GORUCK GR1 vs GR3 – Our Review

Whether you’ve never heard of GORUCK before today or if you’re a total company fanboy, you probably have a pretty good idea of what a “ruck” looks like.

Big bag, hauls a bunch of stuff, walk for miles with, afterwards post pics/watch stats to internet

Sounds about right…right?

If this does sound like pretty standard stuff, our discussion of two of the more popular GORUCK bags probably won’t seem all that novel to you, especially since they both come from the iconic “GR” line of bags.

More specifically, we’re talking about the GR1 vs GR3 matchup.

However, for a couple of bags from the same company’s same product line, there are actually a lot of differences between the two as well as numerous interesting characteristics and attributes that personify each of them.

Without further ado, let’s take a look at two of the stalwarts from GORUCK’s “travel rucksack” lineup:

GORUCK GR1 vs GR3

I know you check out reviews such as this one in order to cut through the crap of retailers’ marketing materials.

Trust me, I can definitely respect you for this (I can totally empathize, too!)

However, I wouldn’t be doing my due diligence without providing some of this information…just to provide some introductory context and to give a little bit of background information about each of the bags in question…before the real fun begins…

First, the GR1:

“FROM BAGHDAD TO NYC

GR1 was built to thrive in Baghdad and NYC and has been tested and proven by Green Berets to meet the life or death standards of quality, toughness, and performance. It has proven itself the world over and earned its “Greatest Of All Time” status the hard way: one deployment, one event, one trip, one mile at a time. 1,000 Events/year, 175,000+ participants, and 200+ Special Forces Cadre later, the GORUCK Challenge is the most significant quality control program of its kind. No other bag is consistently put through more abuse, and GR1 thrives.

The GR1 is built with a minimalist approach in mind and includes only the necessary features of an everyday carry rucksack: a bombproof laptop compartment, opens flat for easy packing, built with Special Forces grade materials, and soft but tough 210D CORDURA on the back panel and shoulder straps so your ruck doesn’t irritate your skin or chew up your apparel.

Proven to Special Forces standards, GR1 is synonymous with the best of American Manufacturing. Each GR1 is built to last and comes with our Scars Lifetime Guarantee.“

Personally, I think this description is a bit try-hard, but I can appreciate the confidence, the use of statistics, as well as the claim that this bag will suit me just fine as I’m planning my long-awaited dream vacation to Iraq.

Next, the GR3:

“LARGEST POSSIBLE CARRY-ON RUCKSACK

Traveling hands-free is freedom and nobody brings a roll bag on an adventure. Never check a bag and never drag anything behind you ever again with GR3®.

The 45L GR3® is the largest possible carry-on rucksack, sized to fit in the overhead bin of all major airlines.

The 35L GR3® maximizes packing space in a compact form factor, sized to fit in all overhead bins.

It’s big, tough, and overbuilt with the best materials on the market. Proudly backed by our Scars Lifetime Guarantee.“

In case you couldn’t quite figure out what the GR3’s whole selling point is…well, to put it simply…it’s a big carry-on bag. It also prides itself on not being dragged behind you (or, worse, being pushed or pulled on a luggage cart!) while navigating the airport.

Cool…I guess…

Anyways, those intros aside…

Rucking

You might be thinking about doing a little traveling with your (soon-to-be) new ruck, but I would imagine that if you’re looking at GORUCK bags, you’re likely most interested in throwing a plate in it, hitting the pavement (or trail) and getting going.

…and for this kind of activity, both of these bags do the job pretty well.

In regard to the GR1, it’s kind of hard to find fault with the “Greatest of All Time” ruck, especially considering that it was initially engineered in an era before rucks had dedicated plate pockets, heavy-duty velcroed enclosures, and other “ruck-enhancing” novelties. Nevertheless, it has a few unique attributes that make it better than the vast majority of its competitors for the task:

• Heavily-padded shoulder straps that do anything except dig into the shoulders during longer outings.
• A decently hard, but not invasive frame sheet that keeps the weight of the packed ruck plate off the back (as opposed to constantly being poked by the plate in the absence of one).
• Dedicated internal sleeve (that just happens to perfectly accommodate GORUCK-branded ruck plates)

The internal sleeve is nice, but doesn’t really secure your plate as well as something like the Rucker, but the frame sheet and shoulder straps are up there with the best.

To expand a bit more on the straps, they are (in addition to the other parts of the bag that are most likely to come into contact with exposed skin) constructed of a different, less abrasive material than the remainder of the bag.

Like most of GORUCK’s gear, the GR1 is mainly constructed of durable 1000D Cordura. This is very resilient, hard-to-tear/scuff material that is pretty much the standard in rucks today. However, the 210D Cordura of the shoulder straps and select other areas is much less likely to irritate the skin (“ruck burn” is a thing!), making it a very welcome bag construction innovation.

With adequate space to haul water, snacks, and anything extra you might need, the GR1 is an excellent choice for “pure” rucking.

…and the GR3 ain’t no slouch either.

There is a lot of commonality between the GR bags, although the GR3 is rightfully characterized as the “travel bag” of the company’s “travel rucks”. Besides its sheer size (between 35 and 45-liter options), small touches like side handles (for easy hauling through the airport) lend it to be more of your go-to duffel than daily rucker.

Unlike the GR1, the GR3 doesn’t actually have an internal sleeve appropriate for a ruck plate. This isn’t the end of the world, but it does allow for a bit more plate jostling than is ideal.

Additionally, the GR3 is no longer compatible with GORUCK’s padded hip belt. To be honest, I’ve only ever used a hip belt, like, twice (it’s just not for me), but, as we’ll see later on, this is a big deal to a lot of ruckers (and, for many, even a deal-breaker). If you like to transfer some of that weight from your shoulders to your hips while rucking, the GR3 ain’t the bag to do it with.

As a smaller (5’7″/160) guy, the GR3 also feels a bit big on my back. As someone who prefers a smaller, more compact bag, it’s pretty much the opposite of my preferred choice. However, I do find it much more comfortable to ruck in than other, comparably-sized bags.

Individual preferences (ex. you need a bigger ruck, you need a hip belt) may bring these two bags closer together (or further apart) as there is a lot of subjectivity in ruck preferences. Ultimately, though, the GR1 outpaces the GR3 as far as pure rucking bags go.

Winner: GR1

Dynamic Rucking

It’s an unpopular take, but one that has to be stated, nonetheless:

GORUCK’s GR bags aren’t the best for dynamic rucking (ex. ruck pull-ups, ruck swings, ruck presses, ruck get-ups). If you’re looking for bags that are legitimately good for this kind of activity, I suggest checking out the Rucker line or even the company’s dedicated Plate Carrier.

That caveat aside, even among these two, one makes a lot more sense as a dynamic rucking bag than the other…and that’s the GR1.

As previously stated, the GR1’s internal sleeve perfectly accommodates GORUCK’s standard-sized ruck plates. As important as this is during “trad rucking”, this is exponentially more important when you’re throwing your bag around, pressing it, or running in it. The plate doesn’t remain as secure as it does in the Rucker’s heavily-padded, velcro-shutting plate pocket, but it works pretty well.

In contrast, with the GR3…well…get used to that plate going all over the place. As you can imagine, this is not ideal. You can sorta get away with this during more “stationary” exercises (ex. squats, pull-ups), but any exercise that involves swinging, pressing, etc…ain’t so good.

Speaking of ruck swings, I can assure you that these are much more difficult (mainly due to how awkward they are) with a larger, bulkier bag. Not only is the weight distribution off (the hands are close together on top of the large bag), but you have to keep your legs really wide to allow the bag to swing through.

These exercises aren’t nearly as much trouble with the smaller, more compact GR1, although there can be a little bit of plate jostling.

It probably goes without saying that running is a bit more difficult with a larger, “enveloping” ruck strapped to your back than it is with a more compact option, making the GR3…less than ideal for your first (or next) crack at “ruck Murph”. It also wouldn’t be my first (or tenth) choice for Chad.

Neither the GR1 nor the GR3 have the side handles or drainage holes that make many of the common GORUCK Event movements (like ruck suitcase carries) or “excursions” (submerging into bodies of water) more tolerable so if you have a GORUCK Light, Basic, Tough, or Heavy planned…you might want to look at the company’s Training Ruck options.

With that being said, the GR1 is by no means a “bad” dynamic rucking option. It easily outpaces the GR3 in this category.

Winner: GR1

Load Capacity

As you can probably imagine, the GR3 pretty much cleans up in this category. A quick scan of the GR1 and GR3 pages reveals that the former tops out at a 26-liter capacity while the latter goes as big as 45-liters…almost doubling its adversary up!

In some cases, we see something like a 20-to-30 percent disparity and don’t think much of it, but the GR3’s capacity is over 70 percent larger.

That is a major difference.

On top of that, you could make the argument that a higher percentage of the GR3’s capacity is effective, particularly if you have larger items to haul around. Because the 45-liter GR3 doesn’t even have a ruck plate pocket/internal sleeve and is literally just a yuge, single open compartment, you have all of that space available for use.

At 26 liters, the GR1 is no slouch, but just can’t compare to the GR3. Also, while its internal pockets can be useful organizers (the internal sleeve also works as a makeshift laptop pocket), they do (slightly) eat into its overall effective load capacity.

One point I will give to the GR1 relates to something I mentioned in the “Rucking” section above; its plate pocket does give it actual “capacity” for (appropriately-sized) ruck plates. Of course, you can easily stick any old plate into the GR3, but it feels a little awkward just being “loose” inside the bag. As such, the GR1’s “dedicated ruck plate capacity” is technically higher.

That being said, the GR1 can win a partial point on a technicality while the GR3 just…wins.

Winner: GR3

Customer Reviews

When it comes to GORUCK customer reviews, there are 2 things you always need to keep in mind:

• It’s (currently) really hard to find a large number of reviews on a third-party website
• The review totals on the official GORUCK product pages are really high

Those caveats aside, I want to let you know that:

• I was only able to take review scores from the official GORUCK product pages for the GR1 and GR3
• The collective scores for both were/are really high (each scored/scores a collective 4.8 out of 5)

Tie ball game here!

Scores this high do a pretty good job of telling us just how much people like these bags, but I think the true value comes when checking out the not so good scores/reviews. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at things), there aren’t really any consistent themes or common complaints among the lower scores for either bag.

Probably the closest thing you can find to a “complaint” with either bag (besides people complaining about “value” or shipping times or whatever) is the GR3’s lack of hip belt compatibility. Apparently, this is a newer development that some people haven’t taken too kindly to. However, people who are really upset about it appear to be getting roasted on Reddit:

Reddit, man…they go hard!

Anyways, one last thing to note is that although both bags currently sport 4.8 collective customer review scores, the GR1 has a much larger sample size (2072 reviews):

The GR3’s sample size (245) is nothing to sneeze at, but until it gets those numbers up, it’s a bit more susceptible to swings, even by a relatively small number of reviews:

For now, though, we’re still calling this one a tie.

Winner: Tie

Price

Remember that cliche, throwaway comment at the beginning of the article (the whole, “you may have never heard of GORUCK before!1!!1!” nonsense)? Yeah, I knew it wasn’t true when I wrote it and that you had/have a pretty good idea of what you were getting into when you clicked on this article.

Nice bags, but expensive nice bags.

If this is the case, you’ll be happy to know that you were right (I would imagine that you’re also pretty unhappy that you’re right…chalk it up to the Game)!

There are very few items in the GORUCK arsenal that could reasonably be classified as “moderately-priced goods” (an argument can be made for the GORUCK Plate Carrier, though) and neither the GR1 nor the GR3 are exceptions to this rule.

At this point in time, short of the somewhat frequent GORUCK sales, the least expensive GR1 is going to run you just under $350. That’s an expensive backpack, no matter the size materials, or capabilities.

As you might expect, the much larger GR3’s floor price is greater than the GR1’s, but relatively speaking, it ain’t that bad. Clocking in at just over $400, you get a bit more bang for your buck (regarding load capacity, at least) with the Cordura iteration of the GR3 than you do with the GR1. At that price point, the GR3 also holds up better against other, non-GORUCK bags in its size range.

If you’re looking for the bag that has the least expensive absolute price, the GR1 wins. However, we assume you take at least a few other factors into consideration. As such, we’re comfortable giving the GR3 the “W” here, mainly due to all of its relative price advantages.

Winner: GR3

Overall Winner

According to our metrics…we have…a tie!

This is actually a pretty interesting result to me since these are actually two pretty different bags (and also because of the…ya know…odd number of measurable categories…) with ample opportunity for one to pull away.

We didn’t include an “EDC” or “Travel” category here so maybe the GR3 actually would have pulled ahead (especially since we went a little harder on the rucking categories), but this is the way this cookie happened to crumble.

With that being said, if you are looking for more of a travel-dedicated bag, the GR3 (or even the GORUCK Kit Bag) is likely going to be your winner while the GR1 is the option (between these two) if rucking is the name of the game.

…or…ya know…you could just play it safe and get your hands on both!

Our Testing Process

Although I’m definitely more in the “training ruck” camp as opposed to the “travel ruck” contingent, I’ve gotten plenty of opportunities to put these bad boys to use. Of course, the GR1 has been on its fair share of travel excursions (I always DD when we’re out!), but both bags have grown accustomed to my usual ruck outings in the area.

Truth be told, I’m not using these all that often for dynamic rucking (I don’t ever intend to put the GR3 through those rigors again…both for its sake and for my own), but my experiences with them in developing this review have been pretty sufficient enough for me to come to definitive conclusions about how they hold up in these areas.

Frequently Asked Questions

After 5 grueling rounds…we have time for just a few more questions.

The GORUCK GR1 and the GORUCK GR3…the best of the “travel rucks”…?

From my personal experiences and from what I come across online, I’m in a somewhat small minority of ruckers who really prefer a training-style ruck to those that you can haul with you for a week or two across Europe.

Maybe I’m too one-dimensional in how I organize things (I like for each ruck to have its own designated purpose), but this has led to “training rucks” being my personal favorite bags.

With that being said, I have a lot of love for both of these bags, especially for the GR1. It truly is a “do everything kind of bag.

…but I appreciate what the GR3 offers as well. If you want to travel and ruck (in that order) with one bag, it’s a tough one to beat.

I get that if you’re looking for your first ruck, you’re almost inevitably going to default to the GR1 (it’s just the way it goes), but remember to keep our “price-to-size” and overall load capacity considerations in mind during your search. The GR1 is excellent at a lot of things, but if you like ’em big and proportionately inexpensive, the GR3 should definitely be on your radar.