UMARDOO Family Beach Tent Canopy Sun Shade Portable 7×7FT, Compact Wind Resistance Beach Sun Shelter Easy Setup with Packable Carry Bag for Outdoor Travel UPF 50+ (Blue)

If you want something light that can create a large tent-like barrier for sun and maybe rain, this can work.It is not simple to set up, especially if you're at the beach, just carried all your stuff, are in the sun already, and the wind is blowing. Be warned...It requires some finagling in a few areas to get it right:- The bags are intended to be filled with sand. Don't expect to do this with your hands, you need a cannonball sized amount of sand for proper weight; I bought a cheap trowel to address this, which worked great.- The tarp ties to the straps tied to the bags. Where are they tied? You get to choose. Do you tie the corner? Do you create a pocket of some sort? What kind of know will work in high winds? I don't know the answers to these questions, but I just tied the corner tightly and didn't have super huge issues.- The poles... need to get shoved in the sand, and pinned into the tarp, and all of them need to be propped up well, in a stable way, at a proper angle, to maintain the shape of the tent.The last part involves a bit of physics: the sand shifts and isn't super stable; the location of the top of the pole in the tent tarp is not straightforward, as you want it to balance the forces from the other 3 (or less...) poles and the associated sandbag weight pulls. When you adjust the poles and the tarps, you end up moving the sand bags, which means you have to move the four poles, the four bags, and the tarp together, successfully, to get it up and stable to begin with. This is very tough to do with 1 person, and challenging with multiple.There was an approach I saw another person on the beach use, which was to use 2 poles and four bags, which creates a saddle-like tent effect. This is a nice alternative, easier to setup because 2 poles requires fewer hands and coordination than 4, and can achieve stability sooner.Also, be aware that some beaches prohibit these. I checked ahead to make sure it was cool bringing it with me, but one beach did not allow any tents.That said, it's super light and much much much easier than bringing one of those rigid structure 10x10 collapsable tents. If you've got tons of space in your car and a lot of people to carry stuff, bring the 10x10. If you are driving a family in a small vehicle on a vacation, or flying, or don't have many strong hands to carry stuff to the beach, this is a viable option, but you definitely need to understand how to set it up for it to be effective.The material doesn't seem super thick, so I question its ability to protect a lot against a super sunny day. I also did not measure UV penetration so I have no idea if it protects against UV much. I'd investigate it myself if I were you and you wanted to verify you're getting UV protection, there are sensors that let you evaluate this if you really care.I am fully confident the UMARDOO brand is simply one of many produced by the same spec from a random factory somewhere. Why are they always in all caps?

This item is nice, but takes up a lot of footprint at the beach for it to work properly. Price could be a little cheaper, for what you get.

Poles are very thin aluminum. They bend very easily

was excited to try this product for a beach trip but it became hard and a disaster when trying to put together since it was very windy that day.good thing was the material was stretchy and was easy to put up once you figure out not to put the pole on each corner but rather more towards the middle. was able to put it into another style the following day and it stayed up as expected.

It was perfect for the first summer we used. Light weight, easy to set up and great protection however this summer we went to the beach and realized that one of the cords that attaches to the sandbag came loose. Still trying to figure out how to fix it. But we did love it the beginning.