Quick answer
The best camping stove for most UK family campers is the Cadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro at around £120: twin 2.0kW burners under a ceramic flat plate and a ribbed grill plate, so one stove fries, grills and boils without packing a single pan. If you only want two gas rings, the hob-only Cadac 2 Cook 2 Pro Stove QR does it for around £60, and if the job is a kettle and a pan on a table, the Go System GS2290 cassette stove costs about £24 and needs no hose or regulator at all. I run the original Cadac 2 Cook Deluxe for our family-of-four breakfasts, and it is the stove this guide is built around.
Our pick: Cadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro
- Best overall for families: Cadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro (~£120)
- Best value twin hob: Cadac 2 Cook 2 Pro Stove QR (~£60)
- The flagship: Cadac 2 Cook 3 Pro Deluxe QR (£115-£160)
- Best double, no regulator: Campingaz Camping Cook CV (£45-£70)
- Best budget tabletop: Go System GS2290 (~£24)
- Best for backpacking: Fire Maple FMS-X3 (~£60)
I came to camping stoves the way a lot of people do: on someone else's. I used a friend's Campingaz Chef a few times before buying my own, and when I spent my own money I bought a different stove, a Cadac 2 Cook Deluxe. It has cooked our family-of-four breakfasts on campsites ever since.
Camping and cooking can be a bit of a rigmarole, so keep it simple: simple ingredients, simple cooking, something you enjoy. Think waking up after a night camping and having a bacon bap, easy to cook, with a cup of coffee brewing while you do it. Everyone loves a bacon sandwich, and the right stove makes that minimal effort.
This guide to the best camping stove UK campers can buy in 2026 is for campsite cooking: the drive-there-and-unload kind, where the stove rides in the boot and feeds a family. Backpacking stoves are the hiking side of this site's territory, so the Fire Maple that makes my trail coffees gets its slot and a pointer to the full review rather than a rerun. And because everything on this page involves a naked flame, every pick is a brand we can trace: a real company, a real safety record, real support. One very big seller fails that bar, and it gets named lower down.
The rest of the camp kitchen, cool boxes included, lives in our camping stoves section.
Check the Cadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro price on AmazonSingle burner or double burner?
Answer one question before you look at a single product: how many people eat at once?
A single burner boils a kettle and cooks one pan at a time. For a couple, or for anyone whose campsite cooking is mostly hot drinks and one-pot meals, a £24 tabletop single is honestly all the stove the job needs.
A double burner camping stove is the family answer. Beans in one pan while the kettle sits on the other ring, and nobody eats in shifts. The family picks in this guide are all twin burners for that reason, and they come in two flavours: cartridge doubles like the Campingaz Camping Cook CV that run two rings straight off a clip-on cartridge, and regulator-fed doubles like the Chef and the Cadacs. The step up from there is not a third burner, it is better surfaces: the Cadac approach of swapping pans for a built-in flat plate and grill plate, which is the single biggest packing-list win in this guide.
Which gas does my camping stove use?
This is the part of the category that confuses more buyers than anything else, because "camping gas" is not one thing. It is three incompatible systems, and the stove decides which one you are buying into.
1. Cartridge stoves (no hose). The gas fits straight into or onto the stove, nothing else to buy. Two common fittings here: bayonet cassette cartridges that lock into the side of a tabletop stove, which is what the Go System GS2290 uses with its own G2220 cartridges, and Campingaz CV470-class valve cartridges that clip on, which is how the twin-burner Camping Cook CV runs. Cheapest to start with and the simplest to run. One rule regardless of fitting: buy branded cartridges from the stove's own maker or another established gas name, not the own-label gas that aggregator sellers push alongside the stoves.
These plug-and-play cartridge stoves are selling like, well, hot stoves on Amazon right now, and stock is looking low across the board. That makes two things matter more than ever: buy a reputable brand, and always use it outdoors. I watched an Amazon video review just today of a woman using one in her kitchen, which is exactly the behaviour the official advice exists to prevent. The full safety picture is in our can you use a camping stove indoors? explainer; the short version is never, not even in a power cut.
2. Threaded canister stoves. The screw-thread (EN417) canisters hikers know. Backpacking stoves like the Fire Maple screw straight onto the canister, and with the right regulator and hose the same canisters can feed a bigger stove, which is exactly how I run mine (next section).
3. Regulator-and-cylinder stoves. The Campingaz Chef and the Cadac range arrive with no gas connection at all: you buy a regulator, a hose and a gas supply separately, classically a refillable cylinder like the Campingaz 907. More parts to buy on day one, far cheaper gas per meal after that, and the system every seasonal family camper ends up on.
Campingaz alone sells stoves across three of these fittings, and its listings rarely make clear which one you are looking at, so if you are choosing between its models specifically, our Campingaz stoves explained guide matches each stove to its gas.
On cold weather: butane stops turning to gas at around freezing, so a pure-butane cartridge that worked all summer can sulk on a frosty morning. Propane keeps vaporising far below zero, and butane-propane mixes sit in between. For three-season UK campsites, butane is fine; if you camp into the cold months, run propane through a suitable regulator or pick mix canisters.
And wind: an open burner loses a lot of its heat to a breeze, which is why exposed-pitch cooking takes twice as long as the garden test did. Pitch the kitchen out of the wind, or buy a stove that builds shielding in. Of everything here, only the Cadac 2 Cook 3 ships with windshields in the box.
The gas setup I actually run
A worked example, because this is where it all turns practical. My original Cadac 2 Cook Deluxe runs off standard EN417 threaded canisters through a Highlander GAS443 regulator and a Cost Wise 3m hose. I wanted a longer hose, and that is the quiet tip in this section: standard hoses run short, and three metres means the canister sits where you want it rather than where the stove dictates.
The whole point of the threaded-canister route is one gas standard across the kit. I use the larger Coleman C500 500g canisters for the gas on camping trips, and take a smaller 100g canister for hiking with the Fire Maple. No point carrying the extra weight. Same fitting, one spare system, and the C500s in the shed double as our power-cut reserve.
One check before you buy any regulator for a Cadac: see which gas connection your unit arrives with. A QR quick-release coupling pairs with Cadac's own QR regulator kit, which carries an excess-flow valve in the regulator; a threaded inlet pairs with a standard 30mbar butane regulator, which is what my GAS443 setup is.
1. Go System GS2290 Dynasty Compact
Best budget tabletop stove
The cheapest way onto this page, and the simplest. The GS2290 is a single-burner cassette stove: a bayonet cartridge locks into the side, no hose, no regulator, no cylinder, and at around £24 it is the stove for boiling a kettle and frying on a campsite table without buying into a gas system at all.
What earns it the slot over the sea of lookalike cassette stoves is the company behind it. Go System is a genuine UK gas specialist, part of the Bollin Group with its own UK filling plant, and the brand sits on the shelves at Cotswold Outdoor, Decathlon, Costco, GO Outdoors and B&Q. For a product with a flame on top, that traceability is the whole game, and it is what the unbranded alternatives cannot offer at any price.
One spec to get right: ignore the 3000W figure floating around the Amazon listing. Go System's own print spec for this stove is 2300W, which is the honest number and a normal output for the class. Feed it the brand's own G2220 bayonet cartridges; other bayonet cassettes exist, but cross-compatibility is not something the maker promises, so stick to the cartridge the stove was built around.
Limits are the obvious ones for the type: one burner, and the butane cassette format is a fair-weather system, so it is a spring-to-autumn stove rather than a frosty-morning one.
Couples, festival campers and anyone whose campsite cooking is a kettle and one pan. The cheapest reputable route to hot food outdoors.
2. Campingaz Camping Cook CV
Best double burner without a regulator
The stove that quietly solves the category's biggest headache. The Camping Cook CV gives you twin 1.8kW burners running on Campingaz's CV470-class clip-on valve cartridges: no hose, no regulator, no cylinder, just clip the cartridge on and cook on two rings. At £45 to £70 it may well be the best of the Campingaz offering, and for a family that wants a proper double burner without assembling a gas system, it is the simplest route on this page.
The valve cartridge is the underrated part. Unlike a locked-in cassette, you can disconnect a part-used CV470 and pack it away, and Campingaz cartridges are on the shelf in practically every outdoor shop and garden centre in the country, so topping up mid-trip is never a hunt. The trade-off against the regulator-fed doubles below is running cost: cartridge gas costs more per meal than cylinder gas, which is why heavy-use campers graduate to the Chef and Cadac class eventually.
Pick this over the GS2290 if you cook for more than two; pick it over the Chef if the regulator shopping list below puts you off.
Families who want two burners with zero gas-system homework. Clip on a cartridge and cook.
3. Campingaz Camping Chef Double Burner
The recognisable starter
Campingaz is probably the most recognisable brand there is for this type of gear, and the Camping Chef is its classic folding double burner stove and grill: two gas rings and a grill under them, running off a regulator and cylinder you buy separately. At the time of writing it holds a 4.5-star average from around 3,176 Amazon ratings, which is a lot of families fed.
I can speak to it first-hand, because this is the stove I borrowed. I used a friend's a few times before buying my own stove, and the verdict from those trips is simple: the burners work great, but the grill is utterly useless unless you like to wait 45 minutes for a piece of toast. It is a great little starter and perfectly adequate, and when I came to buy my own I bought a different one, so that probably tells you all you need to know.
Judge it as two good burners with a famous badge at a starter price, budget for the regulator, hose and cylinder on top, and treat the grill as a lid. On those terms it is a perfectly sensible first family stove, and plenty of campsites are full of them for a reason.
First-time family campers who want two proper burners from a household name and will step up later if camping sticks.
4. The Cadac 2 Cook range: the stove I bought
Best overall for families
This is the one I spent my own money on. After borrowing the Campingaz and watching several reviews, I bought the original Cadac 2 Cook Deluxe, and it has been our family stove since. Operation is simple, it is nice and slim to pack, and the lid has a fastener catch so it travels shut. With four of us I wanted flexibility, and the griddle and hot plate give it exactly that: perfect for eggs and bacon in the morning, and it saves taking frying pans altogether. It is super easy to clean afterwards, which matters more on day three than any spec does.
How we really use it: ours is a breakfast and lunch workhorse, not a three-meals-a-day field kitchen. We usually camp with a low-wattage kettle on electric hook-up, but on the odd pitch without hook-up it boiled our 1L kettle fine in the mornings. Evenings we mostly skip cooking entirely, a takeaway or the local food vans that visit the sites we use, which saves the hassle of cooking and cleaning up. If your camping looks like that, this range is built for your actual week, not an imaginary one.
The current models are that stove's descendants, and Cadac's naming takes a minute to untangle. Here is the short version of the three current models; the full model-by-model guide, every name explained, is in Cadac 2 Cook: which one should you buy?
Cadac 2 Cook 2 Pro Stove QR, around £60. The hob-only model: twin 2.0kW burners with pot stands rather than grill plates, at 3.6kg. At the time of writing the listing shows a 4.8-star average and over 600 bought in the past month. Two proper gas rings in a slim case; you bring the pans.
Buy the Cadac 2 Cook 2 Pro Stove QR on AmazonCadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro, £119.99 at the time of writing. The sweet spot and this guide's top pick: the same twin 2.0kW burners under interchangeable ceramic plates, one flat, one ribbed for grilling. This is the modern version of the flexibility I bought mine for: fry-up one morning, griddled lunch the next, no frying pans in the boot.
Buy the Cadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro on AmazonCadac 2 Cook 3 Pro Deluxe QR, £115 to £160. The current flagship: twin burners stepped up to 2.2kW, GreenGrill plates, and the only stove in this guide that ships with windshields, two of them, plus a lid. RRP is £160 and Cadac's own UK store lists it at £129, so the Amazon price is the one to watch.
Buy the Cadac 2 Cook 3 Pro Deluxe QR on AmazonTwo buying notes that save real money. First, QR in Cadac's names means the quick-release gas coupling, not anything about the cooking surfaces, and there is a trap in it: the 2 Cook 2 QR models use Cadac's 90° Rotating QR ecosystem, where one regulator kit swaps between Cadac appliances, while the 2 Cook 3's integrated QR is not compatible with that ecosystem. Check which connection your unit arrives with and buy the gas kit that matches (the worked example and the QR kit are both in the gas setup section above). Second, none of these includes a regulator, hose or cylinder, so budget for that from the start. The range is certified to BS EN 484:2019, and note that no flat-top Cadac here has a flame failure device; in this range that is reserved for the pricier 2 Cook 3 Turbo at around £173.
Families who cook real breakfasts and lunches at camp and want one slim stove to replace the pan collection. The 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro is the one most should buy.
5. Coleman Classic 2-Burner
The famous green one
The famous green one is exactly that: Coleman's green-lidded two-burner, and the numbers hold up the fame: a 4.8-star average from 20,291 Amazon ratings at the time of writing, which is a volume and a score almost nothing in this category can match. Two 10,000 BTU burners, Coleman's PerfectFlow pressure regulation, WindBlock panels against the campsite breeze, and a solid build at around 5.3kg, for about £164.
Two things to know before clicking buy. First, it is a match-light stove: no piezo button, so a lighter lives in the box, the same arrangement as the Camping Cook CV above. Second, and more important, the gas. The Classic runs on Coleman's green 465g propane cylinders, an American-style fitting that none of the three gas systems in this guide covers, so order the propane cylinder twin pack with the stove, because the screw-thread canisters and Campingaz cartridges UK shops are built around will not connect to it. The upside of that propane diet is real: it keeps vaporising well below freezing, so this is a stove for cold-morning camping as much as summer.
Coleman sells four other stoves on Amazon UK alongside this one, including a screw-thread backpacking burner covered below, and the full model-by-model picture, every stove matched to its gas, is in our Coleman stoves explained guide.
Families who want the proven classic of the category: two strong cold-capable burners and a twenty-thousand-rating track record, bought together with its propane cylinders.
6. Fire Maple FMS-X3
Best for backpacking
The one stove here from the hiking side of the site, included because a lot of campsite campers also walk, and because it completes the gas picture. The FMS-X3 is an all-in-one boil system: stove, pot and stand at 600g together, screwing straight onto the EN417 threaded canisters covered in the gas section above, and in good conditions it boils 500ml in under two minutes. It is the stove that makes my trail coffees, and on the 100g canister it earns its place in a daypack.
It is not a family campsite stove and it is not trying to be: one tall pot, no frying surface, built for boiling water fast for one or two people. For the full story, including why I bought it over a Jetboil at twice the price, read the complete Fire Maple FMS-X3 review.
Hikers, wild campers and solo brew stops. The campsite family stove it complements, not replaces.
The other backpacking burner worth naming here is the Coleman Peak 1: 190g, up to 10,000 BTU, £48.30, and it screws onto the same EN417 threaded canisters as the Fire Maple, the C500s and C300s from the gas setup section above. It is a bare burner for a pot you already own rather than an all-in-one system, with a 6-inch pan limit, and it sits in the wider Coleman lineup covered in our Coleman stoves explained guide.
7. Kuvik Titanium Wood Stove
The no-gas fallback
The odd one out: no gas at all. The Kuvik is a compact titanium wood stove that burns sticks and twigs, packs small, and costs little. My own preference is clear, I would rather have the convenience of gas and an ignition, no mess and no risk of fires, but for some campers this type will have a place: fuel you never run out of and never carry, as an ultra-reliable fallback.
Two cautions before you pack one. Most UK campsites have rules on open fires and ground-level burning, and a twig stove usually counts, so check the site's fire policy before it leaves the boot. And in dry spells a wood flame outdoors demands real care; our guide on helping prevent wildfires covers when not to light anything at all.
Campers and bushcraft-leaning walkers who want a fuel-free backup, and have checked the fire rules where they pitch.
The bestseller we are not recommending
One of the biggest-selling camping stoves on Amazon UK right now is the Green Haven double burner, and it is not in this guide. The reasons are specific, so here they are plainly rather than by omission.
The listing makes no flame failure device claim and no EN 521 certification claim, which on a gas appliance are exactly the claims we want to see made and stood behind. Among its reviews, purchasers on verified orders report a recurring pattern of gas leaks at the canister locking lever. The brand's support website was unreachable when we checked, and the stove is sold through a third-party marketplace seller rather than the brand or Amazon itself, so the route to help if something goes wrong is not obvious. Availability is patchy on top.
None of this is a court judgment on the product. It is the reputability bar for things that burn gas near your family: a traceable company, stated safety features, support that answers. The stoves above clear it. On the evidence available, this one does not, so it stays off the list no matter how many it sells.
Every stove compared
| Image | Product | Price | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|
 | Best overallCadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro | ~£120 | |
| Twin 2.0kW burners · ceramic flat + ribbed grill plates · regulator sold separatelyBest for Families who want one stove to replace the frying pans. The one to buy. | |||
 | Best value twin hobCadac 2 Cook 2 Pro Stove QR | ~£60 | |
| Twin 2.0kW burners · hob only with pot stands · 3.6kg · regulator sold separatelyBest for Two proper gas rings at the lowest Cadac price. Bring your own pans. | |||
 | The flagshipCadac 2 Cook 3 Pro Deluxe QR | £129.00 | |
| Twin 2.2kW burners · GreenGrill plates · two windshields + lid · regulator sold separatelyBest for The biggest output and the only stove here with windshields in the box. | |||
 | Best double, no regulatorCampingaz Camping Cook CV | £68.48 | |
| Twin 1.8kW burners · CV470 clip-on cartridges · no hose or regulator neededBest for Two burners with zero gas-system homework. | |||
 | Recognisable starterCampingaz Camping Chef | See listing | |
| Folding double burner + grill · regulator and cylinder required · 4.5 stars from ~3,176 ratings at the time of writingBest for A first family stove from the most famous name in camping gas. | |||
 | The famous green oneColeman Classic 2-Burner | £150.19 | |
| 2 x 10,000 BTU · Coleman green propane cylinders · match-light · WindBlock panels · ~5.3kg · 4.8 stars from 20,291 ratings at the time of writingBest for The proven green classic, cold-capable on propane. Buy the cylinder twin pack with it. | |||
 | Best budget tabletopGo System GS2290 Dynasty Compact | £39.99 | |
| Single burner cassette stove · 2.3kW · G2220 bayonet cartridges, no hose or regulatorBest for A kettle and one pan on a campsite table, from a real UK gas specialist. | |||
 | Best for backpackingFire Maple FMS-X3 | £62.95 | |
| All-in-one boil system · 600g with pot and stand · EN417 threaded canisters · boils 500ml in under 2 minutesBest for Hikers and solo brew stops. Full review on the hiking side. | |||
 | Budget backpacking burnerColeman Peak 1 | £48.92 | |
| Up to 10,000 BTU · 190g · EN417 threaded canisters (C300/C500) · bare burner for your own pot · 6-inch pan maxBest for A light, cheap burner that screws onto the same canisters as the Fire Maple. | |||
 | No-gas fallbackKuvik Titanium Wood Stove | See listing | |
| Compact titanium twig burner · no gas required · check campsite fire rulesBest for A fuel-free backup for campers who have checked where they can burn. | |||
Can you use a camping stove in a power cut?
Yes, and it is one of the most useful cooking fallbacks a household can own, with one rule that never bends: it gets used outdoors, in the garden or on the doorstep, never in the kitchen, a tent or an awning.
The timing matters this winter. The government's Be Ready campaign asks every household to be able to manage for three days, and its power cut checklist plans for no cooking at all: bottled water, ready-to-eat tinned food and a tin opener. A camping stove used outside is the comfortable answer to the gap that list leaves, which is why the Coleman C500s in our shed are as much a storm reserve as a camping supply. A stove bought for spring campsite breakfasts covers that winter gap without buying anything extra.
The full reasoning on the outdoors rule, straight from NHS and fire service guidance, plus every safe route to hot food in an outage, is in can you use a camping stove indoors?, and the wider household checklist is in our power cut ready guide.
How to dispose of gas canisters responsibly
Every cartridge and canister on this page eventually becomes a disposal question, so here is the responsible answer.
First, run it completely empty: connect it to the stove outdoors and burn off the last of the gas. A canister that feels empty can still hold residual gas under pressure, and a part-full one counts as hazardous waste, not rubbish. For threaded canisters, puncture tools like Jetboil's CrunchIt exist to vent the final dregs safely once the gas is used up.
Second, never put gas canisters in your household rubbish or kerbside recycling, even empty ones. Council guidance (Cornwall's is typical) is blunt about why: they can explode when crushed in the collection vehicle or at the recycling facility.
Instead, take empty canisters to your local Household Waste and Recycling Centre, where the steel and aluminium get recycled. Acceptance varies by council and some sites have a dedicated gas cage, so check your council's website first and ask staff on site where they want them. Some outdoor shops and manufacturers also take used canisters back.
Refillable cylinders are a different case entirely: a Campingaz 907 or similar is not waste, it goes back to a stockist to be exchanged and refilled, which is a quiet argument for the cylinder route if you camp a lot.
Which camping stove should you buy?
The Cadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro is the best camping stove for most UK families, and here is how to judge it: two 2.0kW burners, the ceramic flat and ribbed plates that take the frying pans off your packing list, and a £120 price with the gas kit bought once and kept for years. It is the current version of the stove I chose with my own money after borrowing the obvious alternative, and the one our eggs-and-bacon mornings run on.
If you want two burners without any regulator homework, the Campingaz Camping Cook CV runs twin rings straight off a clip-on cartridge for £45 to £70. If the budget stops at £60 and you are happy to buy into a gas setup, the hob-only 2 Cook 2 Pro Stove QR keeps the twin burners and loses the plates, and the Campingaz Chef remains a perfectly decent famous-name starter if you treat the grill as decoration. If all you need is a kettle on a table, the Go System GS2290 at £24 is the cheapest stove here from a company you can actually trace. And if the stove needs to fit in a daypack, that is the Fire Maple's job, not any of these.
Check the Cadac 2 Cook 2 Deluxe Pro price on Amazon