Montane Minimus Jacket Review

Comfort and Mobility
Montane’s Minimus Jacket is a minimalist-style rain jacket for light and fast adventures that still offers good protection from the wind and rain.

While the jacket is generally a minimalist design, it does fit rather comfortably and offers some features that increase its comfort in wet conditions, increasing its appeal in the event of extended exposure. The sleeves are tailored asymmetrically, which offers your hands a little increased coverage from the elements, and there is small patch of micro-fleece on the collar to prevent all-out chin chafe.

The cut and fit are athletic, allowing for good mobility and full coverage in reachy situations. The hood is large enough to tightly accommodate a helmet, with a moldable wire brim so you can adjust the “peak” of the hood however you’d like.


Breathability
This jacket is not that breathable. It has no pit zips or other means for increased ventilation and the fabric does not breathe as well as one might be led to believe. During moderate exertion our testers quickly felt somewhat clammy. It's not recommended for extended periods of high output activity.

Water Resistance
While the jacket is minimalist in design, it does offer solid protection from wet weather. All the seams are fully taped, the zippers and the Pertex fabric itself is waterproof to 20,000mm. Testers did experience a little seepage along the zipper in our shower test, but very rarely is it raining as hard as the water comes down in the shower and in practical applications the water stayed outside where it belongs. The sleeves are asymmetrically tailored, offering extra top-of-the-hand coverage and the cuffs clamp down tight with a Velcro catch to keep water from running down the arms when reaching up.

The hood is large enough to offer good coverage and has a medium sized brim with moldable wire, lending it enough structure to stay put and protect the face well.


Weight and Bulk
This jacket is the second lightest that we tested, making it ideal for lightweight backpacking or climbing trips. It can pack down nice and small into a ball or into its provided stuff sack.

We wish that it had a pocket it could pack into, but the stuff sack provides another option for carrying and packing other than balling it up in a pack. When packed into its stuff sack it is just slightly larger than a big apple.


Feature Functions
Though this is generally a minimalist jacket, there are some design features that we thought were really thoughtful and added a lot of value. First, there is a chest pocket for a map, topo, iPhone, etc. The pocket with simple mesh lining has a small D-ring to clip some keys. While having a pocket is not critical on a super lightweight jacket, testers of other models found that it was super annoying to not have at least one pocket for random odds and ends.

Second, the cuffs have Velcro cinches and a asymmetrical cut. While the Velcro cuffs might not seem revolutionary, some other super light jackets have no mechanism for closing down then cuffs, thus allowing water to dribble down the sleeves when reaching up to adjust the hood or pack. The asymmetrical design of the cuffs provided a small amount of additional coverage of the tops of the hands.

Lastly, the jacket has several patches of reflective markings on the sleeves and the back. We thought the addition of the reflective markings and the jacket's lightweight/minimal bulk might make it especially useful to cyclists who find themselves caught out in the rain.

On a basic level the elastic drawstrings at the waist and hood function simply and quickly and the hood offers two points of adjustment (around the front rim and across the back). The main zipper works well as does the chest pocket zipper, which is covered with a storm flap.


Best Application
This should be considered an escape jacket to be worn for short periods while escaping the wet weather and getting into some shelter.

It is also good for lightweight backpacking, alpine climbing, lightweight rain gear for cycling.