Quick answer: A wild camp needs the same core kit as any night outdoors, a small low-profile shelter, a three-season sleep system, warm layers, water treatment, food that's easy to manage, a headtorch, and the safety basics, packed into a 35 to 50 litre bag at around 10 to 14kg all-in. What makes it wild camping rather than camping is everything around the kit: knowing where you can legally pitch, arriving late and leaving early, and walking away from a spot that shows no sign you were ever there. This page covers the full list, the law in plain English, and the one simplification that transforms a first wild camp: you don't actually need a stove.

I sell food to people who sleep on hills for a living and for fun, from West Highland Way walkers to expedition teams, and the kit conversations always circle the same discoveries: you need less than you think, the heavy mistakes hide in the food bag and the just-in-case pile, and the first night out is ninety percent nerves about things that turn out to be simple. So this list comes with the nerves addressed.

Where you can actually wild camp in the UK

The honest picture, briefly. In Scotland, you have a legal right to wild camp on most unenclosed land under the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003, provided you follow the Scottish Outdoor Access Code: small numbers, short stays, away from buildings and roads, no fires, no trace. The main exception is parts of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs, where seasonal byelaws mean you need a permit or a campsite between March and September. On Dartmoor, the Supreme Court settled the long legal fight in 2025 and backpack camping is lawful on the commons, following the park's code. Everywhere else in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, wild camping technically needs the landowner's permission; in practice, a discreet, high, single-night camp pitched at dusk and gone by breakfast has a long tolerated tradition in some upland areas, but treat that as custom rather than entitlement, and if you're ever asked to move on, be pleasant and move. The golden rules do most of the legal work for you: pitch late, leave early, stay small and quiet, light nothing, take everything home.

The pack

35 to 50 litres is plenty for one night, noticeably smaller than the 45 to 60 the full multi-day kit list works from, and a smaller bag is its own discipline. Line it with a dry bag or rubble sack; UK rain finds rain covers eventually.

Shelter: small, low, and the colour of the hill

A one-to-two person tent under 2kg in green or earth tones is the standard answer, pitched low-profile out of sight of paths, roads and houses. The romantic answer is a bivvy bag, just you, a waterproof sack and the sky, which is the lightest, stealthiest and most memorable way to do a clear night, with a tarp as the halfway house. First-timers: the tent. You'll sleep, and you'll go again, which is the point.

The sleep system

Same trio as any night out: three-season bag, insulated inflatable mat, and a pillow solved by stuffing your down jacket into a dry bag. UK hill nights get cold in August, and cold sleepers quit wild camping after one trip; if you invest anywhere, invest here. Full detail on choosing the trio sits in the multi-day list.

Clothing

Whatever you walked up in, plus a warm camp layer that goes on the moment you stop, a dry set for sleeping including the sacred dry socks, hat and gloves even in summer, and waterproofs regardless of the forecast. That's the lot. The second outfit stays home.

Water

Camp within reach of running water but pitch well back from it, and treat everything you drink with a filter or tablets however clean the stream looks. Carry a litre up for the evening and refill on the way out; water is the one weight you can largely outsource to the landscape.

The kitchen, and the case for not bringing one

A small gas stove, canister, pot and spork make the classic setup, and a hot evening meal on a hill is genuinely one of life's better dinners. But here's the option nobody offers first-timers: skip the stove entirely. A no-cook camp removes the faff, the washing up, the fire risk in dry spells and the biggest flame-and-light giveaway of a discreet pitch, and it costs you almost nothing: a filled flask from home covers the evening brew, dinner is a cold spread that needs no assembly, and breakfast is eaten while you walk out. It's how a lot of experienced campers do fast overnighters, and it's the single best simplification available for a nervous first camp. Half of our customers' Phoenix Bars get eaten exactly this way, a 557 calorie bar needs no stove, no bowl, no cleanup and no flame, which is dinner insurance and breakfast in one pocket.

Food for one night

One night is gloriously forgiving: dinner, breakfast, and more daytime snacks than seems sensible, because hill appetite is real and an underfed camp is a cold one. Weight barely matters at this duration, so optimise for ease and morale rather than grams, the density arithmetic only starts to bite on multi-day carries. Favour things that survive a rucksack and need nothing done to them, our calorie-dense foods and high calorie snacks guides are full of candidates, and always pack one spare feed beyond the plan, the habit our emergency food guide is built on. The full eating strategy for longer routes lives in the hiking nutrition guide.