Nike ACG Takes the Lava Flow Ultralight Jacket Across the Extremes of Moab

Nike ACG invited House of Heat° to Moab, Utah, for its latest All Conditions Gear Research Mission, giving us the chance to experience the new ACG Lava Flow Ultralight jacket in the type of environment it was designed around.

Called “The Big Drop,” the 48-hour mission brought together a crew of 35 people — from hikers and runners to creators and photographers — with one assignment: find and record the hottest and coldest points we could encounter around Moab. Rather than testing the jacket in a controlled setting, ACG wanted us outside, moving through a landscape where conditions can change dramatically within a matter of hours.

That became clear pretty quickly. During the day, we crossed exposed slickrock and moved through canyons in search of pockets of trapped heat, eventually recording a surface temperature of 107°F. At that point, the Lava Flow Ultralight was packed away, which highlighted one of its biggest advantages. The jacket weighs less than 10 ounces and compresses into its own pocket to a size smaller than a 32-ounce water bottle, making it easy to carry when insulation isn’t needed.

A men’s medium weighs approximately 255 grams, or 9 ounces, while a women’s small comes in at just 217 grams, or 7.6 ounces. Despite that low weight, the jacket uses 1,000-fill-power ExpeDRY™ GOLD down, giving it what ACG calls its best warmth-to-weight ratio yet. The insulation combines water-resistant goose down with recycled gold sourced from e-waste, designed to help keep the down from clumping when exposed to sweat, humidity or other moisture.

As the sun disappeared, the mission shifted with it. We continued through Moab after dark before eventually camping beneath the open desert sky, where the temperature continued to fall through the early morning. Our lowest surface reading came in at 37°F, and this time the Lava Flow UL came out of the pack.

Alongside the down insulation, Therma-FIT ADV technology and a water-repellent exterior help the jacket retain warmth and deal with changing conditions. Experiencing both ends of the mission made the concept behind the jacket easier to understand: it isn’t something you’re expected to wear through triple-digit desert heat. It’s a lightweight layer that can disappear into your pack when conditions are warm and be ready when temperatures fall.

At the center of the trip was ACG’s Research Station, positioned on a mesa overlooking the Green River. The thermochromic structure reacted to the surrounding temperature, shifting from white in warmer conditions to orange as things cooled, essentially turning the basecamp itself into a giant thermometer. Between missions, it became the place where we regrouped, compared readings and learned more about the landscape.

We also spent time with Moab Landkeepers, locals who have spent years navigating the surrounding canyons and understanding a landscape that goes well beyond what can be picked up from a trail map. That local knowledge gave the experience more context than simply chasing the highest and lowest numbers we could find.

By the end of the 48 hours, everyone had logged their own high and low temperature readings. Those numbers were then marked directly onto our individual Lava Flow Ultralight jackets, leaving each piece with a record of exactly what it had been through in Moab.

Reading that a jacket weighs nine ounces or uses 1,000-fill down tells you plenty on paper. Carrying it through 107°F heat, pulling it out hours later as the desert approaches 37°F, and waking up with those two numbers printed onto the same jacket tells the story a little differently.

The Nike ACG Lava Flow Ultralight is available now in men’s sizes XS–4XL and women’s sizes XS–2XL for $400 via Nike.com and select retailers

For more on Nike ACG, make sure to checkout the upcoming Picklejus project, arriving in 2027