Garmin inReach Messenger Review
The inReach Messenger keeps me in touch with my wife from places with no signal, and an emergency beacon belongs in every pack.
In 2020, on a four-night trip across Desolation Wilderness, a member of our group fell seriously ill miles from any road, and not one of us carried a way to call for help. We reached emergency responders only because someone remembered that a bar or two of cell signal might reach the top of a ridge near camp. The extraction became a long, tense, all-hands effort, our friend was airlifted out of the backcountry, and he survived. The whole trip is in The Trip That Taught Me to Carry a Satellite Beacon.
I bought the inReach Messenger in May 2023 because of that ridge. The Messenger weighs 4 ounces on my lists and rides on every trip.
Day to day, I use the Messenger to keep in contact with my wife from places a phone cannot reach, and the Messenger is great at that job. The bigger reason sits underneath. Carry an emergency beacon, because being the group with no way to call for help is a mistake nobody needs to make.
What works
- Two-way messaging home from anywhere with sky overhead.
- An SOS button for the day everything goes wrong.
- Only 4 ounces.
What does not
- None that would stop me carrying one.
Open the inReach Messenger in Backpackers Friend
The link adds the inReach Messenger to Backpackers Friend as a small gear bundle with the weight filled in, ready to apply to the gear list of your next trip.
The trip kits in Backpackers Friend
The inReach Messenger appears in seven of my trip kits. Each kit is a real trip and opens in Backpackers Friend as a gear bundle with every item, weight, and quantity.
- Tahoe Rim Trail, Leg 1, July 2026The first leg of my loop around Lake Tahoe, with the hammock as my shelter. 70 items on a 19.7-pound base weight. Read the trip report.
- Solo near Mammoth Lakes, September 2024A solo trip out of Mammoth Lakes. 80 items on a 21.5-pound base weight, including the only iPad I have ever carried.
- Ediza and Thousand Island Lakes, September 2024Two nights in the Ansel Adams Wilderness with my backpacking partner. 79 items on a 20.5-pound base weight. Read the trip report.
- Ostrander Lake and Buena Vista, July 2024A Yosemite loop with a guidebook shortcut through an old burn. 75 items on a 21.2-pound base weight. Read the trip report.
- Young Lakes, June 2024One night at Young Lakes out of Tuolumne Meadows in peak mosquito season. 77 items on a 21.9-pound base weight. Read the trip report.
- Chilnualna Falls, May 2024A solo loop toward Buena Vista that ended one crossing short, carried with a tent instead of the hammock. 72 items on a 17.7-pound base weight. Read the trip report.
- Point Reyes in the rain, February 2024An overnight at Coast Camp with a close friend in steady February rain. 78 items on a 21.7-pound base weight. Read the trip report.
More water and safety reviews
Keep your own gear list with the trip
The gear checklist in Backpackers Friend weighs every item by category, charts the pack as you build the list, marks each item packed, and saves a list as a reusable bundle for the next trip. The checklist lives on the phone next to the route, the camps, and the offline map. The gear checklist is part of Premium, and planning a trip, drawing the route, and tracking the walk are free with no account.
