Well Traveled Luggage Packing Cubes Deluxe Set Review

If you’re finally dipping your toes into the waters of organized travel and want to get your hands on a set of packing cubes, you might not want to jump straight to the most premium option. After all, you might not like knowing exactly where to find your favorite shirt or get annoyed by the fact that your travel backpack or luggage is neat and tidy when you arrive at your destination. We don’t judge!

Whatever the reason you’re looking for a budget option for packing cubes, you might be delighted with the 4-piece and 8-piece offerings from the Well Traveled Luggage Packing Cubes Deluxe Set. An accessory bag, shoe pouch, and three sizes of compression packing cubes, all for one low price? Who could resist? Certainly not us, so we put them to the test to see how they fared.

External Components

The Well Traveled Luggage Packing Cubes Deluxe Set is made with twill material. Yes, we know, that’s super specific, isn’t it? Unfortunately, that’s what we know about the material, which could be polyester or nylon; we’re not sure. It is stiff and crunchy yet flexible enough to wrap nicely around clothing. The only piece where the crunchiness really comes into play is the shoe/laundry pouch. We want something sturdy to hold shoes, but the bag is quite large and has a lot of extra material even when we stick in two pairs of travel shoes, so the extra bulk remaining in the bag is just something to make room for in your luggage, which is not ideal.

Speaking of pouches, let’s chat about what you get with the 8-piece set, which is what we’re testing. It comes with two small accessory pouches that lack compression zippers, two small compression cubes, one medium compression cube, two large compression cubes, and a large pouch for shoes or dirty laundry. If you opt for the 4-piece set instead, you’ll give up those accessory pouches and get one of each other options: small, medium, large, and shoe. Frankly, we think most travelers can make do with those options, but it’s sometimes nice to have more of one size or to buy one set for your family to share.

All of the cubes use SBS zippers, which are working quite well for us, both on the main zippers and the compression closures. They also have cords with tabs at the end to make grabbing, opening, and closing the cubes easier, with just a metal pull to compress them. Speaking of compression, the accessory pouches lack that feature, but that’s OK; you wouldn’t likely compress your toiletries or tech gear anyway, so we don’t miss it. The shoe pouch or laundry bag lacks a zipper. Instead, it closes with a cinch cord that you pull tight and then secure with a round toggle.

On one corner of each cube is the Well Traveled logo, and there are also tabs sticking out of a seam with the brand name, as well. Unfortunately, they don’t have labels telling you which cube is which size, although it’s pretty obvious when you lay them next to each other.

However, there are mesh pockets on the front of each cube—though not on the shoe pouch or accessory bags—where you can slide in a label. We like that since you can’t see through these cubes. That way, you can let yourself know which small cube has socks and underwear and which holds your tops, and which of the large has bottoms and which contains bulky sweatshirts. You could even put your name and contact information in there if you’re packing for a hostel stay and think there’s a chance you might forget a packing cube in the bathroom, for example. Either way, it’s a nice addition if you need it and unobtrusive if you don’t.

If you do need to carry a cube somewhere away from your bag to change, you’ll be happy to see that they all have handles. The soft webbing is comfortable to hold and allows you to carry a cube wherever you need to take it or easily pull it out of a tightly packed bag.

Inside The Packing Cube

Inside the packing cubes, it looks a lot like the outside. There’s no separate liner or anything; you can see the seams and stitching of the cubes’ construction. That doesn’t bother us, but it’s just something to mention. There are quite a few loose threads around these cubes, inside and out, and you’ll see them here. They haven’t impacted our use of the cubes, and they don’t seem to be unraveling. However, it’s not something we’re surprised to see with budget packing gear like this.

As for what you can fit inside each one, that depends on your clothing and which cubes you’re using. We find the accessory cubes are actually a good size for socks and underwear if you already own toiletry bags and tech pouches; otherwise, you could use them for that. There’s no structure or waterproofing to the pouches, though, so we really don’t love using them that way, but you could in a pinch. We had no issue fitting socks and underwear for a long weekend trip of 3-5 days into the accessory pouch, as it’s the size of some other brands’ small pouches and about the amount of space we’re used to having. It lacks compressibility but is already so small, so we don’t miss it.

However, if you’re packing for a weeklong vacation or have larger pieces than our tester, the small compression cube works well for your undergarments. Even when packing it full, it’s still easy to close the compression zipper, a fact we don’t take for granted. We’ve run into other compressible cubes where the material being compressed takes up so much room that you must take out more clothing than it saves you space.

We also used the small cube for tops and a swimsuit since it had enough space for T-shirts. However, if you’re bringing a lot of long-sleeved shirts or a separate shirt for each day of an 8-day trip, you might want to bump up to the medium. If you’re heading somewhere warm and only need to pack shorts and skirts, it will work for those, or if you’re traveling with a smaller travel daypack as a personal item bag on a budget airline and are packing a few tops and bottoms together. On average, though, we can get away with just the small and large cubes.

The largest cube is good for travel pants and bulky sweaters or hoodies. If you’re traveling somewhere cold and need to bring a few of each, you’ll be happy to have two large cubes, but if you’re bringing one cold-weather outfit just in case, you can probably pack them together in one.

Then there’s the shoe pouch or laundry bag, which is quite large. We fit in two pairs of sandals—one in a men’s size and one in a women’s—and we still had a ton of space left. That means you can probably fit a pair of sneakers or hiking boots inside or lay it in the bottom of your travel backpack and move your clothing from a clean packing cube to the dirty pouch as your trip goes along to keep it from soiling the rest of your gear. The only issue here is that tossing dirty pieces willy-nilly into a large, compressionless pouch will necessarily take up more space on your return trip than your neatly folded clothing in a compression packing cube did on the way out.

However, despite the awkwardness of the sizes and the material, we think this is a good entry-level set for travelers just dipping their toes into the organized-travel waters or those who would rather spend more on their bucket-list trip than the gear they bring. Will they last forever if you’re a digital nomad traveling for months and years at a time? Maybe not, but will they get the average traveler through a few year’s worth of vacation packing? They probably will, which makes them a good idea for keeping your clothing neat and sorted for your next trip.