Bare Revel Men’s 3/2mm Full Wetsuit

The Bare Revel is a men's 3/2mm full wetsuit for warm-water diving: extreme stretch neoprene cut to an anatomically correct 3D pattern, glued and blind stitched seams, and Armor-flex pads on the knees. It is a single-piece suit with an extra-long back zipper, and Bare sells it in multiple sizes for scuba and other water sports.

Who this suits

This is a suit for the recreational diver whose diving happens somewhere warm. 3/2mm is thin neoprene, chosen for freedom of movement rather than insulation, and the Revel spends its build on stretch and fit instead of thermal mass.

It also suits divers who get changed without a buddy on hand. The back zipper is extra long and has a pull-tab leash on it, which is the difference between undressing yourself and asking a stranger on the boat to do it.

Skip it if you dive cool or cold water. A 3/2mm suit will cut your bottom time short and leave you shivering on the surface interval, and no amount of stretch fixes that. Skip it too if you build your thermal protection in layers, because this is one piece with a fixed thickness and no hood, and it is not designed to combine with a jacket or a farmer john.

What 3/2mm means in the water

Wetsuit thickness is written thickest first, so this is 3mm neoprene through the torso and 2mm at the arms and legs.

The split is deliberate. Your core is where you lose heat fastest, so it gets the thicker neoprene, and your shoulders, elbows and knees are where thickness costs you movement, so they get the thinner. In practice that means you can reach a valve behind your head and kick for an hour without fighting the suit, and it also means the suit is doing very little for you once the water cools off.

Glued and blind stitched seams

Every seam on the Revel is glued and blind stitched, and it is worth knowing what that means because the alternatives leak.

Glue holds the two neoprene edges together. Blind stitching then sews them without the needle passing all the way through the panel, so there is no line of holes running from the outside of the suit to your skin. A flatlock-stitched suit, by contrast, is sewn straight through, and every stitch is a small channel for cold water. Glued and blind stitched is the construction you want on a suit you plan to dive rather than surf in, and finding it on a 3/2mm recreational suit is a good sign about the rest of the build.

Fit, and the parts that rub

The Revel is built on an anatomically correct 3D pattern, meaning the panels are shaped to a bent, three-dimensional body rather than a flat one. A suit cut flat wrinkles at the elbow and the back of the knee, and every wrinkle is a pocket of water your body then has to heat.

Bare gives the shoulder and neck an ergonomic design, which is where a badly cut suit does its damage. Restricted shoulders tire you out on a long swim, and a neck seal that chafes turns into a raw patch by the end of a trip.

The collar closes with a low-profile tab on hook and loop, and there is an integrated suit saver behind it so the hook side does not chew the neoprene when the collar is open. Small feature, but hook and loop against bare neoprene is one of the standard ways a wetsuit ages badly.

The knees get Armor-flex pads. Knees are the highest-wear area on a dive suit, thanks to kneeling on entry platforms, boat decks and sand, and the pads reinforce that spot without stiffening the leg.

Which version this page covers

This page covers the men's cut of the Revel in 3/2mm, in the full-suit version. Bare lists multiple sizes, and size is the one decision you should not rush: a wetsuit that is loose flushes cold water through it on every movement, and one that is too tight restricts your breathing and tires you faster. Check the retailer's size chart against your own measurements rather than ordering your shirt size.

The bottom line

The Revel is a well-built warm-water suit at a sensible level of complication: 3/2mm neoprene, glued and blind stitched seams, a 3D pattern that fits the way a body actually bends, and the small details on the collar and knees that decide whether a suit lasts several seasons or one. What it is not is a cold-water suit, and it is not a layering system. Buy it for tropical and warm temperate diving, get the size right, and it will do everything you need. Bare does not publish a temperature range for it, so judge it by the thickness.

Specifications