Inflatable play structures are becoming hugely popular at kid's parties across the country. They're incredibly affordable and offer kids hours of safe and healthy activity. The Cloud 9 Mighty Bounce House is a great way to get started on bounce house fun!
Features
The Cloud 9 Mighty Bounce house is an entry-level inflatable bounce house. It's a bare bones bouncer with a large bounce area, a slide and protective mesh netting to keep the kids in. Nothing more, nothing less. Spoiler alert: this is a great 'bang for your buck' purchase.
Simplicity At Its Best
The Cloud 9 is a straight bounce house. No bells and whistles that can break or raise the price of the bouncer. It's a simple bounce house too: kids can only enter from the front via a front slide. As we'll see below, this simplicity adds an important element to the mix: safety.
Great For Toddlers
The absence of features in the Cloud 9 Mighty Bounce House makes it an inflatable better suited for toddlers age 3 to 8. Children in the 10 year old range may find the bouncy castle a bit repetitive.
Safety Through Minimalism
Perhaps what we find most interesting with this inflatable playground is the safety aspect. All three sides are surrounded by well-stitched protective mesh netting that keeps kids from falling off and hurting themselves. In fact, when we tested the bouncer, we threw ourselves against the mesh and it all held up. It's plenty strong for the intended audience: kids.
Unlike other bouncers on the market, the Cloud 9 Bounce House also has mesh netting at the entrance, with only a small entrance for the precious ones to go in through. This guarantees no kids can accidentally get thrown out and hurt.
Front Slide
The front slide is integrated to the body of the main bounce house. Any kids coming through the front entrance will bounce back to safety via the small slide.
Unfortunately, we found the slide to be a bit small. Your little ones won't be able to roll around on it or play games on it. It's strictly a means to get to and from the main bounce area.
Being designed for toddlers, the slide is sufficiently sloped so that kids of almost any ages can go in an out with little trouble. This is great for parents with toddlers who are developing their sense of independence.
Everything Included
When you buy the Cloud 9 Mighty Bounce House, it comes with everything you need for installation and play. That means blowers, pegs and even a few repair patches! The entire package wheighs under 45 lbs making it easy to get in and out of storage. The blower supplied by Cloud 9 provides more than enough air pressure to keep the structure well-inflated. Provided you respect the 300 lbs load limit, the blower provides plenty of air to support all the bouncing around.
Easy Setup For The Parents
Being so light to carry around, this bouncy castle is extremely easy and fast to setup. You just take it out of the bag, unfold it, connect the blower, arrange the safety blowout
Materials And Stitching
The fabric of this bounce house is of good quality. Most areas prone to repeated wear and tear feature quadruple stitching. We're impressed at the mesh netting and how it's solid enough to stop even an adult. Cloud 9 reinforced the netting by integrating it to paneling instead of just stitching it to the bounce floor. This adds that extra ruggedness that'll prevent damage over repeated use. Overall, we can't foresee this bounce house sustaining damage under normal play conditions.
Pros
- Very safe design
- Mesh netting keeps kids safe
- Good quality materials
- Easy and quick setup
Cons
- Age range limited due to simplicity
- No features other than bouncing
What Others Say
The Cloud 9 Mighty Bounce House is one of the best-selling inflatables on Amazon. The consensus amongst reviewers is as straightforward as the bouncer itself: this is an incredible value purchase. For under $300 you get a bouncer that's so easy to setup and wrap up that you can deploy it whenever you want your kids to play outside the house.
Being such a light and straightfoward design, we couldn't find a single reviewer who had problems setting up or storing the inflatable. Unlike other bounce houses sold on the market, the Cloud 9 Mighty easily stores in the provided carry bag. No need to wrestle with the inflatable once it's folded to cram it in the bag. Surprinsingly, this little extra actually makes a big difference during wrap up.
Some parents had the same critique as ours regarding the age range suitable for a bouncer like this. It's somewhat limited. This isn't a deal breaker if your kids are 1-3 years apart as everyone will get a good play out of the inflatable. However, it becomes a single-use play structure if the age gap is significantly larger. A 10 year old will bounce a few times and quickly move on to something else.
A few parents noted that the Could 9 Mighty doesn't provide shade for the kids playing on the bounce area. This is a valid criticism, especially for families located in extremely hot climates (ie Arizona, Florida). You can get around this issue by placing the inflatable bounce house near a tree.
A commonly-asked question is whether this inflatable can get wet (ie water guns, sprinklers nearby, etc). Like any inflatable not specifically designed to handle water, the Cloud 9 can't get wet. This can compromise the longevity of the fabric if it gets wet and kids play around on it.
Market Comparison
The Cloud 9 Mighty Bouncer is a solid competitor on the market. What it lacks in bells and whistles, it makes up with on quality construction and value. Here's how the Cloud 9 Mighty Bouncer compares to its main competitor, the Bounceland Magic Castle:
| Cloud 9 Mighty Bouncer | Bounceland Magic Castle |
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Picture | | |
Features | Great mesh netting for safety Quality construction Easy setup | Basketball hoop Easy setup |
Size | 12 ft x 8 ft 8 in | 12 ft x 9 ft |
Weight | 45 lbs + blower | 45 lbs + blower |
Price | $ both are in same price range (check current price on Amazon) | $ both are in same price range (check current price on Amazon)
|
Value | Good | Good |
As you can see, both are pretty much priced the same, are just as easy to setup and have near identical safety features. For a few bucks more, the Bounceland has a basketball hoop. However, the Cloud 9 is slightly better built. Both companies have similar return policies in case of damage so we can't even make a recommendation based on that alone.
We wish it was more clear cut so we could give you a definite winner. The thing is, at this price range, most bounce houses are cookie cutters of each other.
Final Verdict
This is a great value purchase that we believe will keep your toddlers entertained for many weekends and parties to come. Remember that this bounce house isn't for every age range. That said, we strongly endorse this product for its value, safety features and rugged construction.