Noxgear LightHound LED Dog Harness Review

Noxgear, founded by aerospace engineers Tom and Simon, initially emerged from their passion for nighttime ultimate frisbee, where they crafted a light-up vest using duct tape and binder clips. This experience ignited a mission to enhance safety for those with active lifestyles, leading them to discover the inadequacies of existing visibility gear. Empowered by their research, Noxgear has evolved into a company offering highly engineered products like the Tracer2 Visibility Vest, LightHound LED Harness for dogs, and a personal speaker.

About the Noxgear LightHound Harness

Introducing the Noxgear LightHound LED Dog Harness, a multicolor LED-illuminated, reflective dog harness designed for the dog’s safety and visibility. Ideal for night walks, romping in the yard, or early morning exercises as it offers 360° visibility up to 1/4 mile, ensuring your dog is always seen.

Crafted with a commitment to durability, this harness is machine washable and constructed from military-grade materials. The rugged Cordura fabric, known for its exceptional strength, ultralight nature, and breathability, forms the base of the LightHound harness. This single-piece construction guarantees durability, allowing your pup to wear it while playing rough and getting dirty.

The LightHound boasts a rechargeable 12-hour battery life, ensuring plenty of time for outdoor adventures. Designed for mobility, the harness allows a full range of motion, enabling your dog to move comfortably and naturally. Its reinforced stitching and a secure leash ring webbing, make it suitable for using it as a harness, not just a visibility vest.

Built with visual science in mind, the LightHound offers 6 multi-color flashing modes and 8 solid color modes, allowing you to choose the right glow for your dog and the environment. The LED fiber optics utilize a patented technology to maintain maximum visibility even when the battery is running low.

Noxgear LightHound LED Dog Harness Review

I purchased the Noxgear LightHound LED Dog Harness for this fall/winter after it was recommended by so many of you and it did not disappoint! This vest/harness is very bright and all the color options are stunning and bright. The flashing modes also have neat-looking effects like slow fading and “pulsating” it’s not just a periodic flashing with different speed.

I have a daylight photo below as I got many questions about its fit. Both the neck and the chest piece are highly adjustable with lots of excess straps that can be tucked away with little velcro loops. The two straps meet at a wide angle that allows for plenty of armpit clearance and to adjust the neck-straps to avoid the shoulder area for free leg movement.

One thing to keep in mind is that the chest strap can go over the soft tissue of the stomach area in case of many dogs which is something you want to avoid, or keep that strap looser so it doesn’t put pressure on the stomach when they are moving. If adjusting the straps doesn’t seem to keep the chest strap over the ribcage, sizing down might solves this for your dog.

If you want to read more on the topic, we have a detailed article on harness fitting.

Noxgear Lighhound Fit

Buckles

While the Noxgear LightHound can be used as a harness, it is not padded and if the dog pulls on the leash, the front just slides up on the lower neck and puts pressure on that area which is the same concern we would have with a dog pulling on a collar. The buckles and sliders securing the straps are great for a vest but I wouldn’t use them to secure a strong dog who pulls/lunges.

Also, as this is not a rigid harness and doesn’t have a piece between the front legs, it is prone to sliding to the side especially when used on-leash. I imagine it would stay in place better on wider dogs - like a Labrador - while rotating more easily on narrow, skinny dogs like Zu.

As a workaround, I have added a carabiner to the handle of the Noxgear LightHound and used it over another harness to provide visibility while preventing rotation by attaching the Lighhound to the other harness.

I have also used it over winter coats without any rotation issues - it seems that the extra material really helped to create “traction” for this LED harness. Using it over a coat is also great because most coats would cover the neck area where I normally have an LED collar on Zu. The Lighthound provides unbeatable visibility regardless of what the dog is wearing.

Noxgear LightHound LED Dog Harness Review Summary

The Lighthound is a great product that really grew on me over the dark walks of the last months. The LED light is incredibly bright, the battery lasts long and the colors are beautiful with fun modes.

However, I would think about this more as a visibility vest than a harness - especially if the dog pulls, lunges, or tries to back out from it. Zulu usually doesn’t pull and wouldn’t run away even if she gets out of a harness but I still felt that the Lighthound just slides and rotates too much when used as the leash attachment point and preferred not to use it like that.

I heard from many people who have been using the Noxgear LightHound for years and they are still very happy with the product. It is also a commonly used visibility product for search dogs when they are working in the dark.

Earlier products tend to have an issue with the LED section popping out (they are removable for washing) and Noxgear recommended zip-tying the LED unit to the base of the harness for extra safety. However, I haven’t seen any concerns with that and didn’t see these complaints in the last few years so it might have been fixed in the meantime.

Altogether, the Noxgear LightHound is a great product that I enjoy using, and it probably got the most compliments from passerbyes in 2023 among all the products we have used.