Methodology

Treeline Index is a faceless gear index. We do not field-test products in the way a single reviewer might. What we do is sort and structure: we gather specifications and prices from primary sources, present them side-by-side, and write the kind of decisive paragraph a knowledgeable friend would write if you asked them which of these to buy. Every product specification we publish — weight, fabric, fill, capacity, price — is sourced from the manufacturer's own materials or a vendor product page, and each spec carries the date it was last checked. We will re-verify specifications on a recurring schedule and flag stale entries for review.

Editorial standards

Comparison and "best under X grams" pages are drafted with editorial tooling — a per-keyword brief feeds a structured prompt that asks for specific weights, fabrics, and trade-offs. The output is reviewed and polished before publication: an automated editor pass enforces restrained voice and rejects drafts that fabricate specifications or lean on marketing language. A human reviews every draft that clears the editor pass before it goes live. We do not invent specifications, and we do not publish a number we could not source.

Brand overview essays and example-setup pages are partly drafted with the same tooling and then hand-edited for voice. We cite each brand's own about / heritage pages as primary sources. Where a fact about a brand is unconfirmed, we say so plainly rather than guessing.

Sourcing specs

Product imagery on comparison and review pages comes from one of two sources: the affiliate network's official media (Amazon, REI, Backcountry, Garage Grown Gear) where the product is in those networks, or the manufacturer's own product page for boutique brands that are not in those networks. Manufacturer-sourced images are used under comparison-and-review fair use, are credited on the page, and carry an outbound link to the originating product page.

Image policy

Atmospheric imagery on brand-essay and example-setup pages will be AI-generated. Product specification pages use only real product photography. Landscape and trail imagery that does not depict specific products is sourced from Unsplash and Pexels under their respective licenses, with photographer credit where required. AI-generated images carry their license metadata, and rendered SVG assets are credited under the rendered-svg license.

When AI imagery is used

AI-generated imagery will not be used at launch. Forward compatibility is configured so that AI imagery can be added in future releases without affecting the page publication or schema integrity.

Affiliate relationships

Treeline Index earns affiliate commissions on outbound links to retailers. Affiliate links are marked at the link level (rel="sponsored") and disclosed at the page level and site-wide. Affiliate relationships never determine what we cover or how we rank it — see our affiliate disclosure for the page-level and site-wide disclosure copy.

Cookies and consent

GDPR posture

Our cookie banner uses Klaro's mustConsent: false mode with the region preference cookie set to default-on. We interpret a single-letter region marker (used purely to render prices and affiliate links in the correct currency) as falling under GDPR's legitimate-interest basis, not the strict opt-in required for tracking. The affiliate-tracking purpose itself is strictly opt-in (default-off). If EU traffic grows materially, we will revisit this calibration.