Tested: ewool PRO+ | Ready-to-wear warmth

With a few thoughtful touches, Montreal-based ewool has released the upgraded version of its heated jacket that it already described as “the best in the world.” The ewool PRO+ is even warmer, covers wider… and costs even more.

Karim Benessaieh
The Press

WE love

Unlike most heated jackets commonly found on the market for less than $100, the ewool PRO+ doesn’t just have two or four plates to do its job. We’ve woven a full array of heating elements that covers virtually the entire surface of this vest. And for this new version, we added a large area at the lower back, for the lower back, where we place the large battery.

Also in this section, we added a pad to lessen the discomfort of having a pile in the lower back, if you remain seated in the car or snowmobile. This was something we highlighted last year and was obviously shared by other users.

Better still, the left front pocket has been enlarged and fitted with an auxiliary power socket. Result: we can put our stack in this pocket, completely freeing the lower back, or use it for a second stack.

The ewool PRO+ is designed as an intermediate layer, to be placed between a sweater and a coat. Its look is therefore of little importance, but it is a beautiful garment, well adjusted with elastic bands on the sides to better tighten the body.

We had perfect opportunities to test it in the bitter cold of January to confirm that it fully fulfills its mandate: the heat spreads all over the trunk, from the collar to the lower back, giving utterly decadent comfort even to – 25℃.

Obviously, this jacket is of no use for heating the rest of the body. Well protected, these areas benefit from this technological contribution of heat, but there is no miracle: in extreme cold, you end up feeling cold… but not in the trunk.

We have here a 12 V battery capable of delivering 70 W initially, then up to 51 W – the first version gave 42 W. These technical specificities put this vest in a completely separate category: in competing models of jackets with battery, we couldn’t find better than 7 W.

On the autonomy side, this garment gave us, with a single battery, about two hours of heat at high intensity. In normal setting, the one that is activated automatically after switching on, we got between 3 h 30 min and 4 h. Finally, at the lowest setting, we get 7 h 30 min. With a second battery, sold for $129 at ewool, we double all these statistics. The jacket can be plugged into a 12V source, such as a snowmobile, for unlimited power.

The jacket is washable, we did without damage once the battery was removed.

We love less

After a few weeks of use, we still have difficulty mastering all the language of the single button, which is used to turn on, adjust the temperature or test the battery charge. The result was that on a few occasions we didn’t turn off the garment properly, which continued to heat up until its battery was drained.

We still regret, like last year, that there are no heats. A future model should offer them.

Finally, at $598—$727 if you want two batteries—this is an expensive buy. “I made the product I dreamed of without worrying about the price,” its designer, Alain Desmeules, told us last year.

One buys ?

At ewool, we drew up a statistical portrait of the users of this top-of-the-range vest: 40% are snowmobilers and 30% are hunters, i.e. customers who do not do intense physical activity, who want to keep warm in the open. air and don’t skimp on the expense.

If you recognize yourself in these categories and are ready to pay the big price, one thing is clear: we are dealing here with a quality product, designed to last and which has even been improved compared to its first version.