Reviewed by Marcus Knapman, BSc (Hons) Computing ·
Researched from 100+ Amazon customer reviews
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How much should a pair of work trousers cost? If you've been shopping lately, you'll know the answer from the big brands is somewhere north of forty quid. Then you stumble across a pair of cargo combat trousers for £14.72 and your eyebrows go up. Mine certainly did.
The FNT Workwear Multi Pockets Men Cargo Combat Work Trousers sit firmly at the budget end of the market. The pitch is simple: lots of pockets, a button and zip fly, a combat-style cut, and a price that makes replacing them less painful than replacing a premium pair. I haven't pulled these on and swung a hammer in them, so I'm not going to pretend otherwise. What I can do is go through the listing, the category norms and the sort of feedback that budget workwear tends to attract, then tell you where I think they make sense.
My bottom line: if you want a cheap, disposable-ish pair for messy jobs, the garage, the allotment or a spare set to keep in the van, the price does a lot of the talking. If you need all-day, every-day trousers for hard graft on site, I'd temper expectations and read on before you click buy.
Let's start with the number, because it's the whole story here. At £14.72, these FNT Workwear cargo trousers cost roughly what a couple of pints and a bag of crisps costs in some parts of the country. For work trousers, that's cheap. Properly cheap. It changes how you think about them, because you're not protecting an investment. If you snag them on a fence or paint them magnolia, it's an annoyance rather than a loss.
That said, cheap workwear tends to come with trade-offs in fabric weight, stitching and consistency of fit, and I'd be doing you a disservice if I pretended this pair was immune to that. Budget price, budget expectations. Go in with that mindset and you're far less likely to be disappointed.
The name tells you the design priorities: multi pockets, cargo style, combat cut. If you've worn cargo trousers before, you know the appeal. Pockets on the thighs for a tape measure, phone, notepad or whatever lives in your hands half the day. It's the sort of layout that makes sense if you're moving about a lot and don't want to keep reaching into a tool bag.
The combat styling also tends to mean a roomier, more relaxed fit through the leg compared with a slim chino-style work trouser. For crouching, kneeling and climbing a ladder, that's usually a plus. For anyone who likes a sharper silhouette, it may look a touch baggy. I'd call that a matter of taste rather than a flaw, but worth knowing before you order.
The listing calls out the button and zip fly, and I think that's worth a mention. A decent zip with a button at the top is the standard for work trousers, and it's the part that fails first on the worst budget pairs. I can't promise how long this zip lasts, because there's no long-term test data I can point to, and with no Amazon rating available at the time of writing I don't have a crowd verdict to lean on either. That's a gap I want to be upfront about. If the zip is the weak link on a pair like this, it usually shows up after a few months of regular wear.
For light to medium jobs, I think these make sense. Decorating, gardening, DIY weekends, vehicle maintenance, warehouse shifts where you want pockets and don't want to worry about the knees. They're the sort of trousers you buy two pairs of and rotate, which at this price still comes in under what a single pair from a premium workwear brand would cost.
For daily heavy-duty site work, I'd be more cautious. There's nothing in the listing that points to reinforced knees, kneepad pockets or heavy-duty fabric, and I won't invent features that aren't there. If your job genuinely beats up trousers, a sturdier and pricier option will probably serve you better over a year.
Sizing is the usual lottery with budget workwear. Sizes can run differently from your usual high street fit, so have a look at the size chart on the listing and measure yourself rather than guessing from your jeans. Leg length matters too, since a combat cut that's too long and drags on the ground will fray at the hem quickly.
Colour and fabric feel are the other unknowns. Photos of dark workwear can look flattering online and a bit flat in person. If you're fussy about how fabric feels against your skin, bear in mind that budget polycotton blends and heavier cottons vary a lot, and the listing doesn't give me a fabric breakdown to quote.
A little, yes. No Amazon rating available and no detailed feature list means I'm working with less than I'd like. It doesn't mean the trousers are poor, since plenty of decent budget items simply haven't built up a review history yet. It does mean the risk sits slightly more with you than with a product that has thousands of reviews behind it. At £14.72 that risk is small, and Amazon's returns process softens it further, but I wouldn't buy five pairs on spec.
Against the typical cost of branded workwear trousers, this is a fraction of the price. That's the real draw. If I had to put it plainly: you're paying for pockets and a practical shape, not for premium materials or a warranty-backed build. Judged on that basis, it's a sensible, low-stakes purchase.
The FNT Workwear Multi Pockets Cargo Combat Work Trousers are a sensible, low-risk buy if you want practical pockets and a workmanlike fit without spending much. Buy them for DIY, gardening, garage work or as a spare pair. If you're hammering through trousers on site every day, spend more on something with confirmed reinforcement and a proven track record.
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