The thought of coffee rustled me from my sleeping bag, as it does most mornings. I could hear the wind howling against my truck. Bleary-eyed, I peeked out the window and saw our camp chairs blown over, and my friend’s tent flapping in the late September breeze. It was a blustery fall day. Good thing I had a wind-resistant camping stove, I thought, and climbed out of bed.

You can probably guess some of my favorite backpacking stoves. But I’d never used a Primus until I got the Ulti Stove System last fall. It’s a sleek, compact, modern-looking camping and backpacking stove. According to the brand, this is its most wind-resistant and powerful stove system to date, packing 3,000 W of firepower.

It was a good morning to test those claims. I sat outside at the camp table, filled the stove with water, and lit the burner. The circular metal heating ignited with a flash and turned a satisfying molten orange color.

It was go time. I put the water on to boil and waited, watching desert dust blow in the wind around me.

In short: The Primus Ulti Stove System’s ($375) flameless, disc burner uses catalytic combustion and infrared radiation to heat an anodized aluminum pot. It comes at a premium price, but for harsh conditions and windy environments, this portable stove system packs a punch. It boils water in minutes, is highly resistant to cold and wind, is fuel-efficient, and doesn’t take up much space. High alpine explorers and winter campers alike will appreciate the Ulti.

Check out GearJunkie’s guide to the Best Backpacking Stoves.

Primus Ulti Stove System Review

Editor’s note: This stove is currently only available through European retailers. The U.S. rollout was pushed back several times and then stalled by President Trump’s tariffs. Primus suggests using a retailer like TrekkInn that will ship the stove internationally for a nominal fee. We will update this review when that changes.

GearJunkie has reviewed infrared camping stoves in the past. But when Primus reached out about its powerful, wind-resistant, fuel-efficient Ulti Stove System, I was intrigued. The brand designed this “next-gen burner” specifically for cooking in harsh conditions, like those you find in the alpine or on any winter camping trip.

The Ulti mixes fuel and air inside its burner and uses a metal alloy catalyst to reduce the energy it needs to heat things quickly. The burner is flameless and instead uses infrared radiation, which is extremely resistant to wind and cold. The entire system packs inside its pot and is compact enough to easily fit in a backpack. It’s also compatible with both 100g and 230g fuel canisters.

I received my Ulti in September and used it through the fall and on my annual winter camping trip in Leadville, Colo. It’s a slick stove, and the more I used it, the more utility I found in its design.

The Design

Like many backpacking stoves, the Primus Ulti packs into itself. The anodized aluminum disc and pot are perfectly sized, so there is no rattling when they’re packed together. It’s smaller than a Nalgene, so it fits easily into a backpack for travel and transportation.

However, despite its smaller size, the Primus Ulti is a hefty boy. At 1.3 pounds, it is heavier than every other stove in our guide to the Best Backpacking Stoves.

The only other one that comes close is the MSR Reactor, which is also designed for alpine environments and has a similarly high price. However, that stove has a 2.5L pot, compared to the Ulti’s 1L pot. So, no matter how you slice it, this is a heavy backpacking stove.

There is no built-in ignitor, so you must carry a lighter or a book of matches with you. The burner has three fold-out legs that stabilize it. The remote hose system also has a nifty feature that allows you to balance the gas canister upside down. That leverages gravity to help increase fuel efficiency in cold and high-altitude environments.

In the Field

I used my Ulti throughout fall and into winter, camping all over the states of Colorado and Utah. Generally, in regular camping conditions (not windy or particularly cold), it performed on par with my trusty Jetboil. It took slightly longer to boil water, but we’re talking maybe 30 seconds longer — so it was pretty much negligible.

Because there’s no flame, it isn’t always obvious in daylight whether this stove is on. Look for little sparkles on the mesh top of the burner for a good indicator that it’s on and hot. If the light is right, though, the stove glows a bright orange (pictured above).

In windy weather, this stove blew me away (pun intended). Where my Jetboil surely would have blown out and needed a relight, the Ulti persevered. In fact, I never once encountered windy enough conditions to extinguish the burner. There were a few times I thought it had gone out, but it never did.

When I used it to heat water for tea, dehydrated meals, and coffee on my winter camping trip at ~9,400 feet, it seemed to heat water just as quickly as it had in warmer conditions at lower elevations. This thing powered through the cold like a workhorse. Throughout my testing, I didn’t even see it sputter.

I also found this stove to be far more fuel-efficient than my standard backpacking stove. Despite the 3,000W power it cranks out, I used the same 230g fuel canister for all of my trips and haven’t yet burned through it (although I am starting to get close).

Limitations: Weight & Versatility

The biggest limiting factor of the Ulti is its weight. As mentioned, it’s a heavy stove compared to most backpacking stoves on the market. The 1L version I have is just over 1.3 pounds.

That’s significantly heavier than my Jetboil and my MSR Flash (the other two stoves I’ve been using lately). While it’s compact, it isn’t what I want to bring when I’m headed out on a casual summer backpacking trip.

In the winter, that weight doesn’t bother me. This stove is so tenacious in cold weather and at high altitudes that I wouldn’t balk at packing it when I’m going on an overnight ski trip or a winter camping trip.

If you plan on camping high in the alpine, you’d be grateful to have it despite that extra weight. The gram-counters out there might disagree, but I’m not one of those folks. I don’t mind carrying a heavier pack for the extra peace of mind.

The second limitation isn’t unique to this stove, but it’s worth mentioning anyway: You can’t really do much with the Ulti except boil water in it. It’s not big enough to cook a full meal inside of, and due to its size and shape, it would be hard to clean.

It gets so hot so fast, I think it would also be easy to burn food inside of. So, if this is your primary means of making hot food, you’d better have dehydrated meals on you. You could probably boil pasta in it. But again, cleaning it would be tough, especially if you burned noodles to the pot.

Finally, the lack of an ignitor might be a turn-off to some. I almost always have a lighter on me or in my pack, so it never bugged me too much. But it sure would suck to get miles into the backcountry, high into the alpine, and realize you don’t have a way to light your stove.

Primus Ulti Stove System: Who Is It For?

If you spend a lot of time camping in the alpine or in particularly cold and windy conditions, this stove would be a great addition to your camp cooking kit. It is highly wind-resistant, and in testing, I found it to work as well at high altitudes and in the cold as it did at lower elevations and in warmer weather. It’s a specialized tool (that comes at a premium price), but it does its job very effectively and efficiently.

The Primus Ulti Stove System would almost surely be overkill for standard backpacking trips in fair weather, and it would be a heavy option for those kinds of trips anyway. So, if you’re shopping for a basic backpacking stove, I’d recommend you take a look at our guide to the Best Backpacking Stoves.

I got some great use out of my Primus Ulti Stove system last fall and over the winter season. I’m not sure how much I’ll use it through the summer unless I’m knowingly headed out into some stormy weather or venturing above treeline for some alpine camping. But I’ll be excited to bust it out the next time I go winter camping or on a multi-night ski trip. Having it in my pack for adventures like those gave me peace of mind.