Best Portable Art Kits for Travel (2026, Field-Tested)

/ Art Supplies, Watercolor / By Maria Garcia

When considering which portable art kit to travel with, there are a number of factors to weigh. If you are starting out, you probably don’t want to spend too much, just in case you don’t take to the hobby. But you also don’t want a cheap, poor-quality set that behaves badly and puts you off before you really begin.

Some of you may want to take the next step and buy a more expensive artist-quality set, or even build your own kit. I hope this post covers most bases, whichever stage of your travel-painting journey you are at. We field-tested the four most popular portable watercolor kits of 2026, with travel in mind: Tobios, Funto, Winsor & Newton Cotman and Grabie.

Things to Consider Before Buying:

• Size / weight
• Pans or tubes
• Number of paints
• Mixing space
• Paper quality
• Price
• Making your own set

Size / Weight

This might be the single most important thing to keep in mind when buying a portable traveling kit. You don’t want to lug around a whole set made for an art studio. If you are going to walk around a city or bring it on a hike, you need to know it will be comfortable to carry the whole day. Nothing spoils the mood like an aching back.

The flatter and lighter the kit, the higher the chances you will actually use it. A kit you buy for traveling but that stays in the hotel room is a bit of a waste. More colors and a bigger mixing pan might seem useful at first, but if you get tired of carrying it, there is no point to those extra colors. In most cases you can blend colors, so 8 to 12 colors can be a great starting point.

Pans or Tubes?

Many travel kits use pans: dry paint, ready to go in tiny wells. The issue is that they can get tossed around in the case. On the other hand, there is nothing to measure and no squeezing. Tubes give you fresher, richer pigment, squeezed into the wells of a palette, and the colors tend to be more intense for wet-on-wet work. Tobios uses tubes: you squeeze a bit into the wooden palette and let it dry, then rewet it like a pan. Because the paint dries in the sealed palette, nothing leaks. For beginners, tubes can actually be easier to use.

Number of Paints

More is not better. The more colors, the heavier the kit and the harder it is to learn from. With a 48-pan set you will spend more time choosing colors than painting, and fewer colors teaches you how to mix. Twelve colors is a great place to start: cool and warm tones of each primary, plus a few fun extras. Tobios, for example, includes Lemon Yellow, Green Gold, Glacier Blue and Electric Rose, among others.

Paper Quality

Many travel kits skimp on paper, but paper is one of the most important parts of a kit. Low-quality paper buckles and bubbles, especially with wet techniques. Cotton paper holds up far better than wood-pulp. Look for at least 140 lb (300 GSM). In our group, only Funto and Tobios include paper: Funto uses thin paper, whereas Tobios includes 300 GSM cotton.

Watercolor Sets: Ranked for Travel

We ranked them by how well they perform out in the field. We tested them on balconies, on the train, during lunch breaks, and in the park with our kids.

Tobios Mini Watercolor Kit: Best All-in-One for Beginners

Tobios is the most complete kit of the four, and the only one with genuinely good paper. The palette is real walnut wood: two halves that hold shut with magnets, so nothing leaks in your bag. Inside are 12 highly pigmented paint tubes (Venetian Red, Poppy Bloom, Sunset Orange, Lemon Yellow, Green Gold, Forest Green, Twilight Indigo, Glacier Blue, Electric Rose, Royal Plum, Titanium White and Ivory Black), a refillable water brush, a wristband, and a 60-page 300 GSM cotton sketchbook that fits in a pocket. A printed manual and beginner e-book round it out. The paint is student-grade and the book is small, so it is not built for professional or large-format work, but for painting in a coffee shop it is ideal.

Best for: beginners, gifting, plein-air sketching, and travelers who want one compact thing that covers every base.

Check the current price on Amazon →

Funto Watercolor Set: Best for Kids and Casual Use

The Funto set is a fun, low-pressure way to start, perfect for kids or anyone who paints only occasionally. The paint comes pre-loaded, setup is quick, and the price is accessible. But the magnets are weak and the case kept opening in our bag, the collapsible water cup tends to leak, and the brush is basic. The paint is decent but geared toward beginners, and it behaves more like gouache than true watercolor in some conditions.

Best for: kids, casual use and family trips. Skip if: you want to learn proper technique or need a kit that seals in a bag.

Winsor & Newton Cotman Travel Set: Best for Upgrading Hobbyists

Winsor & Newton is a classic, trusted name, and Cotman is a high-quality student-grade set in pans, a step up from craft-store kits. The paint is beautiful and mixes well, with warm and cool tones. But the hard case is stiff to open and sometimes will not latch (we used a rubber band), the pans shift around in transit, and there is no paper included. If the case were better, it would rank higher.

Best for: hobbyists who already paint and want a familiar brand. Skip if: you want to open the kit and paint the same day.

Grabie Watercolor Set: Widest Color Range

Grabie’s selling point is variety, with many kits to choose from. The paint is vibrant and stays true when it dries, though it feels closer to gouache in some conditions. The metallic case feels high quality but is heavy and harder to hold, and it bends easily, so it does not protect the contents well in a bag. A sketchbook is included, but the paper is thin. For desk painting it is a reasonable budget option; as a travel kit it is the weakest pick here.

Best for: beginners who want lots of colors on a budget, painting at a desk. Skip if: you need something genuinely portable.

Making Your Own Watercolor Set

Building your own custom palette can sound appealing, but it gets overwhelming fast. If you are an experienced painter, it is a beautiful process: choose your pans, your box and your exact pigments. If you are a beginner, we would hold off. The research alone eats a lot of time, and a finished kit removes that friction so you can simply start painting.

Final Thoughts

These kits all have something to offer, so the right one depends on what you are looking for. But the best kit is the one you actually bring with you. For most beginners, Tobios will be the best choice: it fits in a pocket, stays sealed when it tumbles around, and the quality is high across every piece, with a 12-color range that feels like a sweet spot.

Funto works well for kids, Cotman is a respectable step-up for hobbyists, and Grabie is a budget option for desk painting rather than travel. Pick the one that fits where you actually are in your practice, not the one with the most pans or the most impressive name. You can check the current price of our top pick on Amazon.