Save Your Time by Buying a Go Bag

If you are reading this, chances are you decided to buy a go bag instead of making one. If so, no problem! This guide will help you buy a go bag that will be good for you and your family.

It has never been more important to buy a go bag (also known as a bug out bag). There is increased awareness to the fact that we live in unexpected times where natural and man-made disasters are on the rise. Despite our best efforts to create a better future by getting involved in things like climate change initiatives or other awareness groups, we still need to be prepared.

Have you purchased or put together a go bag yet? If you haven’t, now is a great time to do so.

Pre-made go bags have never been more readily available and affordable. Merchants such as Amazon and Walmart have a wide selection of these bags already put together with all of the contents needed in the event of an emergency.

In this guide, we will cover the basics needed to buy the right go bag. With a few tips, you will be better equipped to start your search.

Ok, let’s get started. Please note that this guide does contain affiliate links to products we stand behind and researched. You are under no obligation to buy any of our recommendations. However, if you do, we may earn a commission that will help keep this free website running.

Go Bag Essentials

Items in your go bag can categorized in the following categories:

1. Food and Water: A 3 day (72 hour) supply of food and water
2. Shelter: This includes blankets, tents, bivy sacks, and/or ponchos
3. First Aid: A first aid kit with bandages, wraps, and ointment for emergency situations
4. Communication: A radio equipped with NOAA communications and powered by solar, batteries, or hand crank.
5. Survival Tools & Accessories: These include knife, flashlight, mask, rope, and tape
6. Essential Documents: Most pre-made go bags don’t have waterproof folders or flash drives. It is great idea to purchase separately.
7. Bag: Make sure that your go bag has space for other items as needed.
8. Other Useful Items: This includes list of emergency contacts, maps, credit cards, cash, paper and pens.

There are other items that might not be listed above or might not appear in the go bag you choose. We do recommend browsing the building a go bag guide for extra items such as the water purification straw.

Recommending Go Bags

In recommending go bags, we decided to break them into categories. For each of these categories, we will explain the category and have one or two bags to choose from. The categories are:

• One to Two Person Go Bags
• Family of Four
• Premium

In addition to the bags we recommend, we will also give you some additional items to consider purchasing to make the bag more complete.

One to Two Person Go Bags

For this category, we wanted to find go bags that were adequate for one to two people. There are one-person go bags on the market, but there are several reasons that you look for bags at least two people:

• One-person go bags tend to be missing a lot of necessary items. This would mean that you will have to purchase additional items.
• Two-person go bags have enough items that, if needed, you can help others.
• Many times, the cost between both options is pretty low. So opt for more bang for your buck.

As part of our research, we looked for bags that had food, water, shelter, and first aid as the baseline. From there, we compared bags that offered a good mixture of features such as survival tools and communication. We found that there were many options on the market.

Here are our favorite options:

Family of Four Go Bags

While it might be easier to some to just buy two of the bags above for a family of four, the vast majority would probably want to buy one all-inclusive go bag for the family. If so, you are in the right section.

Following the guidelines of how much food and water per person per day was crucial in deciding which bags to recommend. Additionally, we want to make sure these bags had extra room for other necessary items. Being lightweight is important since added more items tend to increase the bulkiness and weight. We also wanted these bags to be easier to carry.

One item of note is that in our research we saw containers that were advertised as emergency kits. These kits would work if loading into a car or for sheltering in place. However, we wanted to focus on bags that you can carry and potentially run with in the event an emergency.

Here are our family of four go bag recommendations:

Premium Go Bags

So what makes a go bag premium? In our case, it is not the brand or the name recognition. But rather, it is everything that is offered in the go bag.

For this section, we disregarded price and went for the one with the most options and in most cases supported more than a family of four. These all still have the essentials. They just go beyond.

Here are some of the recommended premium go bags:

How We Selected Our Go Bags

When making our selections, we first wanted to make sure they had all of the recommended items on the list. Additionally, it was important that the bags contain space for additional items such as important documents. Considering that many people are packing for couples or families, we looked at options that were suited for them as well. We also checked reviews and our personal experiences with these products. It is with that in mind that we made these recommendations.

Buy a Go Bag

It is our hope that this guide proved helpful and, at the very least, moved you to think why it is important to buy a go bag. With the uncertainties of life, having a little piece of mind goes a long way.

This website contains resources to help you make an informed decision when it comes to emergency preparedness. We refresh our content regularly to make sure we keep our readers prepared.