Magnetar Advanced Package 400kg — Worth the Step Up?

When I first picked up the magnet from this kit — just held it in my hand before I'd even gotten near water — I noticed the coating immediately. It's got that matte, almost rubberized texture that the cheap kits try to fake and never quite nail. This one just feels like it's been finished properly. No sharp edges on the eyebolt housing, threading that doesn't feel like it's going to strip after six sessions. Small things. But you notice them after you've handled enough of the other stuff.

I took it out to a canal bridge I've been hitting on and off — concrete railing, murky water that's eaten two of my older ropes from the friction — and dropped it in with a double-half hitch on the 10mm line. First pull brought up a rusted bike chain and what I can only assume was a 1970s padlock. Standard canal haul. But the magnet released clean. That's the thing about single-sided that I keep coming back to — when you're prying something loose against a canal wall or the underside of a dock, you know exactly where your pull is coming from. No guessing, no weird torque. You pull, it pulls.

That control matters more than raw numbers once you've been doing this a while.

The rope in this kit is genuinely better than what I was running before I upgraded. I've had cheaper kits come with rope that looked fine but started fraying at the splice point after a month. This held up through a full season — and I'm not gentle with it. I've dragged it along gravel bottoms, tied off to rough concrete, left it wet in a bag for longer than I'd like to admit. Still solid.

Now — the case. Hear me out, because I don't want to oversell this. The carry case is fine. It does the job. But it's the part of the kit that feels most like an afterthought. The zipper works, the padding is adequate, and it fits everything. It's just not going to survive being thrown in a truck bed for two years. If you're the kind of person who already has a dedicated bag for your gear, you probably won't care. If you were hoping to live out of the included case long-term, maybe grab a secondary bag eventually.

The grappling hook that comes with it is serviceable. Don't expect miracles from it, but it's not useless either.

Here's the honest positioning on this kit: it's not for someone who just saw a magnet fishing video and wants to try it. That person should spend $40 somewhere and see if it sticks. This is for the person who's been out maybe a dozen times, pulled some decent finds, started getting annoyed at their cheap magnet releasing at the wrong moment or their rope twisting up constantly — and is ready to stop tolerating mediocre gear. That's the person this is built for.

At $119.99 it's not a throwaway purchase. But Magnetar isn't padding the price for a brand name here — the build quality earns it. I'd buy this one again without much deliberation. And I'd point someone at it before almost anything else in this price bracket.