Aer Travel Pack 4 (28L) Review

Nine years ago, Aer crowdfunded the development of the Travel Pack on Kickstarter as the ultimate carry-on backpack. This year, they rolled out the fourth iteration of the Travel Pack in 28L and 35L variations. So how does a backpack that was already the ultimate carry-on improve multiple times? And how ultimate is the Travel Pack 4? In this review, I’ll try to call out the key differences between the Travel Pack 4 and the Travel Pack 3. Some people will like these changes. Some people will hate them. It’s just personal taste.

Disclaimer: Our Travel Pack 4 (28L) was provided to us by Aer. We are hugely grateful for the chance to try it, but we also caveat that we provide our honest opinions in the reviews, both the positives and the negatives.

Overview

• 1680D CORDURA ballistic nylon; also comes in X-Pac and Ultra400X (Challenge Sailcloth) versions
• 3.52 lbs. in weight
• 19.25 x 12.75 x 8 inches (H x W x D); 28 L volume
• Separate laptop compartment (up to 16")
• Dual water bottle pockets
• Internal framesheet for structure

The Travel Pack 4 features three main compartments (a laptop compartment, the main compartment, and an admin compartment) plus four additional external pockets. The main compartment has a clamshell opening that lets you pack very efficiently. For traveling, I can fit a medium-sized packing cube with clothing (13.75 x 9.75 x 3 inches), a Dopp kit, a case for headphones, a book, a case for glasses, and my laptop charger in the main compartment. For the office, I can use it to bring a notebook, headphones, a mouse, a keyboard, laptop charger, glass case, a set of gym clothes and sneakers in the main compartment. Both of these loadouts will mostly fully pack the main compartment, though you can overstuff it if you want. If you’re going on a longer trip (e.g., over a week long), the 28L might be too small, though of course it depends on how much you pack.

Pros

• Very durable construction and materials
• Good balance between large space for packing for travels and organizational pockets
• Large, elastic mesh water bottle pockets can hold a variety of sizes well and still stay out of the way when not in use

Cons

• Admin compartment only has one zipper
• Admin compartment’s opening can feel a little small
• On the heavier side for a backpack of this size

Organization

• Laptop compartment — The compartment has a laptop sleeve and large tablet sleeve. The laptop sleeve fits 16" laptops, is lined with microfleece, is padded, and has a false bottom.
• Main compartment — Plenty of cargo space and easy to pack with the clamshell opening. Also has a stretchy tablet sleeve on the back wall and two zipped pockets on the front wall. The one on top is 6.5 x 10.5 inches (H x W), though the zipper is 1.5 inches down from the top, slight stretchy, and has a small loop for your key leash. The one below is 8 x 10.5 inches (H x W) but is a bit less convenient to use without opening the clamshell all the way. Both pockets use a horizontal zipper. In the Travel Pack 3, instead of the lower pocket, there is a huge flat pocket with a vertical zipper along the side where you can keep your collared shirt nice and flat or your flip flops separate. Some people may miss this pocket. Some people won’t even notice.

• Admin compartment — The admin compartment has a zipped pocket about 6 inches deep, two slightly elasticated pockets (4.5 x 5.5 inches and 4.5 x 3.5 inches), a wide pen sleeve, and a removeable key leash. The entire compartment is about 9 inches deep, which is a significant change from v3, which had two rows of small pockets and was much deeper. This admin compartment only has 1 zipper, which has been a nuisance in my view, albeit a minor one. I also wish the zipped opening went down a little further to give you wider access.
• Front panel pocket — Beneath the admin compartment is an 11 x 11-inch zipped pocket. There aren’t any features in this pocket. Just extra space to keep your snacks.
• Quick access pocket — At the top of the backpack, between the laptop compartment and main compartment is a quick access pocket that is roughly the width of the whole backpack but only 2.75 inches deep. Compared to the v3, the v4’s pocket is not as deep. It also uses a soft elastic fabric instead of microfleece. With the size of smartphones today, I feel like the v4 reduced the size of this pocket a little too much. My S26 still fits no problem, but with a wallet, work badge, and keys, I can see a large phone having trouble fitting or just barely fitting. The nice thing about the reduced size, however, is that it doesn’t get in your way when packing the main compartment.
• Dual water bottle pockets — Deep, elastic mesh-like water bottle pockets on both sides of the backpack. Some people may feel like the elastic is a downgrade from the v3’s single water bottle pocket, which was a zipped pocket that expands when you unzip it to hold a bottle. I definitely prefer the v4’s redesign. It brings the pockets to the bottom of the side panels instead of having it around the middle of the side panel like the v3. The v3 design also required an extra step of unzipping the pocket in order to store your bottle. The v4’s elastic is stretchy enough to fit 1L Nalgene bottles with no trouble, but secure enough for thinner bottles like a medium S’well bottle.

Additional Features

• Smart tracker pocket — Small slot for your AirTag or Smart Tracker located at the top of the main compartment’s upper interior pocket.
• Sternum strap — Fully adjustable and removable sternum strap that is attached to webbing straps along the shoulder straps. It uses a Fidlock magnet and also has an elastic section, which the v3 did not have.
• Grab handles — Four grab handles. One on the top, one on the bottom, and one on each side panel. The v4 has the side grab handles more centered down the middle of the side panel, instead of closer to the back panel, where the v3 had them. But they’re also closer to the top due to the bottle pockets. The top grab handle on the v4 is behind the laptop compartment’s zipper (at the back edge of the top panel). The v3’s top grab handle was centered at the top of the bag. In any case, I love these grab handles. Though the bottom handle is just a piece of webbing, the other three are padded and easy to grab, but also stay out of the way when not in use.
• Load lifter straps — Pretty standard design, but they also have loops at the end of the webbing to make it easy to pull while wearing the backpack.
• Luggage passthrough — The luggage passthrough on the v4 runs horizontally, allowing the bag to sit upright when using the passthrough. On the v3, the luggage passthrough run vertically up the middle of the back panel, requiring you to lay the bag on its side to use.

Smart tracker pocket (L); Luggage passthrough (R)

• Counter pulls and lash points — The external zipper pulls are all Hypalon instead of the cord with plastic tab that the previous versions had. There are Hypalon counter pulls around the middle of the side panels to use when opening/closing the lower front panel pocket and a pair at the bottom corners of the front panel, giving you leverage when opening/closing the main compartment all the way. The shoulder straps each have a Hypalon lash point as well. On the v3, these were webbing.
• D-rings — Similar to the v3, there are a pair of D-rings toward the top of the side panels (one on each side) and on one shoulder strap for whatever you wanted to attach.
• Compression straps — There are none! Just calling this our because it’s a significant design change from the v3. It gives the bag a cleaner look. And the water bottle pockets are pretty deep. Still, if you wanted to carry a tall item like a tripod, it may be difficult using only the water bottle pockets.

Construction and Comfort

The 28L version of the Travel Pack 4 is 19.25 x 12.75 x 8 inches (H x W x D) and comes in at 3.52 lbs., which is a bit on the heavier side for a 28L backpack. It uses 1680D CORDURA ballistic nylon for the exterior and a lightweight ripstop nylon for the interior. Both fabrics are bluesign approved. Though it’s not a technical material, 1680D ballistic nylon will have some natural water resistance, and is very robust. This is partly why the bag weighs so much and feels quite beefy.

The zippers are all YKK and seem like #8 RCz for the admin and laptop compartment, and #10 for the main compartment and lower front panel compartment. I’m not quite sure why the front panel compartment uses such a large zipper when the other compartments use #8. The laptop compartment’s zipper is Aquaguard. The plastic hardware is Duraflex and all feels as durable as you’d want a travel backpack to be. Overall, the craftsmanship is also top notch, and the anchor points all have reinforced stitching. This backpack will last many years.

The back panel has four quadrants of mesh-covered soft padding with an airflow channel running down the middle. The padding feels like some type of open-cell padding against the firm framesheet. The shoulder straps are contoured and have a dual density padding. Altogether, the Travel Pack 4 is quite comfortable, in my opinion, particularly for a larger EDC backpack.

Additional Notes

While you can get the Travel Pack 4 to stand up on its own, you have to pack with heavy flat items on the bottom. The bottom of the bag tapers slightly so it doesn’t have the widest base. So, the backpack tends to lean/fall forward.

The first few weeks I was using the bag I tended to mix up the zipper pulls between the main compartment and the admin compartment because those zippers are so close to each other (less than an inch apart). The zipper pulls on Aer backpacks are rather long and this isn’t something isolated to the Travel Pack 4. Even in the Tech Pack and City Pack, if you leave the zippers in the same general area, you can get confused on which compartment’s zippers you are grabbing.

Lastly, while I think the 28L size fits me well, I can certainly see the 35L version being too bulky on someone smaller. For reference, I’m 5'11 and over 200 lbs.

Summary

Overall, the Travel Pack 4 is a fantastic backpack. The 28L version is a great large EDC that I use for work and the gym. It’s also great for short term travel. I’ve used it on week-long trips with enough space for all my clothes and gear, though I tend to pack relatively light. If you find yourself struggling to fit all your work gear in a 20L backpack, or if other travel backpacks in the 35–40 L range are just too big for your style, this could definitely be the backpack for you. While some people don’t agree with the changes from the v3 to v4, I am a fan of most of them and the only things I’d really change are putting a second zipper on the admin compartment and allowing the admin compartment’s zipper to open a tiny bit further. It’s definitely a backpack that I’m going to keep and use often.

As always, thanks for reading. Drop a note in the comments if you have any questions about the Aer Travel Pack 4 and follow us on Facebook and Instagram to stay up to date on what bags we’re trying out.