Garden hoses are unremarkable when they work well, but if they underperform, they’ll drive you insane.
After several years of testing—washing cars, gardening, pressure-washing driveways, and doing other hosey home chores—we’ve concluded that the Continental Commercial Grade Rubber Hose (50 feet) is the all-purpose garden hose we’d invest in.
It isn’t perfectly kink-proof, but its sturdiness and dependable performance go far beyond those of the twisted, knotted, worthless garbage hoses that probably inspired you to search for something better.
A lot of the hoses we’ve used, tested, and recommended over the years work great for a year or two but then start to kink easily or otherwise degrade.
Through this time, the Continental has remained a workhorse. It isn’t a flashy garden hose, but it is one we’ve come to confidently rely on.
Our pick
This tough rubber hose isn’t cheap and can be heavy to wrangle, but its strong fittings and durable body should last for years—and it has a lifetime warranty, just in case.
The Continental Commercial Grade Rubber Hose (50 feet) is far from being the cheapest hose you’ll ever find, but after testing the bargain models and the midrange options, we’re convinced that the best value in a garden hose is the one you can buy once and use indefinitely. Although the lifetime warranty is reassuring, we’re confident (after doing our own tests and reading customer anecdotes about long-term use) that you may never need to take Continental up on it. Durable and versatile, this hose is perfect for all kinds of utility work (even though it can be a bit of a beast if you’re just quickly watering a small patio garden). Availability shouldn’t be an issue, as the Continental hose now has nearly ubiquitous availability at home centers and hardware stores.
Also great
The Dramm hose has a lot of the high points of the Continental hose, but it typically costs more, and it kinked more easily in our tests.
We also like the Dramm ColorStorm Premium Rubber Hose (50 feet). It offers many of the same features as the Continental and some that the other hose doesn’t have—like nickel-plated brass couplings—but it typically costs more, and in our tests it kinked more easily and held a memory of the kinks (once it kinked, it was prone to kink in the same spot again). We like that it comes in a variety of colors, but that’s not enough to offset the kinking issue. The Dramm was our previous top pick in this guide, but its increasing costs, coupled with the results of our long-term testing, have led us to see the Continental as the better option.
Upgrade pick
The Eley is lighter, easier to use, and more durable than our other picks. It’s the best hose we’ve ever tested.
The Eley 5/8-inch Polyurethane Garden Hose was a revelation to us. It’s the best hose we’ve ever handled, and after using it for a while, we came to see all other hoses, including our other picks, as cumbersome, primitive, and dysfunctional. Compared with quality rubber hoses like the Continental and the Dramm, the Eley is lighter (much lighter), easier to loop, and more durable, and it seems immune to any kind of folding or kinking. The brass fittings at the ends are large and easy to tighten by hand or wrench, and it comes with a 10-year warranty (twice as long as the coverage that Eley offered on its discontinued rubber hose). With all of these high points, this Eley hose doesn’t come cheap—costing roughly $110 for a 50-foot length, it’s certainly an investment. But if you have trouble hefting a heavier hose or if you just want to simplify and eliminate as many of the daily micro-frustrations of a garden hose, this Eley hose is very much worth considering. It’s available in a variety of sizes, and Eley can even make custom lengths.
Also great
Manageable, lightweight, and easy to store, this coiled hose is perfect for a small patio, where you don’t need a ton of range or the absolute maximum water volume.
The HoseCoil ⅜-inch Self Coiling Garden Hose (25 feet) is neither as tough nor as long as our other picks, but for a small patio, balcony, or yard—where dragging around a big 50-footer feels like overkill—it’s a fine alternative. The HoseCoil’s main selling point is its retractable corkscrew design, which works as advertised in making the hose easy to extend, recoil, and store. Compared with our bigger picks, this ⅜-inch-diameter hose loses a quarter-inch of capacity, which translated to slightly lower water pressure in our side-by-side trials. Although the HoseCoil’s total length is 25 feet, in practice it’s really good for only about 17 feet before it starts to strain. As with our heavier-duty picks, the HoseCoil’s nozzle end has flat facets for a wrench to grab. Its two-year warranty is reassuring, too; though we’ve heard of some HoseCoils lasting longer, hitting the two-year mark is about what we’d expect. We have a test unit that has been doing fine after two years of intermittent use and daily Southern California sun exposure.
Our pick
The Eley hose reel offers top-notch durability, overall quality, and ease of use. It’s not cheap, but it solves all of the problems people have with hose reels.
You can find a lot of inexpensive hose reels out there, but in our experience, we’ve seen too many limitations and frustrations—poor quality, iffy stability, and small wheels—for us to recommend one. For a far superior reel, one that solves all those frustrations, we recommend the Eley Portable Garden Hose Reel Cart, or if you prefer a wall-mounted version, the Eley Wall Mounted Garden Hose Reel. In the world of hose reels, Eley models have a stellar reputation, and after testing one, we fully understand why.
The build quality of the Eley reel is as good as it gets: The strong metal frame provides stability, the giant tires easily bounce over an uneven lawn, the handles are comfortable and well placed, and the reel itself pulls in a hose with minimal effort. The components are heavy-duty, and it’s an item that we expect would last a lifetime with proper care.
Also great
The Hoselink hose pulls out easily and retracts on its own, making it a great choice for those who need the length but want minimal hassle.
The Hoselink 82ft Retractable Hose Reel offers a simple way to manage a lot of hose with minimal effort. It’s 82 feet of hose on an enclosed reel that pulls out easily and retracts on its own after a slight tug, like a window blind. A guide roller at the reel moves back and forth as the hose retracts, guaranteeing that the hose spools on evenly, not all in one lump. The set comes with 6.5 feet of leader hose, and a quick-connect system on both the leader hose and the main hose makes attaching and detaching the connections easy. The quick-connect piece at the end of the main hose even has its own shutoff, further simplifying a nozzle swap; this quick-connect piece also freely rotates, so you can shift the spray nozzle around without twisting the hose. Because you can mount the Hoselink reel at any height, it eliminates any bending over or back strain associated with knee-level reels or hose spigots. We were skeptical of the Hoselink reel at first, but after having used it daily for a month, we’ve found that it’s an efficient way to keep a hose off the lawn. So far the only downside we’ve seen is that the hose is only ½ inch in diameter—not ⅝ inch like the others—so jobs like filling buckets take longer.
