How to select the best cooler under $100

If you are looking at purchasing a new cooler for you or a family member check out my cooler buyers guide below.  I explain the differences between different types of coolers and describe what features you will want to look to have on your next cooler.  So then who makes the best cooler under $100? Keep reading!

Capacity

Depending on how much you need a store in your cooler you will want to look at the internal storage space of the cooler.  Most coolers will list how many quarts they would be able to hold at capacity.

Generally, soft shell coolers will not be able to hold as much as hard shell coolers because of their design.  Softshell coolers are typically designed to be in the shape of a bag than a box, though some manufacturers do make soft shell coolers that are designed like more traditional hard shell coolers.

Hardshell coolers, in contrast, will usually have plenty of room in them depending on how large of one you get. If you are planning on taking your cooler on a camping trip or need to be able to store a lot of items within it a hard shell cooler is going to be your better bet.  

Ice Retention

Hardshell coolers are usually better able to retain their ice better than a soft shell cooler as well.  If you want your cooler to be able to retain ice for long periods of time then a hard shell cooler is going to be your better bet.  

This isn’t to say that soft shell coolers are terrible at holding ice, some can hold their ice for a few days, but a higher end hard shell cooler should be able to hold it its ice for 5 days or more.  RTIC says that their hard shell coolers can hold ice up to 10 days.

Hard Shell vs Soft Shell

When looking at coolers there are two main types of coolers hard shell and soft shell coolers.  Hardshell coolers as the name say have a hard exterior shell. Softshell coolers have a soft exterior shell.  

To check out the prices on Amazon of this Coleman Steel-Belted cooler click here.

Portability

If you are planning on taking your cooler around with you on short trips and need your cooler to be more portable than a soft shell cooler would be preferred.  Softshell coolers are nice because you can fit them in a lot of spaces that a hard shell cooler would not fit in such as the back of a golf cart. Softshell coolers typically have less insulation thickness than hard shell coolers as well so will usually fit in smaller spaces.

Weight

Usually, a hard shell cooler will weigh more than a soft shell cooler because of the materials used to make the cooler.  A hard shell cooler is typically made of plastic material or steel. A soft shell cooler is typically made of different types of fabric. A  fabric shell is going to be lighter than a plastic shell so a soft shell cooler is typically lighter than a hard shell cooler.

Security

On some hard shell coolers, they offer a locking mechanism that you can use a padlock on to keep the cooler from being opened.  This could be useful if you want to keep people from being able to get into the cooler or if you want to secure it to make sure it doesn’t open up while you are transporting it.  This also allows the option of securing your cooler to a post or tree to keep people from stealing your cooler when you are not at your campsite.

Storage

Most softshell coolers are going to have storage pockets to store your things in.  This can come in handy if you plan on taking your cooler to the beach or pool and want to be able to have a place to carry your sunscreen, keys, and phone without having to have them on you.  Most hard shell coolers are not going to offer these kinds of storage pockets on them so if that is something you are wanting then a soft shell cooler may be your better option.

Wheels

Softshell coolers are going to be more portable than hard shell coolers unless you have a hard shell cooler with wheels.  If you do have a hard shell cooler with wheels you would want to make sure that where you are going there will not be rough terrain.  Nothing sucks more than having to wheel a cooler over rocks and broken asphalt.

Soft Shell Designs

With hardshell coolers, they are typically going to be designed in a rectangular shape that is designed to hold as many cans or as much food as possible.  With soft-shell coolers, they can come in a few different shapes.

 The most common shape of soft shell coolers is going to be the shoulder bag style.  These can either be carried over your shoulder or by hand and look almost like a laptop bag.  I bought one like this for my stepdad and he really likes it. He said some people have confused it to be a laptop.

The other common style for soft shell coolers is the lunchbox style.  These are designed to be able to hold a small amount of food or drinks and are about the size of your standard lunchbox or a bit bigger.  This style of soft shell cooler is typically designed for 1-2 people for day’s use, they are usually not that big.

If you are interested in buying a soft shell cooler that I would recommend on Amazon you can check out this Pelican softshell cooler.

If you need a bit more storage space and need to be able to transport a heavy load easily the backpack style of soft shell coolers is going to be your best option.  Backpack style coolers look like a typical backpack but are lined with insulating material to make sure that whatever you put in the backpack stays cool. This style would come in hand if you need to carry a lot of heavy things on you for a long distance.  

I’ve had a friend that had one of these and we used it to transport beers from our coolers where we had parked to a concert venue and it worked well. What is nice is that you can carry a heavy amount on your back and it’s not that hard to get around. You could carry the same amount of beer or cans of pop in a hard shell cooler but it would be much harder to get around than a backpack cooler.

In Conclusion

Hopefully, this cooler buying guide was able to give you more to think about when buying your next cooler.  Depending on what your needs for a cooler are there are many different coolers and features to choose from so I’d hope that you learned something by reading this guide.

If you are potentially interested in coolers like Yeti coolers but cheaper click here to check out my other article on that topic.