EcoFlow RIVER Portable Power Station

Last year Ecoflow were kind enough to send me one of the their River 288Wh portable power stations, and to say that it’s been useful is a huge understatement, it’s become almost as indispensable as my mobile phone.

Weighing in at a reasonable 5kg, the River has a built-in sturdy handle on the top and overall feels fairly rugged, it’s also small enough to store in a corner of your 4x4 without taking over the entire boot and hides neatly in your tent.

On the front of the River you’ll find a 100W USB-C slot, two USB-A slots and a fast charge USB-A outlet. There’s also a 12V cigarette lighter outlet that has been incredibly useful for for the tyre compressor. Nestled in the centre there’s an easy to read display screen that includes hours and % left, input and output, and it’s very simple to use and understand - even for this luddite. Just to the left of the display screen there is a small torch with a few different illumination modes that’s perfectly adequate in an emergency, but you wouldn’t want to carry the River around the camp on a regular basis.

On one side you have two AC outlets that are activated by pressing a small button. Once fired up, you’ll be able to boil a kettle multiple times, run a fridge for up to three hours and so on. Switch to X-Boost technology and you’re able to power high-wattage appliances up to 1800W, which is enough to power a hairdryer, or even a lawnmower, apparently!

The other side is where you’ll find the sockets to charge up the River. The Ecoflow River can be fully charged in only 96 minutes via your home socket, or 3 hours by plugging it into your car with the car adapter. You can also charge it using Ecoflow’s solar panels, and I’ll get onto that later.

You can power up to 9 devices at once using all the ports, and you have enough power to charge your phone 21 times, MacBook Air’s battery five times or even make 12 cups of coffee with a coffee maker - or you can simply bring your kettle from home. Another handy feature is that on the display it tells you how much time you have left until it runs out of power. more at » uk.ecoflow.com

It really comes into its own when you’re out touring and camping, as during the day it can be plugged into the vehicle’s 12v socket, then in the evening it’ll power up an LED strip light, and top up my phone, iPad, rechargeable camp lights and other bits, and in the morning it’ll even handle a small induction hob for breakfast. A friend of mine uses his River to keep his portable fridge charged during the night as he hasn’t got a split-charge system in his pickup yet.

It isn’t just a handy product to take camping, it's also a sensible insurance policy for around your home, too. I’m not what you’d call a prepper, but it’s nice to know that if there was a power outage I can still charge my phones and iPad that’ll keep me in contact with the outside world. I can also plug in my kettle and toaster for a brew and toast!

Typically, whilst I’ve been putting the River to good use and completing this review, the good folk at Ecoflow haven’t been resting on their laurels, they’ve been busily updating and improving their wares and have recently released their the new River 2, so it could be argued that this review is slightly out of date. However, a quick search on the web shows the River is still for sale at various sites at a greatly reduced price, so I’d be inclined to grab a bargain whilst you still can.