Best Blackout Curtains of 2026

Cheapest of the blackout sets we covered, and the gap is wide enough to matter when you are dressing three windows at once. What you get is a 42-by-63 pair of triple-weave polyester, six grommets a panel, soft to the touch and lighter in the hand than the lined sets here. We think it is the right first pair for a rental, a kids' room, or any window where mostly dark is enough.

The compromise lives in the build rather than the stitching. With no liner, light blocking comes from the density of the weave and the depth of the dye, and NICETOWN is straightforward about it: 85 to 99 percent, with dark colors doing the best work. Black, navy, and charcoal behave like blackout curtains. The pale greys and whites behave like very good room-darkening ones, which is fine in a hallway and disappointing at six in the morning in July.

Softness is where these surprise you. The fabric has a silky, almost dress-lining hand, and it drapes without the papery crease that cheap backed panels get. Care is a cold machine wash and a low tumble, the pair weighs just over two pounds, and the 1.6-inch grommet opening fits the rod you already own.

Sixty-three inches is the drop that covers a small bedroom window and stops at the sill, and this pair makes its case right there: a light grey face, a black back, and a compact 42-inch width that box rooms and dorm windows actually ask for. Nothing in the listing oversells it, either. No twenty-size matrix, no linen weave, just the two-layer build in a short panel.

Two layers change the arithmetic. The black backing blocks light whatever face color you order, and it does quiet work on street noise and winter drafts that the single-layer panels here cannot match. The panels feel denser without becoming a wrestling match on the rod, the six silver grommets slide without snagging, and hanging them took us minutes rather than an afternoon.

It is the highest-rated panel in this group, and once it is up the reason is easy to see: nothing about it calls attention to itself, the color is even across the face, and the light stops at the fabric instead of glowing through it. For a small bedroom that has to be black at nap time, this is the least fussy route we found.

Two-tone curtains usually ask you to trade darkness for looks, and in a bedroom that trade is a bad one. This pair refuses it. The ombre gradient sits on the front, a black backing sits behind it, and the result is a panel rated at 100 percent blackout that still looks like something you chose on purpose rather than settled for.

The gradient is where the detail lives. Each panel runs navy at the top to greyish white at the bottom, and each panel repeats that run, so a pair hung side by side reads as two matching gradients rather than one continuous wash from dark to light across the window. If the room needs the mirrored effect the product photos suggest, this is not it. The repetition is the actual design, and it looks deliberate once the panels are up.

Everything else is straightforward. Fifty-two by 84 inches per panel gives 104 inches across the pair, the silver grommets are rustproof, the polyester has a soft satin hand, and the panels are machine washable. The black back also earns its keep in summer, stopping the sun before it reaches the room in a way the unlined panels here cannot.

More than 20 sizes and as many colors is the headline, and for curtains that is not a vanity metric. Most of the packs here come in a size or two, and a 70-inch-wide window or a wall that wants a 108-inch drop is where they stop. Joydeco keeps going, which is most of the reason it earns a place.

The fabric is 100 percent polyester microfiber with a faint linen texture and no plastic backing, so it has a dry, smooth hand instead of the slick face that gives inexpensive blackout panels away. Eight silver grommets per panel on a 1.6-inch opening, a machine-washable label, and stitching that stays even along the hem.

The heavy weave does the usual quiet work at the glass: it takes the hard edge off traffic noise and slows heat transfer without soundproofing anything. Measurements run true, which matters more than it sounds when you are ordering four panels for one wall and need them all to line up.

Where we come down is fit. Matching a set to an awkward window is the hardest part of this purchase, and this is the line that covers the most of them without a custom order. Order wide enough to clear the frame on both sides and the difference between this panel and a lined one narrows to a faint edge of glow.

A linen weave that genuinely blocks light is rarer than it should be. Most textured panels are decorative first, which is why a beige pair rated at full blackout is worth a closer look. The texture is the point here, and the darkness has not been traded away for it.

We were skeptical of the linen claim and came away convinced. The weave has a visible slub and a matte finish, closer to a real linen drape than to the brushed polyester that usually carries that label, and the blackout layer stays hidden behind it. In a bedroom built on naturals and warm neutrals, this is the rare blackout panel that does not advertise itself as one.

The build is what the money goes to: a triple weave with an opaque backing, 52 by 84 inches per panel, eight grommets, and enough weight that the curtains fall in straight columns rather than flaring at the hem. Hung wide, a pair covers a standard double window with the overlap that blackout actually requires.

Sold one panel at a time, which sounds like a technicality until you are hanging a stairwell window, a 96-inch drop, or a wall that wants three panels and not four. The rest of the group arrives in pairs. This one lets you buy the number you actually need.

The panel itself is lined polyester in jet black, 52 inches across, with eight grommets on a 1.6-inch opening and a soft, silky face with enough sheen that a plain black drape does not read flat. Ninety-six inches is the number that matters: it reaches the floor on a tall window and covers a slider without a custom order, and the lining keeps a long drop from turning into a light leak at the hem.

Long and single is the combination that makes the panel useful, and the caveat is the color you order. Jet black comes closest to the 99 percent sunlight claim, while the same panel in a pale shade is a good room-darkening curtain rather than a blackout one. If the room has to be dark, stay dark.

No grommets. Seven back tabs and a rod pocket instead, which changes two things: the header sits flat against the wall rather than standing off it on metal rings, and the folds fall in narrower, softer pleats than a grommet panel's. Both matter more than they sound here, because the top of the window is where most of the leak is.

The fabric is 230 GSM polyester with a black yarn layer woven between the faces. The result is a deep, even black on both sides rather than a colored front with a white back, plus a light sheen that keeps it from looking flat. Thick enough to hang with some body, light enough that a standard rod carries it without complaint.

That weight does quiet, useful things at the glass: it takes the hard edge off traffic noise and slows heat transfer, which is about all a thermal label is ever worth in a curtain. Paired with the closed header, it makes a living room feel calmer without turning it into a cave.

What keeps us coming back is the price against the finish. This is one of the cheaper 52-by-84 pairs in the group, and it is the only one that closes the light gap at the top without a wrap-around rod or a valance. Because the rod passes behind the fabric instead of through rings, the hardware disappears too, which is a nice thing to get for free in a room with a decorative rod.