Bowtech Eva Shockey SS Review

Editors' review

Most bows aimed at women are flagships with the good technology quietly taken out to reach a friendlier price. The Bowtech Eva Shockey Signature Series - the SS - does the opposite. Underneath the Electric Blue accents sits a real carbon-riser flagship: the same OverDrive Binary cams, the same PowerShift technology, and the same Knight carbon-compound riser Bowtech built its top hunting bows around, re-geometried for short-draw and lighter draw-weight shooters rather than stripped of features. It was the first signature-series bow the industry built around a woman, developed with bowhunter and television host Eva Shockey across 2015, and it sold on that promise through 2020. The headline trick is PowerShift FlipDisc2, which lets one bow behave like three - a fast setting for hunting, an easy setting for a long day of 3D, and a middle ground - flipped by hand at the cam. For a short-draw shooter who has spent years being handed entry-level equipment, that is the whole story.

Finish

At launch in 2015 the Eva Shockey SS shipped in a single signature look: Micro Carbon Fibre with Electric Blue accents woven through the string, cables, and hardware, over black limbs. The teal-blue signature treatment is the point - it reads as this bow from across a 3D range, and it is one of the few hunting bows where the cosmetic identity is deliberate rather than incidental. Bowtech widened the palette as the run went on: Mossy Oak Break-Up Country arrived in 2016 for shooters who want the bow to disappear into timber, and 2017 added a Micro Carbon finish along with Kryptek Highlander, Altitude, Raid, and Typhon options. Across its production run the chassis never changed - only the coatings did - so a 2015 BlackOps bow and a 2017 Mossy Oak bow shoot identically. Period owners who ran the bow through full seasons reported the coating holding up to weather and handling without complaint.

Riser

The Eva Shockey SS is built on Bowtech's Knight riser, a carbon-compound design that is the reason the whole bow weighs just 3.3 pounds - light enough that it carries easily on a long walk in and stays put on target instead of fighting your hold. Drawing it, the first thing I notice is how little there is to fight: the mass sits where it should, and the bow hangs steady rather than nosing around. The riser carries Bowtech's FLX-Guard, a flexing cable guard that pulls the cables clear of the arrow while cancelling the sideways torque a fixed guard puts into the riser at the shot, which is a real contributor to how calmly this bow releases. The geometry is a compact 31.5-inch axle-to-axle (ATA - the distance between the two cam axles), short enough to swing well in a treestand or a tight ground blind without feeling twitchy in the hand. It is a genuine carbon-riser build, the same category of hardware Bowtech reserved for its flagship hunters, which is unusual at this bow's place in the market.

Grip

The grip is Bowtech's slim side-plate design of the era, mounted low and direct to the riser so the hand sits close to the centerline where torque is easiest to keep out of the shot. The narrow profile suits smaller hands, which matters on a bow built for shorter-draw shooters, and it fills the palm without forcing the wrist into a high, tension-heavy position. Owners describe the hold as steady and repeatable - part of why the release reads so calm - and the side plates are warm enough to shoot bare-handed into cold weather rather than reaching for a glove. There is nothing exotic here; it is a clean, low-torque grip that gets out of the way, which on a hunting bow is exactly what you want.

Limbs

The Eva Shockey SS runs solid one-piece limbs set in a near-parallel geometry, so at the shot the top and bottom limbs drive back against each other and cancel much of the shock and noise before it reaches your hand. That parallel layout is a big part of why owners call the release forgiving rather than harsh. Draw weight comes in three peak modules - 40, 50, and 60 pounds - each adjustable 10 pounds down from its peak, which covers a range from a manageable 30 pounds up to a full 60-pound hunting setup. Changing draw length happens at the cam modules rather than the limbs, so limb-weight is set once for the shooter and left alone. Solid limbs like these have a long, quiet reliability record across Bowtech's lineup, and they hold their tune season to season without the split-limb fussiness some shooters worry about.

Eccentric System

This is where the Eva Shockey SS earns its keep. It runs Bowtech's OverDrive Binary cams - a binary system slaves the top and bottom cams directly to each other so they self-correct their timing and keep nock travel straight, which is what a short-draw shooter feels as a consistent, repeatable release. Draw length adjusts from 22.5 to 28.5 inches through rotating modules in half-inch steps, no bow press and no new cams required, so the bow grows with a teenager or gets dialed to an adult in minutes. The published IBO speed (the industry chronograph rating at a fixed 30-inch, 70-pound, 350-grain setup) is 332 fps, quick for a compact women's-market bow. The signature feature is PowerShift FlipDisc2: rotating the disc at the cam by hand shifts the bow between a Performance setting for maximum speed and knock-down energy, a Comfort setting for the easiest possible draw with a solid back wall, and a Classic middle ground - three draw personalities in one bow, no press needed. The trade-off is honest: the settings sit about 12 fps apart, so a change of mode means re-sighting, which is why most owners choose one and leave it. Let-off is 80% (the holding weight drops to a fifth of peak at full draw), and in the Comfort setting a 60-pound bow genuinely draws closer to a 50 - the single most useful thing this cam system does for the shooter it was built for.

Draw Cycle/Shootability

Drawing the Eva Shockey SS is the part everyone remembers. Owners reach for the same words - smooth, quiet, easy - and pulling it in the Comfort setting I understand why: the weight builds gently, rolls over without a hard hump, and drops into a defined valley behind a back wall (the firm stop at full draw) that feels solid rather than mushy. Eva Shockey herself noted that after moving up eight pounds in draw weight she couldn't feel the difference, and that tracks with how little effort the Comfort setting asks for the energy it stores. At the shot the carbon riser, FLX-Guard, and parallel limbs work together for a release owners describe as calm and quiet, with the bow settling fast in the hand rather than jumping. It is not a dead-silent flagship of the modern era, but for its time and price it shoots noticeably steadier and quieter than the entry-level bows most short-draw shooters were being handed. Switch to the Performance setting and the same bow turns into a faster, more aggressive hunting rig without giving up that composed shot. What stays with me is how little it asks of the shooter for what it hands back.

Usage Scenarios

The Eva Shockey SS was built first for the whitetail hunter who happens to be a short-draw shooter - light enough to hang on a treestand hook all morning, compact enough to draw in a cramped ground blind, and quick enough in the Performance setting to reach across a food plot with authority. The same bow does double duty at the 3D range: flip it to the Comfort setting for a long club shoot where an easy draw over dozens of targets matters more than a few feet per second. Its 22.5-inch bottom draw makes it one of the few real hunting bows a growing teenager can start on and keep, adding draw length in half-inch steps and stepping up through the 40, 50, and 60-pound modules as they gain strength. Picture a mother and daughter sharing one bow across three seasons - the daughter learning on Comfort at a short draw, the mother hunting on Performance at 28 inches - without either of them touching a bow press. Where it runs out of room is at the top end: a tall or heavy-draw adult who needs 29 inches or a 70-pound peak has sized past what this platform offers.

Versions

The Eva Shockey SS is one bow sold under one spec across its 2015-2020 run; the only thing that changed year to year was the finish. It launched in 2015 in the signature BlackOps look (Micro Carbon Fibre with Electric Blue accents), added Mossy Oak Break-Up Country in 2016 - the version many dealers labeled the "Signature Series Gen2," though it is the same chassis with new graphics - and picked up a Micro Carbon finish plus Kryptek Highlander, Altitude, Raid, and Typhon options in 2017. It launched around $849 in the signature BlackOps finish; the later Mossy Oak and Kryptek patterned options ran a little higher. Right- and left-hand builds were both offered. Note that this original Signature Series is a distinct bow from Bowtech's later Eva Shockey Gen 2 (2021-2023) and Eva Gen3 (2024), which revived the name on the entirely different Solution SD DeadLock platform - if you are shopping the modern lineage, those are separate bows with a longer brace height and different cams.

Bowtech Eva Shockey SS vs Mathews Jewel, Diamond Infinite Edge Pro

Bow	Bowtech Eva Shockey SS	Mathews Jewel	Diamond Infinite Edge Pro
Version	2020	2016	2026 Legacy
Picture
Brace Height	6.25 "	6.375 "	7 "
AtA Length	31.5 "	28 "	31 "
Draw Length	22.5 " - 28.5 "	22 " - 29 "	13 " - 31 "
Draw Weight	30 lbs - 60 lbs	30 lbs - 60 lbs	5 lbs - 65 lbs
IBO Speed	332 fps	325 fps	300 fps
Weight	3.3 lbs	3.6 lbs	3.3 lbs
Let-Off	80%	80%	80%
Where to buy Best prices online	$850 Compare prices	$599.99 to $800 Compare prices	$125 to $900 Compare prices
	compare more bows

In its era the Eva Shockey SS had one true premium peer and one accessible alternative. The Mathews Jewel was the other flagship women's bow of the moment, and the match is close: a 28-inch ATA against the Bowtech's 31.5, a 6.375-inch brace, 325 fps IBO, a 22-to-29-inch draw range, and the same 30-to-60-pound draw span, at a launch price around $999 for the anodized finish (near parity with the Eva Shockey's sub-$900). The Jewel leans on Mathews' signature dead-in-the-hand quiet and a slightly shorter, steadier ATA; the Eva Shockey SS answers with PowerShift's three draw settings and a longer riser that some shooters aim better. The Diamond Infinite Edge Pro plays a different role - it is the grow-with-anyone bow, adjustable across an enormous 13-to-31-inch draw and 5-to-65-pound range at 300 fps IBO, and it sells as a complete ready-to-hunt package for well under $400. It cannot match the Eva Shockey's carbon riser, 3.3-pound mass, or 332 fps, but a first-time or still-growing archer weighing whether to spend up will cross-shop it hard. The decision comes down to priorities: PowerShift versatility and a true carbon-flagship feel with the Eva Shockey SS, Mathews' silence and steadiness with the Mathews Jewel, or maximum adjustability at minimum cost with the Diamond Infinite Edge Pro.

Summary

The Bowtech Eva Shockey SS was the first hunting bow the industry built as a woman's signature flagship rather than a de-contented version of one, and it holds up as exactly that: a 3.3-pound carbon-riser bow with OverDrive Binary cams, an 80% let-off, a compact 31.5-inch ATA, and a published 332 fps IBO, sold from 2015 through 2020 at a sub-$900 launch price around $849. Its defining feature is PowerShift FlipDisc2 - three draw personalities in one bow, a fast Performance setting for hunting and an effortless Comfort setting that makes a 60-pound bow draw like a 50 - and what stays with me after drawing it is how much easy, quiet composure it offers a shooter who had been sold short before. It is an excellent bow for the short-draw or women hunter who refuses entry-level gear and wants genuine flagship tuning in a light, forgiving, compact package, and it does real double duty on the 3D range. Buyers who prize dead-silent shot feel over switchable settings should also look at the Mathews Jewel; those who want maximum adjustability and a complete package at the lowest price should look at the Diamond Infinite Edge Pro.