The 7 Best Vacuum Storage Bags for Clothes

Spacesaver makes the claim that their bag is the original vacuum storage bag, and indeed, it has many copycats that appear to be exact replicas. Spacesaver comes in five sizes, with two, three, five, or eight bags to a packet, and a hand pump is included. We stuffed a large Spacesaver bag (24″ x 32″) with bulky towels and zipped it shut. The zip clip was a bit stiff in running it across the zipper, but it sealed the bag the first time without our having to re-do it.

The Spacesaver hand pump screws tightly into the triple-seal valve, and it quickly sucked out air as efficiently as a vacuum cleaner. We checked the bag daily during our week-long testing period, and it showed no signs of leakage. When we unsealed it, the towels had wrinkles and an impression of the valve, which proved how completely the bag had been vacuum-sealed. We did, however, need to fluff the towels in a drier to remove the wrinkles. Spacesaver is a small U.S. company and is the only brand that offers a full refund after 30 days and has a lifetime replacement policy should a bag prove faulty.

GONGSHI is one of the copycat vacuum storage bags, but it’s an excellent alternative to our top choice and also a great value. The GONGSHI bags come in various sizes and packages from 10 to 12 bags per package. We tested the four-size 12 pack that has three small bags (16″ x 24″), three medium (20″ x 28″), three large (24″ x 32″, and three jumbo (30″ x 40″), which, for our testing, comfortably held two large 17″ x 26″ pillows. The separately packaged zipper clips sealed smoothly with one or two zips.

The GONGSHI bags come with the hand pump, which is a bit flimsy but worked fine with the smaller bags though it wasn’t as good with the jumbo bag. In fact, we gave up pumping and sealed it with a vacuum cleaner. The sealer valve is slightly smaller than other bags, so we had to press the vacuum hose firmly over the valve before air was removed. As with Spacesaver, the GONGSHI bags lost no air over a week’s time. The GONGSHI bags are well-priced and for the number of bags you get in each package — along with the pump — they’re a great value.

The Amazon Basics vacuum storage bags have all the attributes of our top choices. They’re available in medium, large, and jumbo in packages of six. However, the multiple pack (four or five of all three sizes) comes in a 12 pack — which is more expensive than GONGSHI’s 12 pack — and a 15 pack. The Amazon bags are also made in China and are of the same good quality as GONGSHI.

The included pump, however, is sturdier and efficiently vacuum-sealed a jumbo bag (30″ x 40″) in just a couple of minutes without much effort. The seal held firm during our week’s testing and when we removed the bulky towels we had sealed inside, they had fewer wrinkles than the fabrics we sealed in the Spacesaver and GONGSHI bags.

Despite Storage Master’s claim that its bags have five layers of plastic, we were hard-pressed to find them. The bags are no thicker than the other bags we tested, but it does have a unique crinkly embossing that, in our testing, seemed to adhere — almost like shrink wrapping — more snugly to the fabrics inside the bag. The zipper and zipper clip are sturdier than the other bags, and the bag was sealed after running the clip along the zipper once.

The bags are decorated with a blue plaid pattern, and a matching hand pump is included. The pump is quite substantial and isn’t as flimsy as the others we tested, but we did find it arduous to use, requiring lots of strength and elbow grease to deflate the bag. The Storage Master bag retained its vacuum seal for the testing period, but when we opened the bag, the clothes inside were deeply wrinkled. The Storage Master bags come in five sizes, including a travel size for rolling up clothes into compact packages for a suitcase.

Except for the labelling, the BoxLegend clothing storage bags are identical to the Amazon Basics bags. We tested the combo package that has two jumbos, two larges, two mediums, and two smalls. We did find it irritating that the sizes aren’t printed on the bags and had to drag out the tape measure to determine which size was which.

That gripe aside, the zip clip secured the zipper tightly with only one try. A hand pump is not included, so we sealed them with a vacuum, and it took only 15 seconds to deflate. The bags held the vacuum sealed, and when we opened them, we were pleasantly surprised that the clothes inside weren’t wrinkled at all. If you don’t care about the hand pump, the BoxLegend bags are affordable and a good value.

The HIbag vacuum storage bags only come in boxed combinations — 10, 15, 20, and 28 bags to a box — with five sizes: jumbo, large, medium, small, and roll-up (travel). As noted earlier, the roll-up bags, in our opinion, defeat the purpose of a vacuum sealer bag. It’s simply a large Ziploc bag that you need to squeeze out the air as you’re rolling up clothes into a cylinder.

The HIbag comes with adhesive labels for recording contents and date, which we thought was a nice touch — and the exact same blue hand pump as the Storage Master bag. The pump seemed not as well-made, however, so we sealed the jumbo bag with a vacuum. But the bag never quite sealed completely — perhaps because the zipper was so flimsy — and during our testing period, it had slightly inflated.

The Simple Houseware vacuum storage bags have over 25,000 mostly positive reviews on Amazon, so we had high hopes for this product. The extra large bags we tested measure 26.5″ x 39.5″; however, the stop fill line is 7″ deep — the most of any bag we tested — so that subtracts from the actual length and amount the bag can be filled.

The zipper was very tricky to seal, and we had to repeatedly close it, using the zip clip and our fingers. Simple Houseware seems aware of this problem, since instructions say the zipper needs to be zipped three or four times. Of course, it bears asking why not just replace the slipshod zipper with a better one?Read more…

Hundreds of reviews also mention that the bags are great for short-term storage but don’t hold up over the long term. Since a hand pump isn’t included, we sealed the bags with a vacuum. The seal, however, didn’t even hold up overnight, and by the end of the week, the bags had almost completely deflated.