How To Choose The Best Ski Goggles For Your Lifestyle & Budget for 2023

The winters have arrived, everyone! That means the season of holidays and full of snow is right here knocking on the door. The best part of having snow is obviously making the snowman, right? No, it is Skiing! While it is the coldest time of the year, it is also the most exciting one with so many places for skiing and Ice skating. It is time to pack yourself up, grab your ski skates and gear, wear your goggles, and set out on the snow to ski. To protect yourself, make sure you have the best Ski Goggles, lest you suffer from a nasty fall and break your head. Safety First Folks!

Before we start, we need to know what the Ski Goggles thing is all about, right? Simply put, they are goggles that you put on while skiing to protect your eyes and are an essential part of your gear. These ski goggles protect the eyes from harsh elements and injury. Sports like skiing expose our eyes to prolonged periods of harsh wind and bright sunlight and therefore it becomes essential that we wear these goggles and protect ourselves. But, these days they are also used by people to look fashionable and cool, being styled in multiple ways and available in different designs, colors, and types.

Guide

Since these Ski goggles are so important, it is vital that you choose the best one out of them. To help you make the best choice, we have curated this Ski goggle guide and provided you with different info about them. Nowadays, it is quite easy to buy ski goggles online, as online shopping sites give you a variety of options to choose from and you get real-life reviews from the people using them. It is great for both first-timers and seasoned skiing individuals! So, for the coming year 2023, keeping all these tips in mind and purchasing ski goggles for your lifestyle and budget would be the best bargain that you could get.

Lenses And Their Types

Start by choosing the right lens for your goggles. It is said that the larger the lens, the better your peripheral vision becomes. Theoretically, ski goggles can be classified into three forms: spherical, cylindrical, and torical. But the major ones in use are-

Cylindrical Lenses: They curve left-to-right across your eyes and face, but the lens surface is vertically flat and stays between the nose and forehead. Cylindrical-lensed goggles cost lesser and work rather fine. Their only problem is that the flatness leads to more glare and slightly reduces peripheral vision.

Spherical Lenses: These lenses, too, curve across your eyes and face, but they also curve vertically. This is their advantage, as curved spherical lenses give better peripheral vision, less distortion, and less glare. But they are costlier than cylindrical ones. It is said that the larger the lens is, the better your vision becomes.

Visible Light Transmission (VLT)

It is also important to consider the VLT factor. The amount of light that reaches your eyes through the lens of the goggles is called visible light transmission (VLT). The Smith ski goggles are one the best brands concerning the use of VLT.

There are three types, having different values and advantages. Lighter lens tints have a greater VLT since more light passes through the lens. Yellow, gold, amber, green or rose-colored lenses are the best options for cloudy, socked-in days due to their high VLT. 

While the darker tints have a lower VLT because less light passes through the lens. Lens colors such as brown, gray, and copper-colored all deliver reduced VLT and thus are optimum for beautiful sunny days. Clear lenses are great for night skiing as they give you an apparent field of vision.

There are multiple types of lenses used in goggles such as Photochromic, Mirrored, and Interchangeable. Mirrored lenses are different because they are covered by a partial or full lens coating on the outside of the outer lens. They reflect more light and thus allow in less light, more than 10% than non-mirrored lenses. Interchangeable lenses let you easily swap out different colored lenses to fit the changing light conditions. There are also Polarized lenses that reduce the glare from the sunlight on the snow.

Photochromic Ski Goggles

These goggles have Photochromic lenses that tend to darken because of a chemical process. It is because these lenses are embedded with millions of molecules, including silver chloride or silver halide. They are transparent until your goggles are exposed to the sunlight, but as soon as they are exposed to sunlight, they darken and protect your eyes perfectly. Whether it is day or night, these goggles are bound to give you value for your money.

The greater the sun’s intensity and its bright light, the darker these goggles will become. On the flip side, these lenses lighten up when we are indoors, conditions are overcast, or dashing through the snow. They offer greater protection from harmful Ultraviolet rays and the harsh environment than any other lens out there. That is why they are considered the best and preferred by most people who go skiing.

While purchasing the best goggles, it is also great that you purchase the best brand of photochromic ski goggles. These are some of the best photochromic ski goggles brands out there, trusted and tested. 

The Smith I/O Snow Goggles, Bolle Z5 Snow Goggles, and Revo Onix Polarized are the brands that stand among our best picks for the skiing season. You can buy them without any hesitation as these are the best among the pool of photochromic ski goggles brands.

Giro Ski Goggles 

These Ski Goggles that have withstood the test of time are the Giro ski goggles. The U.S. manufacturer has been serving professional athletes since the 1980s and has generated a lot of loyal customers over the years. The Giro snowboard goggles are one of a kind, with their reputation of being polarized ski goggles that offer you a panoramic field of vision.  The best part is that they do not get foggy or cloud up at all! Axis Giro, Giro Blok, and Method Goggles are the brand’s best offerings with excellent reviews and almost no complaints.

Conclusion:

Keeping all this info about ski goggles in mind, go and get your own new pair of goggles or change the ones that you have. This winter season, do not shy away from going out. Beat the cold and ski to your heart’s content. Happy Skiing!