LEVEL SIX: Exhaust Pro fabric – 2026 Product of the Year (Innovation)
“After 6 years of development, Exhaust Pro is the world’s first fabric designed from the ground up for paddlesports: PFAS-free, recycled, and outperforming everything we’ve ever made.” — Stig Larsson, CEO & Co-Founder, Level Six
Among the highlights of last year’s Paddle Sports Show was the 2026 Product of the Year Awards, organized in partnership with KS Publishing and the Paddler’s Guide. Each year, the contest spotlights the best new paddlesports gear for the upcoming season. This year, Level Six won the Innovation Award with the Exhaust Pro, the new waterproof and breathable fabric they designed from the ground up specifically for paddlesports. We asked the team a few questions about their award-winning technology to understand how it works and its performance in paddlesports.
Hey Team! Congrats on winning 2026 Innovation of the Year for the Exhaust Pro Fabric at the Paddle Sports Show. Can you introduce your technology in simple terms?
« The real star of the show is the hydrophilic membrane featuring proprietary additions »
Exhaust Pro is a 3.0-ply waterproof, breathable fabric designed from the ground up specifically for paddlesports. It’s the world’s first fabric built intentionally for the demands of paddling environments and not adapted from hiking or skiing textiles. It achieves a 33,000 mm water column and 6,000 g/m²/24h breathability while being completely PFAS-free and made from 100% recycled materials. It also features a hydrophilic membrane and a slight two-way stretch, which together give it real-world performance that has consistently exceeded our lab results. The real star of the show is the hydrophilic membrane featuring proprietary additions, which actively wick moisture away and disperse it in the membrane, making it easier for your body to heat up and push out of the fabric. This gives the suit higher breathability performance in the real world when you are active and generating body heat.
What a description! How much time and effort went into bringing this to life?
Over six years of intensive R&D and real-world testing. When PFAS regulations started evolving, most brands modified their existing fabrics to reduce PFAS content. We had already done that; we were actually the first paddlesports company to release a PFAS-free drysuit, but we also made the decision to simultaneously start from zero and develop something entirely new. That meant years of invisible work: sourcing new materials, testing and failing, testing and failing again, all while continuing to run the business and serve our dealers. There were long stretches where the team was pouring effort into something that no customer could see or appreciate yet. It was one of the hardest things we’ve done as a company, but also one of the most important.
Does it build on ideas or designs from previous products you have created?
Our previous Exhaust fabric was the foundation that taught us what paddlers actually need from a technical fabric. Our key learning was that existing high-performance textiles fall short in wet, dynamic environments. But Exhaust Pro isn’t an evolution of past fabrics; it’s a complete rebuild. We took everything we’d learned over 29 years of making paddlesports gear and used it to define what a purpose-built paddling fabric should be, then engineered it from scratch. The philosophy carried forward, but the fabric itself is entirely new. It is a new membrane technology, new face fabric, and new construction.
Was there a moment during development when you realized this tech was special?
The lab numbers were impressive on paper: 33,000 mm water column, 6,000 g/m² breathability, but the real moment came when our testers started reporting back from the field. Every single person said the real-world performance exceeded what the lab results suggested. That’s unusual. Most fabrics test well in a lab and then underperform in actual conditions. With Exhaust Pro, the hydrophilic membrane technology actually performs better when you’re active and generating body heat, which is exactly what happens when you’re paddling. That was the moment we knew we had something that wasn’t just competitive, it was special.
What feature or innovation are you most proud of in this product?
The hydrophilic membrane. Most waterproof breathable fabrics on the market use a typical hydrophobic membrane. These membranes work by pushing moisture through the membrane rapidly when the humidity within the suit reaches a critical mass. This means that when it’s more humid inside the suit than the outside, moisture is pushed through at impressive rates. However, paddling doesn’t often have situations when it is less humid outside the suit than in it, which is where these membranes can fall short.
« Our hydrophilic membrane actively draws moisture vapour through the membrane regardless of the outside humidity. »
Our hydrophilic membrane works differently. It actively draws moisture vapour through the membrane regardless of the outside humidity. It wicks moisture away from the paddler’s body at a steady rate and absorbs it, so it maintains its breathability over time and in real-world conditions. To really simplify the concept, it does not wait for a critical mass to remove moisture from the paddler’s body; it just works. It also incorporates graphene to give the membrane more resilience against soiling. All this combined with the slight two-way stretch we’ve built into the fabric, it creates a suit that moves with you and breathes with you in a way that’s immediately noticeable the first time you put it on.
How do you see this technology evolving in the future?
Exhaust Pro is the foundation, not the ceiling. We’ve already developed Exhaust Lite, a 2.5-ply version tuned for semi-dry tops and lighter pieces where packability and next-to-skin comfort are the priority. Moving forward, we see this membrane technology and PFAS-free approach becoming the basis for everything we make. We’re also investing in how fabric works with fit. Our 2026 Freya women’s drysuit, for example, was built using data from over 500 women worldwide, and the two-way stretch in Exhaust Pro was essential to making that new fit system work. The fabric and the fit are evolving together, and that’s where we think the real innovation is heading.
How does it compare to other fabrics out there?
« All this combined with the slight two-way stretch we’ve built into the fabric, it creates a suit that moves with you and breathes with you in a way that’s immediately noticeable the first time you put it on »
Most waterproof breathable fabrics on the market were designed for hiking, mountaineering, or skiing, and then adapted for water sports. Essentially, a company like Level Six goes to a fabric mill and buys what they think will translate the best to paddlesports from what other industries have already made. There are some incredible options out there, and some of them are names you are all very familiar with. Exhaust Pro was custom-designed from day one for paddling, for sustained contact with water, for the specific range of motion a paddler needs, and for the temperature and humidity conditions you encounter on the water. That purpose-built approach is the fundamental difference.
Beyond that, the combination of attributes is what sets it apart: 33,000 mm water column and 6,000 g/m²/24h breathability in a PFAS-free, 100% recycled fabric with two-way stretch and a hydrophilic membrane. These numbers and attributes all exist in other fabrics, but we combined them into one fabric. Most brands are asking paddlers to choose between sustainability and performance, or between waterproofness and breathability. We’re not. And I’d add that the fabric has a suppleness and hand-feel that’s immediately different from the stiff nylon you find in most drysuits; it feels premium, and that’s not accidental.
Do you think it can be used outside of watersports, too?
The technology absolutely has applications beyond paddling. The hydrophilic membrane, the PFAS-free chemistry, the recycled construction; these solve problems that exist across outdoor sports. But honestly, we designed this for paddlers first, and that’s where our focus is. The paddlesports industry has spent decades borrowing fabric technology from other sports and hoping it works on the water. We think paddlers deserve gear that was engineered for them from the start, and that’s the lane we’re committed to.
To learn more about Level Six, visit their website.
Find and learn more about the Exhaust Pro fabrics and related products on the Paddler Guide website.
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