Jetboil Flash Lite Stove – Less is More

JetBoil Flash Lite

Want to save a few grams with your camping gear? There are plenty of ways to go lighter, but a lot of them make you compromise in one way or another. The Flash Lite from Jetboil is not one of those. You still get the flux ring and piezo ignition. Jetboil made the cup just a bit smaller, and changed the burner and shroud to save weight. But there is no drop in performance.

Going from a 1 liter cup to a .8 liter cup to save a few grams would not really get anyone too excited. So the whole cooking system went on a diet. Even the lid got changed. It’s not as tall, and the sippy opening has a small lip to make up for that. A nice touch is a set of small strainer holes opposite the larger single hole. Jetboil then cut some weight from the shroud and the burner. At first glance, the angle cut of the openings in the shroud did not look like they should save any weight. But then I counted them, and there are 9 in the Lite, compared to 10 in the 1 liter Flash. There’s a little less metal, based on my “measure by eyeball” math. The real savings is in the burner though. If you view it from above, there is a lot less metal. From below, there is a lot less plastic. From the side, it looks like about half the fat has been trimmed off. Oddly, there is one part that is bigger. Below the burner, there is actually more metal where gas and air is mixed. Yet when I weighed the two burner units, my Flash came in at 5.2 ounces, and the Flash Lite a mere 4.0 ounces.

Flash Lite (L) and Flash (R) burner comparison

Find your Jetboil Flash Lite stove on Amazon!

Flash Lite (L) and Flash (R) burner comparison

Now that I have gone over all the points where you’ll find less, it’s time to mention where you get more. As expected from changes made to the burner, the air and fuel mixture is definitely more efficient. In a side-by-side test, my Flash Lite boiled faster than my Flash. Both had water from the same source, and despite being lit first, the Flash didn’t bring my water to boil first. I didn’t time it, and we were at about 6,700 feet. For me, this means that first cup of coffee is ready a few seconds sooner, but the reality is that it will probably use less fuel. If you are cooking in the pot, rather than just boiling water, the new lid with the strainer holes makes your next mile-high pasta dish a bit less messy.

Before I got the Flash Lite from Jetboil for our review, I really thought that they had just cut down the pot, and kept the price the same. But after comparing it to my original Flash, I can see that they cut out only what we didn’t need, and improved it. Same price, but better, and it takes up a little less space in your pack. Check it out at Jetboil.com

– Brian

I‘d like to thank Jetboil for providing their Flash Lite stove for this review. Like most people, we have a limit to the funds we can spend on our gear. So to be able to review them, then share that review with our readers, allows us to pay it forward in a way that we hope will benefit everyone.