The Minimalist Guide to Packing for Your Next Trip

avatarGT | 5/14/25 | travel

Packing for a trip is no one’s relaxing way to unwind. Traveling is stressful packing can be too. Inevitably, we overthink, procrastinate and over-pack. Well, here I’m going to unpack the process of packing and provide some solutions to help keep the contents of your luggage to a minimum for your next trip. You may even enjoy packing after this. Let’s get started.

You don’t have be a minimalist in life to be a minimalist in travel. Travel is all about consolidating for a journey, so look at packing your bags as an opportunity to scale down and simplify. Great packing starts with a mindset. The first point to address is your bag.

Choose Your Bag

When traveling by air, do you ever notice the flight crew in transit and take note of how organized and minimal their baggage appears to be? The small, rolling pieces of luggage neatly stacked, easily maneuvered and effortlessly stored gives you pause when you look at the heaping, unwieldy mess to which you are bound.

Great packing starts with a great bag and an understanding of your travel needs. Start with a list of everything you’re bringing and keep that with you as you pack - don’t pack from memory. Is your journey in a car? A plane? Boat? Some combination of all of these? What is the travel time and how long are you spending at your destination? What goods and services will you have access to? How much of your personal items do you need to bring and how many items could your purchase at your destination? What are you doing and what is the climate?

Answer with a critical honesty because this is the first test and how you plan based on these responses determines the success or failure of your packing. There are pros and cons to luggage. There’s durability and maneuverability, comfort, pliability (smash-ability), and volume. A great bag is going to be some combination of all these things, but you’re going to have to make some trade-offs.

Soft bags that can expand slightly are going to be excellent for storage capacity. They tend to be bulkier but the soft material also allows the bag to compress for easier storage in overhead compartments or stacked with dozens of other bags. A comfortable backpack with sturdy, cushioned, adjustable straps is a great option and my personal favorite. The downside to this option is that you may be stuck carrying the thing for an extended duration, so make sure its easy to wear.

If you’re partial to the hard shell luggage, look for a bag with wheels and an extendable handle. Find a set that can stack so you can easily attach smaller bags to the roller. For extensive walking, these bags are great for saving your back and shoulders from strain, but beware, uneven, unfinished surfaces are a problem for the wheels and if you have to carry this luggage, you might regret the decision. Know you journey and bag accordingly.

Moving Mindset

Packing well can be reduced to consolidation and compression. Take only what you need - think like you’re moving and preparing your possessions for transit. Heavier, bulkier items should be at the bottom or base of your bag. Lighter items and things you may need immediate access to should be near the top. You can fill in the middle and the gaps with smaller items. I prefer keeping t-shirts, pants, shorts, hoodies, etc in a separate smaller zip clothing bag. This helps to keep things even more compartmentalized and keeps your clothes nicely stacked and neatly folded. Be discriminating with what you pack and optimize for space.

Another recommendation is to keep your toiletries in a small bag. If traveling by air, you likely will need to have these items in a clear plastic case anyway, so keep an airport approved bag on hand for these items anytime you’re hitting the road. Strategically separating items and assembling a collection of smaller bags inside your larger travel bag is the best approach to organization. If your bag were a model of your living space, you’d want to have it organized and structured by room. Think of your bag like rooms within a house.

Go Light

Your ultimate objective when packing is always weight. No matter the type of trip or type of bag, weight is your adversary. A heavy bag is a problem bag. Everything else you’ve done up to this point can be reduced to a simple question: how much does your bag weigh? You may or may not want (or need) to physically weigh your bag, but your ability to comfortably maneuver and carry your bag at capacity is the final gauntlet of packing.

Backpackers, mountaineers / climbers understand this rule well. Every small reduction in weight of your pack helps speed, endurance, and to some extent, comfort. You don’t have to be going on an outdoor expedition to adopt the minimalist mentality when packing. Like the adventurer undertaking an ostensibly overwhelming challenge, break the goal into small, manageable blocks. Plan, create a packing list, collect and compartmentalize your belongings, put everything together, and execute.

Organization and, by extension, packing takes deliberation and a ruthless sense of utility. Try a minimalist approach when packing for your next trip and see if it makes the experience smoother. Happy packing!

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