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MSR Needle Stake Review

MSR Needle Stake Review

MSR Needle Stakes are lightweight aluminum tent stakes with square-shaped shafts, a wedge tip, and a hook at the top. Weighing 8 grams each and 6 and 3/8″ long, they’re ideal for staking out tents and tarps that use cords as guy-lines. You can also use them to stake out webbing, of course, but there’s nothing better for staking out a cord. The square stake shafts hold best in packed earth or mineral soil but won’t break if you hit a rock when you pound them in. They’re not good for use in sand or snow, which requires a wider stake or deadman for more purchase.

MSR Needle Tent Stakes

Lightweight
Durable
Secure
Easy to Extract

Ultralight Hooked Tent Stakes

MSR Needle Stakes are ideal for staking out tents and camping shelters that have cord or webbing-based guylines. They grip well and are ultralight, making them ideal for backpacking or hammock camping.

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I’ve been using these Needle Stakes since 2016. For a while, they were hard to come by and you could only get them if you bought an MSR tent, which is where I got my first set. But they’re more widely available again and are usually sold in packages of 4 or 6 stakes. I never use the tent stakes that come with the tents I buy or manufacturers send me to review because they deform to easily, they’re too heavy, or the heads have sharp edges that tear my hands when I try to pull them out of the ground.

The red color of the MSR Needles stakes makes them hard to loose.
The red color of the MSR Needles stakes makes them hard to lose.

I’ve never broken one of these MSR Needle Stakes, although I have bent a few, by stepping on them accidentally. The soil where I backpack is usually soft enough that I can insert them into the ground by hand since the points are thin enough that they slide in with a little pressure. I have hit them with a rock in denser mineral soil, but they’ve stood up to the abuse without any issues.

However, you don’t want to push them (or any other tent stakes) into the ground with your foot. That’s a good way to bend a metal tent stake. If you need extra force, find a flat rock and pound them in at a 45-degree angle instead. To pull them out, simply grab the guy-line and pull it out by the cord. That usually does the trick.

MSR Needle Stakes are great for staking out tents that use cords for guy lines
MSR Needle Stakes are great for staking out tents that use cords for guy lines

I’ve probably used every tent stake you can name at one time or another including MSR’s ground hogs and mini ground hogs, but these MSR Needle stakes have stood the test of time. Most of the ultralight tents and tarps I own use cord for their guy-lines and the hooks built into these stakes are great for anchoring them down.

Disclosure: MSR gave me these stakes long ago when I reviewed one of their tents.

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7 comments

  1. I didn’t know these had become hard to get. I acquired a batch of silver ones a decade ago and have been using them ever since. Love ’em.

    • Impossible for a while. It was really odd. MSR even stopped listing them on their website for many years, even though they still shipped with their tents. Anyway, they’re back again and available.

  2. I’m always concerned with how “sharp” the edge is on the MSR ground hogs at the head where the tent cord is looped around. I feel as though I’m going to shred the cord. Is the needle head a bit easier on the cord with this type of stake?

  3. Thanks for the write up Phil.
    FYI… I’d love to see an article comparing various types of tent stakes, brands, what stakes to use in various conditions, etc..

  4. Sadly these great stakes seem to no longer be available. I can’t understand that, they’re (one of) the best tent stakes around.

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