How much light?

Thanks to increasingly bright and efficient LED bulbs, headtorches are becoming brighter all the time, but for a lot of general use, you don’t need a particuarly bright beam. Petzl’s Tikka 2 puts out around 86 lumens and that’s enough for use around camp and for occasional use for night-time walking.

For seeing further, a brighter LED is a good call, but you’ll almost certainly want the ability to use lower light levels for cooking, reading and so on. Some torches have dimmable main beams, others, like the Black Diamond Revolt above, use additional smaller LEDs – sometimes in different colours – as an alternative light source, which has the advantage of using less power and giving longer burn times.

Power Source – Batteries

The advantage of conventional batteries is that you can replace them easily with spares – make sure the battery box opens easily either rechargeable or one off alkalines. Or in cold weather, opt for high capacity lithium cells for better performance.

You will, however, need a separate battery charger or a deep wallet. An interesting halfway house is the Black Diamond Revolt, which allows you to charge recharegeable AAA cells using USB while still in the torch. Or simply use conventional batteries instead. Genius.

Power Source – USB Rechargeable

Soem torches, like the cracking little Kickstarter-finded Bosavi above and the latest Petzl Nao and Tikka RXP use an internal lithium polymer or lithium ion battery which is chargeable with a USB cable. The plus side is convenience and no need to buy batteries.

The negative side is on multi-day trips when you need to provide an additional charging source, maybe a back-up battery pack or a solar charger.

Remote Battery Boxes

There are two pluses for remote battery compartments like this Silva Runner. The first is that it removes weight from your head, which is ideal for runners and adventure racers in particular. The second is that it allows you to keep the batteries close to you body in an inside pocket in low temperatures.

This helps to keep the battery warm and operating more efficiently. With all batteries, cold slows the chemical reactions inside and reduces output. If you have a choice of batteries for cold conditions, lithium cells work best.

Remote Battery Boxes

There are two pluses for remote battery compartments like this Silva Runner. The first is that it removes weight from your head, which is ideal for runners and adventure racers in particular. The second is that it allows you to keep the batteries close to you body in an inside pocket in low temperatures.

This helps to keep the battery warm and operating more efficiently. With all batteries, cold slows the chemical reactions inside and reduces output. If you have a choice of batteries for cold conditions, lithium cells work best.

Headbands, Helmets And Comfort

Finally, make sure the torch you buy is comfortable. Padding on light units and battery boxes can help here and we like Petzl’s new-look harness above. You want a snug, secure fit that’s not painfully tight. You’re also looking for stability and adjustability.

You should be able to angle the torch slightly downwards to suit and when it’s adjusted, it should stay adjusted, even when you’re running.

A separate battery box may mean more battery power, but also more overall weight, but we’d generally rather have weight split between a battery box and a head unit unless the torch is a lightweight overall.

For running and cold weather use, a remote battery box with an extension cable is a really good call and minimises the weight on your noggin.