How To Choose a Climbing Harness

Find out from the experts at Black Diamond, the tips to find the best rock climbing harness for you.

This goes around your waist (surprise, surprise!). Some harnesses have tons of padding and a wide waist belt, while others are super minimalist with more of an emphasis on keeping the overall weight down. This part of the harness is meant to rest on the top of your hip bones.

Leg loops

Some are adjustable, some are not. If you are looking for a versatile harness for both winter and warm weather climbing, we’d suggest going with a harness with fully adjustable leg loops.

Belay loop

Some of our lightweight, high-performance harnesses have our patented Infinity Belay Loop, which eliminates carabiner shift when belaying. Others, like the Long Haul harness, have two belay loops, while others still, like the Couloir, have a simple, lightweight loop that is mostly used for rappelling.

Gear loops

Are you carrying a triple rack or a single dog draw? Having an excess of gear loops on your sport climbing harness is overkill, while cramming a rack of cams onto a harness without enough gear loops isn’t ideal either. The type of climbing you’re getting into will dictate the number, size, and material construction of gear loops on your new harness.

Haul loop

Need to clip a tag line to your harness? Not sure what that means? Some types of climbing, like sport climbing or climbing in the gym don’t really require a haul loop. If you’re climbing big walls or multi-pitch routes, you’ll probably want a harness with a haul loop, or at least a fifth gear loop in the back so that you can clip a tag line or a haul line to your harness.

Different Harnesses for Different Climbing Styles

Sport Climbing

If you’re mostly focused on sport climbing, you’ll probably want a harness that is lightweight and comfortable. Long belays, full days at the crag, and time spent working your project all require a harness that ideally you forget you have on. The Black Diamond Solution is your best bet for day-in-day-out sport climbing use. If you’re looking for something even more lightweight, the Black Diamond AirNet harness is ultralight and highly breathable, which is great for the gym climbing, or redpoint burns.

The All-ArounderMaybe you are on the hunt for a harness that can do it all. Meet theBlack Diamond Zone harness. This is your do it all harness. It’s equally at home cragging in Indian Creek, sessioning the sport crag in the Southeast, or climbing long routes in Red Rocks. The Zone is even up for alpine missions, with five gear loops and two ice clipper slots.

Alpine Climbing Built for the four-season climber who wants a harness that provides both versatility and comfort on steep ice or rock, theBlack Diamond Technician harnessis the ticket. Adjustable leg loops, four ice clipper slots, five gear loops, and a haul loop provide all the features needed for most mountain outings.

Big Wall ClimbingTheBlack Diamond Long Haul harnessis the latest version of our big wall specific climbing harness. Though it’s a bit bulkier than most of our other harnesses, this thing is seriously comfortable. If you’re going to be on a wall for multiple days, this is the ticket to avoid getting battered by your harness. It also has tons of space for gear with five molded gear loops, plus a fully rated haul loop as an extra safety feature.