Secure The Bag: The Best Carry-Ons For Every Trip

Whatever your requirements, we’ve got the perfect carry-on for your next trip. Just remember to always check your airline’s luggage allowances, because in this, the year of our lord 2024, there still isn’t standardisation on this sort of thing, and that’s really enough to justify a stiff drink at the airside Wetherspoons, frankly.

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For the photography aficionado: ThinkTank Airport Advantage

Dimensions: 32.3cm x 50.8cm x 18.5cm

Weight: 2.7 kg

Capacity: litreage unlisted, but it can fit two DSLRs with lens attached, plus 3–4 additional lenses, or more lenses if the bodies are mirrorless. The biggest lens it'll fit is a 200-400mm f4 with the lens hood reversed.

Price: $319.75 if buying direct (ShopPay installments available), or £299 via Amazon UK.

Buy it here (US) or here (UK).

If capturing gorgeous images of your trip is a priority, you know the struggle: you don’t want to put your expensive camera and lenses in your checked luggage, where they’ll be beholden to the whims of the rough-and-tumble baggage system (and, potentially, jet-setting on an unplanned trip of their own). But equally, most camera bag systems are bulky and inconvenient, and by the time you’ve packed your kit, you don’t often have room for much else. 

Enter ThinkTank’s Airport collection. Let’s not beat around the bush: a ThinkTank is an investment, with prices featuring on the high end of the spectrum for a carry-on suitcase. But for your money, you actually get a huge amount of features: there’s a dedicated laptop sleeve, which will comfortably hold a 15” computer; they come with rain covers for further protection; and while they look, from the outside, like a normal soft-shell case, they’re actually seriously robust. From a security standpoint, too, that very normal exterior is a quiet asset: after all, do you really want to advertise the fact that you’re lugging potentially thousands of pounds worth of equipment?

The ThinkTank’s customisability, though, is what really earns it its place on our list. It’s made up of padded dividers with Velcro ends, all of which can be repositioned as you like or removed completely. That means you can create snug, secure slots for the kit you’ve got, and then repurpose the other areas of the bag to fit a change of clothes, your in-flight toiletries, your chargers, a book – whatever you need, basically, to hit the ground running once you’ve landed. The Airport Advantage will fit two cameras and a smaller telephoto, like a 70-200mm f2.8 – but if you, like us, need to haul a much bigger lens around, there’s a ThinkTank Airport bag to suit your needs. Just be careful when choosing a bigger option – the Airport Advantage is the only roller bag that’s sized to meet most regional or short-haul carry-on dimensions.

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For the busy rider: Samshield Iconpack

Dimensions: unlisted

Weight: unlisted

Capacity: unlisted

Price: £165 (Klarna available!)

Buy it here.

Planning to ride at your end destination? Like the camera-toting crew, you’ll have an expensive investment to protect – your riding hat.

We’re big fan’s of Samshield’s Iconpack, which comes in a range of smart colours and is actually designed as a show bag, but has so much more untapped potential. First and foremost among its features? An expandable mesh helmet-holder on the front, which will keep your safety kit snug and protected, and which tucks away neatly when not in use.

Beyond that, it’s packed with sensible, handy storage compartments, which might be designed for, say, loose studs or plaiting bands, but which are equally useful while flying. There’s a removable case on the rucksack’s strap for your phone, a small pocket on the top of the bag which perfectly houses your wallet and boarding pass, a pocket for your sunglasses, a side pocket that’ll easily hold a passport and, we reckon, a Kindle, and there’s a bottle-holder on the side and a dedicated laptop pocket on the back side that’ll keep your computer secure and out of reach of thieves.

It's also made of tough, water resistant 1200D coated polyester with waterproof zips, and if that’s not enough, it comes with a raincover, too, which is ideal if you’re heading for, say, a riding holiday in Ireland (sorry to be the bearer of bad news). There’s plenty of space inside for your essentials, and the interior is split into two compartments, so you can stay organised.

Finally, it has two slightly-less-useful but also kind of fun additional features: a whip holder on the side, if you’d like to make your trip through security a little bit weirder than usual, and a chest strap that the company proposes will allow you to “maintain the backpack while riding.” We do not recommend! But you do you!

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For the busy rider on a budget: WoofWear Riders Backpack

Dimensions: 53cm x 39cm x 14cm

Weight: unlisted

Capacity: unlisted

Price: £44.99

Buy it here. 

The slightly more budget-friendly cousin to the Samshield Iconpack is WoofWear’s very functional Riders Backpack, which also has a mesh housing for your helmet, that totally inessential but also, we guess, sort of handy whip holder, two bottle holders, a secret laptop compartment, and a top compartment for your phone and passport to slide into.

Like the Samshield, it also has a mesh divider in the main pocket, which means you can keep your clothes separate from your toiletries or another pair of shoes – but while it’s robustly made from 900D fabric, it’s not got the same waterproofing that the Samshield does, nor does it come with a raincover.

However, there’s workarounds available – like this waterproof cover, which will run you less than a tenner on Amazon – and if you’d rather devote your holiday budget to spending on arrival, this is a great bit of kit for your arsenal that doesn’t give off overt horse girl vibes. Until you’ve got your helmet strapped onto it, of course, and then, we’re afraid, you’re sort of broadcasting that to the world. Own it, work it, love it.

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For the country-chic diehard: the Holland Cooper Knightsbridge Small Suitcase

Dimensions: 48.5cm x 40cm x 22cm

Weight: 2.61 kg

Capacity: unlisted

Price: £349 (Klarna is available!)

Buy it here.

Look, we get it. It’s the gold hardware detailing. It’s the fact that Laura Collett is dressed in this stuff head-to-toe and we all kind of want to be Laura Collett, really, when it comes down to it. There’s no judgment from us if you want your travel bag to fit in with a finely-honed lewk that makes getting the grid post in the departure lounge a very easy proposition indeed.

Fortunately for you, Jade H-C’s got plenty of travel solutions to match your wardrobe – and rightly so, since she appears to be pretty much constantly on the move. Among her offerings are some very smart holdalls, but if we’re going to give you a style-first pick, we’re also going to make sure it’s convenient – and for those of us who’ve trudged to the furthest possible gate in basically any given airport, that means wheels. Always, without fail, wheels. There’s nothing country chic about a pulled shoulder muscle, girls, so save the holdalls for weekend trips in the car.

So instead, here’s a petite, pretty case that’ll hold all you need it to for a short trip. It’s not quite making use of the full dimensions you could cram into an overhead locker – they do, however, have a snakeskin version for that, if packing lots and looking a little bit dominatrix is your thang – but if you’re a capsule-wardrobe, minimalist sort of packer, it’s a really nice size for taking on tour without feeling like a pack mule. The inside is fairly basic – there’s a zip compartment, two small pockets, and a slim front pocket that can fit an iPad – and then the rest of the interior is left open-plan for maximum packability. You can either do the haphazard cram-and-stuff approach favoured by us here at thp to fill it up, or, more likely, since you seem like a pretty polished individual, you can pop in packing cubes, like these compressible ones from Monos, or fill it with HC’s own makeup and wash bags. You don’t need us to tell you that Jade also has a branded passport cover for you to really complete this look, do you? Gold. Hardware. Detailing, baby.

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For the traveller in need of plans B, C, and D: the Away Carry-On Flex

Dimensions: 55.1 cm x 36.7 cm x 22.9 cm

Weight: 3.6 kg

Capacity: 39.8L/44.6L when expanded

Price: £265 (Klarna is available!)

Buy it here.

You’ve left your packing until the last minute, and now you don’t have time to actually think about what you need each day – instead, you’re going to try to stuff it all in your case and get organised when you get to your destination. But also, you’ve left leaving for the airport pretty late, too, and you’re once again among the last few passengers to board – and this time, they’ve run out of overhead bin space, so your bag’s getting checked. A bummer – but because you invested in the Away, you’re golden. It’s expandable by 6cm, so it can fit all your extra stuff (although be careful if you’re flying RyanAir, for a multitude of reasons, really, but also because this is a fraction of an inch oversize for their carry-on allowance, and they will get you). It’s also seriously tough – it’s become a favourite weird pastime of travel editors to take a baseball bat to it, presumably when deadline stress starts kicking in, and by all accounts, it’s impossible to leave a mark on it. That’s great news when you’re handing it over to the whims of the baggage folks, frankly.

There’s lots more to like here if you just want a good, reliable, robust carry-on. When expanded, it’s got nearly 45l of space, so you can cram in a week’s worth of clothes if you’re pretty savvy at packing, and the inside is split with mesh dividers and a hidden laundry bag to help you separate your clean bits from your dirty bits. It can be supplemented with packing cubes (not included, but available to purchase here), and it’s got a TSA-approved lock for added security. It’s got 360-degree wheels, and they’re actually functional, unlike many roll-on suitcases; it’s got a little grab handle on the underside, which is a bit of a godsend when you’re chucking it into an overhead bin; and it's actually, all things considered, very cute – there’s ten colour options and you can add a personalised luggage tag for a tenner, too.