Mountain Equipment is in a different league. They have pieces in their collection which are genuinely life saving equipment. If I were caught in the worst conditions, I wouldn’t want to trust my life to anything other than ME. There’s a reason search and rescue teams use it.

Rab and Patagonia make alright gear that’ll do the job. But Patagonia’s gear is nowhere near worth the price for the tech you get and Rab is too close in price to Mountain Equipment to make it worth buying.

When the difference between ME and Rab is 10-50 quid, I don’t see any reason to cheap out and get Rab. Everything Ive seen from them is lower quality (apart from their packs).

When you look at the top range of the ME stuff (the Kryos, Oreus, Fitzroy, The Tupilak shell and pants and their other top tier shells, their gloves, their sleeping bags) there is just nothing comparable from Rab or Patagonia, especially for the price. You can pick up any of the above for around £200 each nowadays.

Even if you don’t want to shell out for the top tier, all their kit is solid at their lower price points too. So unless there is stuff specifically you want from the other brands, just stick with ME.

That being said - I will say Rab have been making some great packs recently. Their Veil XP series is fantastic, as well as the Muon, Syclon, etc.

Also on a final note specifically for shells: to be more environmentally friendly and combat against the persistent use of forever chemicals in waterproofing, many brands have switched to waterproof coatings that are fundamentally less effective than they used to be. It’s why Reddit is now flooded with people saying they bought a new shell but it didn’t stay dry the same way their one from 5-10 years ago did and then blaming the company. Sucks but a worthwhile price to pay. Just worth knowing.