity and design, and so a key question keeps coming up: Is it better to go with an inflatable or a classic hardshell?

Lately, I've been giving out some awards to my favorite kayaks of the year. Now it's time to turn our attention to the best...

Award season continues with my picks for the Best-in-Class kayaks of 2022. In order to claim such a crown, these kayaks had to demonstrate...

Today's category is portable kayaks. These are the 5 inflatable kayaks and portable kayaks that not only made a great impression on me, but demonstrated their ability to deliver a quality experience for lots of different paddlers. 

"Gateway" kayaks are a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they can be accessible and affordable boats that get new people excited about paddling. On the other hand, if someone's first foray into the sport ends up being a lousy experience, then this may turn them off for life.

I don’t usually “spoil” my review right out of the gates, but in this case, it just made sense. As you can see from the title, I had a blast testing out the new Jackson Kayak Rockstar V. It’s not everyday I get to play around with a bomber freestyle kayak, so I’m pretty excited to tell you all about it.

Inflatable kayaks are great for portability, but they’re typically not designed to handle a broad range of conditions, or to be used for multi-day trips. Advanced Elements has set out to challenge that paradigm with the AdvancedFrame Expedition Elite.

It’s time for another in-depth, unbiased gear review. For this round I decided to go to my local Walmart and get the cheapest kayak set-up I could find. I ended up walking out of there with a paddle, a life jacket, a pair of booties, and the Decathlon Itiwit inflatable kayak, which is billboarded as a 2-3 person kayak, but I fared just fine on my own.

Portable kayaks have become some of the most sought-after models on the market. These slick, innovative packages are lightweight, easy to store/transport, and generally a breeze to assemble on the shore. The explosion of demand for these kayaks has produced a wide array of options to choose from; some I have raved about in previous reviews, and others don't quite hit the mark when it comes to the most important metric of all: paddling.

In today's breakdown I'm going to be comparing two of the most popular portable (specifically, foldable) kayaks that come in under $1,000. The portable kayak market has transformed enormously over the past decade. It used to be the case that the only two options were cheap inflatables or really expensive skin-on-frame kayaks.

Today I'm going to be telling you all about the latest release from Jackson Kayak - both a detailed run-down of its features, as well as my own assessments from a thorough paddle/pedal test.

Today I'm going to pit 3 of my favorite and, coincidentally, best-selling recreational kayaks on the market in a head to head (to head) comparison. If you've been paying attention to PaddleTV then you might have seen that I gave the Wilderness Systems Pungo and the Sea Eagle Razorlite 393rl Kayak of the Year awards for 2021.

Fishing kayaks have been some of the best-selling models on the market for a number of years now. With that popularity has come significant advancements in the tech/styles, but also the prices. Hardcore anglers might be accustomed to spending 10s of thousands of dollars on motorboats and other gear, so a high-end kayak in the $2,000 to $5,000+ range might not be a big deal.

Welcome my paddling padawans! Today I'm going to be reviewing a high-performance touring kayak, the P&H Sea Kayaks Leo. I'll tell you all about my experiences on the New River in North Carolina, where I took this bad boy down some Class 1 rapids as part of an overnight paddling trip. That's right folks, sea kayaks are meant for a wealth of exciting conditions, which is why I prefer to call them touring kayaks - "sea kayaks" doesn't quite do them justice.

Inflatable kayaks have been booming in popularity lately - and for good reason! They knock down some of the biggest barriers for getting into kayaking. First off, how do you transport a kayak to and from the water? Secondly, where do you store a kayak if you don't have a lot of space? And finally, how does a budget-conscious paddler get into the market? Well, if an entry-level, inflatable kayak can condense into a glorified duffle bag then those issues start to dissolve. That being said, it's important to gauge how such a compact, inflatable kayak actually performs. So I'm going to break down the ins and outs of the Advanced Elements Advanced Frame Kayak and let you know if it's a worthwhile investment. 

Inflatable kayaks have been exploding in popularity because they remove the two biggest barriers for getting into kayaking: transporting your kayak and storing your kayak. However, these perks can sometimes come at the cost of performance. So I put the Advanced Elements AirVolution to the test to figure out if it paddles as well as it packs. 

When most people think about inflatable kayaks, the question of durability comes to mind. Can they handle bouncing into a rock? How about general rough conditions? Many inflatable kayaks are best suited for calm water, but the STAR Raven Pro was specifically designed for river running - everything from fast flowing water to challenging white water conditions.

The Wilderness Systems Pungo has been one of the best selling recreational kayaks for around 25 years. That's an impressive accolade - especially when you consider that it's in the highly-competitive, mid-range kayak market. Wilderness Systems touts the Pungo as being the easiest to paddle and the most efficient kayak in its class, with superior stability and premium comfort. That's a rather bold statement, and one that definitely warrants putting to the test. And so, I took the Pungo 120 to the water to find out why this model is so popular, and to determine whether it deserves to remain one of the best selling kayaks in the world.  

When you’re trying to decide what kayak to buy, your biggest question is whether to get a sit-on-top style, or a sit-inside. The former is typically for someone who is willing to give up some paddling performance for a range of other benefits. The Native Watercraft Falcon 11 is a recreational, sit-on-top kayak that offers an ideal platform for fishing enthusiasts and calm-water paddlers. What it sacrifices in performance (i.e. efficiency), it makes up for in stability.

The sea kayak I’m testing on this paddling adventure is the Boreal Design Baffin P3 touring kayak / sea kayak. After 20-miles of paddling, which took around 5 hours, here’s what I can tell you.

World Champion kayaker, author of 12 books and videos about paddling, and the host of the largest paddlesports YouTube channel, Ken is one of the most accomplished and respected paddlesport professionals in the world.