Hoyt REDWRX Carbon RX-7 Ultra Review
Pros
- VitalPoint grip is the standout - flat-backed and warm, it gives the hand latitude instead of forcing one position, for a repeatable low-torque hold
- Smoothest draw of Hoyt's 2022 line - it loads without aggression, rolls through with no real hump, and settles into a forgiving valley that lets up just enough
- Dead in the hand and very quiet - owners note the Ultra finally sheds the hand shock older long-axle Hoyts carried, shooting as hushed as the Mathews flagships
- Lightest 34-inch carbon rig at 4.3 pounds - rigged out it runs about half a pound under the Mathews, and the carbon riser stays warm to bare fingers at altitude
- Long 34-inch axle-to-axle and 7-inch brace hold dead-steady at distance, and the 27 to 32-inch draw range fits the taller-draw hunter the compact RX-7 leaves out
Cons
- Back wall carries a slight sponge with a faint recovery at the very tail - mild and most owners stay engaged through it, but flagship limb-stop-wall shooters may want to draw one first
- Carbon-flagship price tier and the slowest IBO of Hoyt's 2022 line - running an 80-pound build recovers speed, and buyers who want the same cam and grip for less can step to the compact RX-7 or Hoyt's aluminum VTM
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Editors' review
For years the long Ultra in Hoyt's carbon line was the one that buzzed - the extra axle-to-axle gave it more shot vibration than its compact siblings, and owners learned to live with it. The 2022 Carbon RX-7 Ultra flips that script: owners coming off the older Ultras describe this one as having no hand shock at all, the quietest long-axle carbon Hoyt yet. It earns that on the same breakthrough as the standard RX-7 - Hoyt's first 100% carbon riser, two carbon tubes with no aluminum anywhere - but stretched to a 34-inch axle-to-axle frame with a 7-inch brace height for the hunter who wants maximum forgiveness rather than the most compact package. The headline numbers tell the positioning: 334 fps IBO and 4.3 pounds, a touch slower and a few ounces heavier than the compact 30-inch standard model, traded for a longer, steadier riser and a 27 to 32-inch draw range that finally fits taller-draw shooters. The same HBX Pro cam, VitalPoint grip, and In-Line accessory system carry over. This is the carbon rig for the open-country Western hunter who holds long and wants the bow to sit still at full draw. Carried over unchanged into 2023, it served two seasons before the Carbon RX-8 Ultra replaced it for 2024.
Finish
The RX-7 Ultra shares the standard model's palette, and it leans toward the high-country and open-terrain camo systems Hoyt's Western audience favors. At launch the lineup ran solids - Black Out, Buckskin, and Wilderness - alongside a deep camo slate including Realtree, Kuiu, and Gore OptiFade patterns aimed squarely at the spot-and-stalk hunter glassing across open country. For the 2023 carryover the slate settled to Hoyt's then-current set: Black Out, Wilderness, Buckskin, Bottomland, and Vetiver, with Realtree options, while the riser, cam, and limbs underneath stayed put. That breadth is wider than most carbon hunting bows carried at the time. Black Out remains the most timeless pick for the hunter who plans to add their own accessories and wants the long riser to disappear behind them, while the OptiFade and Kuiu builds suit the open-country stalker who lives in sage and timber. Coverage on Hoyt's carbon and laminated limbs held up well in real use, with owners reporting bows arriving clean and chip-free and the finish shrugging off the abuse a backcountry season throws at it.Riser
This is where the Ultra and the standard RX-7 are the same bow - and where both break from every carbon Hoyt before them. The riser is Hoyt's first-ever 100% carbon structure: two hollow carbon tubes with no aluminum caps or pockets anywhere, where prior RX risers molded carbon onto an aluminum head and limb-pocket section. Owners can see the difference on camera - the limb-pocket attachment now lives in the carbon itself, not on a glued-in aluminum bracket. Pulling that aluminum out is how a 34-inch bow comes in at just 4.3 pounds, which owners call as light as it gets for a long axle-to-axle hunting rig. Carbon brings the cold-weather payoff aluminum cannot match: the riser stays warm to the touch, and one backcountry owner shooting at 11,000 feet in mid-January found the carbon never went ice-cold in a hand that grips the bow for hours of hiking and glassing - a real difference, not marketing. The riser also carries the In-Line accessory system: a Picatinny rail (the same accessory mounting standard used on AR-platform firearms) machined into the front for the sight, an Integrate dovetail that docks a compatible rest tight to the back of the riser, and an optimized quiver location, all pulling accessory mass in-line and front-of-center - which on a long, forgiving riser is exactly where it helps the sight settle. Two Shock Pod locations near the limb pockets soak up residual vibration, part of why this Ultra finishes so much quieter than the long Hoyts that came before it.Grip
The VitalPoint grip earns near-universal praise from everyone who has shot this bow, and on the Ultra it matters even more - any palm torque shows up faster on a long, light riser held at distance. It is molded directly to the riser from Hoyt's Versaflex non-slip material with a warm, rubber-like texture and a flat back that centers hand pressure in the meat of the palm. The change owners single out is what it does not do: where older Hoyt grips were a harder contoured plastic that forced the hand into one position, this one gives the hand latitude to settle the way the shooter naturally wants, then repeat it shot after shot. That repeatable, low-torque hold is the quiet foundation under the Ultra's forgiveness. The Versaflex material is the cold-weather story again - non-slip and never icy through a long, freezing sit on an open ridge. The grip is bonded to the riser, and while an owner can peel it to fit an aftermarket grip, most find no reason to - it ships comfortable, with no pressure point at the base of the thumb, and they leave it exactly as it comes.Limbs
The RX-7 Ultra runs Hoyt's split, past-parallel limbs seated in machined metal limb pockets - the proven interface that anchors the brand's flagship hunters and a big part of why these bows tune predictably and hold tune across seasons. Past-parallel geometry points the limb tips away from each other at the shot so their forces cancel, which on the Ultra pairs with the carbon riser and dual Shock Pods to deliver the dead, quiet finish owners highlight. Draw weight is offered across the full hunting span in 40, 50, 60, 65, 70, and 80-pound peak brackets, and because the smooth HBX Pro draw makes peak weight feel lighter than it reads, plenty of Ultra owners step up to the 80-pound option - useful here, since running more draw weight is how you buy back the speed the long, forgiving geometry trades away. The 7-inch brace height is the forgiveness story in hardware: the longer brace lengthens the time the arrow stays on the string under guidance, smoothing out small form errors at the moment of release. Hoyt's limited lifetime warranty covers the limbs, pockets, and eccentrics to the original owner, reflecting confidence in a limb-and-pocket system the company has refined across the RX line for years.Eccentric System
The HBX Pro is a three-track binary cam - the same wheel top and bottom, tied together so the system stays in time - and it is the second iteration of Hoyt's binary platform, re-profiled over the prior HBX for a cleaner center shot and full-draw sight picture. Two module sizes cover the Ultra's 27 to 32-inch draw range, the span that makes this the long-draw answer to the compact standard model. The cam carries a 334 fps IBO rating (IBO being the industry-standard chronograph figure taken at 30 inches, 70 pounds, and a 350-grain arrow) - the slowest in Hoyt's 2022 line, which is the honest cost of the long axle-to-axle and tall brace, not a flaw. Real-world numbers track sensibly below that: at 70 pounds and a 30-inch draw a 350-grain arrow ran 315 fps, while a heavier-setup owner clocked 295 fps with a 329-grain shaft at 71 pounds - speeds the long-draw hunter readily lifts by running the 80-pound brackets. Let-off is shooter-selectable between 80% and 85% (let-off being the share of peak weight your holding weight drops to at full draw) by sliding a peg in each cam's module, a tool-light change with no measurable speed cost; at 85% owners say it feels like holding almost nothing at full draw, a gift on a long stalk. The 334-IBO, 34-inch, 7-inch-brace combination is what owners call genuinely tunable and shootable, though the binary's center-shot adjustment is done by shimming the cams, so the first setup rewards a press and a little patience. Hoyt's own testing puts the platform 24% quieter than the RX-5, and on the Ultra that gain is the headline - owners rate it as quiet as or quieter than the Mathews flagships that usually own the silence crown.Draw Cycle/Shootability
What owners remember after shooting the RX-7 Ultra is how civilized a long, light carbon bow can feel. The front end loads without aggression - no real hump to muscle through - and then the HBX Pro rolls cleanly to the wall, a draw multiple owners rate the smoothest of any bow they pulled that year, with the nearest rival being Hoyt's own Ventum Pro 33. The valley is the open-country sweet spot: it tanks down but does not drop hard, letting up just enough that a hunter can come to anchor quickly when a buck steps into the lane without the bow yanking the sight off the spot. The one honest quirk is the back wall - owners describe a slight sponge with a faint shimmy to recover at the very tail rather than a concrete limb-stop wall, mild enough that most simply stay engaged and pull through it. Post-shot is where the generational change lands: where older long-axle Hoyts buzzed, this Ultra sits dead in the hand with no hand shock owners can feel, and it is quiet - the carbon riser and dual Shock Pods doing the work the longer riser used to undo. At 4.3 pounds on a 34-inch frame it holds like a target bow, settling planted at full draw rather than darting, and the 7-inch brace forgives the small form errors that creep in at the end of a long day. Because the smooth cam makes 70 pounds feel closer to 60, owners comfortably run heavier draw weights without fatiguing across long practice sessions. Dial the draw length and this is a rig you can hold steady on a far target and shoot all afternoon.Usage Scenarios
The Carbon RX-7 Ultra is built for the open-country hunter who holds long and wants the bow to sit still, and its 34-inch axle-to-axle frame is the through-line. Picture a Western spot-and-stalk hunter belly-crawling to the edge of a sage flat, ranging a mule deer at 60 yards across a coulee: the long riser and 7-inch brace hold the pin dead-steady at full draw, the flat-enough speed tightens pin gaps, and the In-Line balance keeps the sight planted through a deliberate release. For the backcountry elk hunter packing in to 11,000 feet, the 4.3-pound carbon shaves real weight off the load and stays warm in a frozen-dawn grip, while an 80-pound build with a heavy shaft drives the kinetic energy to punch an elk's shoulder at the end of a long climb. The 27 to 32-inch draw range is the headline for fit - this is the bow for the 6-foot-3 hunter with a 31-inch draw who never quite fit the compact 30-inch RX-7. It still threads a treestand for whitetails, where the dead-quiet, no-shock shot keeps a close deer from jumping the string, though a hunter in a very tight stand may prefer the shorter standard model. It can moonlight as a 3D and even a target rig for shooters who like a long, forgiving riser and a deep hold, making it one of the more versatile carbon hunters of its era for the taller-draw archer.Versions
The REDWRX Carbon RX-7 Ultra is the long, 34-inch model, sold as a single bow configuration across two model years. It debuted in 2022 at roughly $1,899 MSRP and carried over unchanged into 2023 at about $1,899 - same 100% carbon riser, same HBX Pro cam, same 334 fps / 34-inch / 7-inch-brace / 4.3-pound spec, with only the finish palette rotating between years. It was discontinued after 2023 and replaced by the Carbon RX-8 Ultra for 2024. Buyers choose their configuration through peak draw weight (40, 50, 60, 65, 70, or 80 pounds), draw-length module (covering the 27 to 32-inch range), hand, and finish rather than separate package SKUs. The separate REDWRX Carbon RX-7 is its own model - the compact 30-inch axle-to-axle bow with a 6.25-inch brace, 342 fps, 25 to 30-inch draw, and 3.9-pound mass, and a lower price ($1,799 in 2022, $1,849 in 2023) - aimed at the hunter who wants the most compact, fastest carbon package rather than the long-draw, maximum-forgiveness platform this review covers.Hoyt REDWRX Carbon RX-7 Ultra vs Mathews V3X 33, Bowtech SR350
| Bow | Hoyt REDWRX Carbon RX-7 Ultra | Mathews V3X 33 | Bowtech SR350 |
| Version | 2023 | 2023 | 2023 |
| Picture |  |  |  |
| Brace Height | 7 " | 6.5 " | 6 " |
| AtA Length | 34 " | 33 " | 33 " |
| Draw Length | 27 " - 32 " | 27 " - 31.5 " | 25 " - 30 " |
| Draw Weight | 40 lbs - 80 lbs | 50 lbs - 75 lbs | 40 lbs - 70 lbs |
| IBO Speed | 334 fps | 336 fps | 350 fps |
| Weight | 4.3 lbs | 4.67 lbs | 4.4 lbs |
| Let-Off | 80% or 85% | 80 or 85% | 85 / 87% |
| Where to buy Best prices online |
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An RX-7 Ultra buyer who looks beyond Hoyt's own lineup cross-shops the other 2022 long-flagship hunters, and two stand out. The Mathews V3X 33 is the closest match on platform: a 33-inch axle-to-axle, 6.5-inch-brace, 336 fps bow at 4.67 pounds with a 27 to 31.5-inch draw range and 80/85% let-off, built on Mathews' aluminum Bridge-Lock chassis with the Crosscentric cam and launched at $1,299 - roughly $600 under the carbon Hoyt. The Bowtech SR350 plays the speed card: a 33-inch axle-to-axle, 6-inch-brace, 350 fps bow at 4.4 pounds with Bowtech's DeadLock cam tuning and an 85/87% let-off, also launched at $1,299, though its 25 to 30-inch draw range stops short of the longer draws the Ultra's 27 to 32-inch span reaches. Against both, the Ultra's case is material, brace, and warmth: it is the only one of the three with a 100% carbon riser, it carries the tallest 7-inch brace for the steadiest hold at distance, and it is the only one that stays warm to bare fingers in the cold - all of which matter most to the longer-draw backcountry hunter packing miles in open country. The Mathews V3X 33 answers with its renowned silence, a streamlined Bridge-Lock sight integration, and a 31.5-inch top draw that nearly matches the Ultra's reach, for the buyer who wants a long, forgiving flagship without the carbon premium. The Bowtech SR350 answers with the highest IBO of the three and DeadLock's reputation for fast, lock-in tuning, for the shooter who prizes a tighter-brace, more aggressive, speed-first feel. The decision comes down to priorities: the RX-7 Ultra for the longer-draw hunter who wants the lightest, warmest carbon platform and the most forgiving hold, the Mathews V3X 33 for the buyer who wants a quiet long-axle flagship for hundreds less, and the Bowtech SR350 for the shooter chasing the highest speed and the simplest tuning.