Deer, pronghorn, bears, and big game beware. There are some young rounds in town, but they’re appearing in some of the more classic chamberings. DoubleTap may be most well-known for its defensive pistol ammunition, but the old-school hunting ammo has our attention.  

To be clear, the DoubleTap brand has been around for over 20 years and keeps expanding. This year, additions to DT’s hunting rifle lineups caught our eye. The new .25-06 Remington and .35 Whelen options stood out, so of course we had to get them to the range. Here’s what we found.
 

Table of Contents

About DoubleTap
.25-06 Rem at the Range
.35 Whelen at the Range
Field Notes
Final Thoughts

About DoubleTap

When entrepreneur and shooter Mike McNett’s 2002 garage dream became a reality, DoubleTap Ammunition was born. After cutting its teeth on full-power 10mm loads, the company has grown into multiple ammunition specialties but clearly hasn’t lost touch with the consumer. At DoubleTap, someone personally handles every cartridge, an approach that shows in the quality of the product.
 

DoubleTap offers scads of other ammunition types, but the hunting-specific rifle ammunition caught this author's attention with its .25-06 Rem loads. From there, we’ve extensively fired the .35 Whelen, in addition to some .300 Winchester Magnum and .50 Action Express. Our focus for this piece, though, is the two more uncommon rifle rounds. 

We appreciate a company offering some less common, though no less cherished chamberings. In addition to the .25-06 and 35 Whelen we selected, DT offers multiple hunting rounds like 6.5x284 Norma, .257 Roberts, 7mm STW, .45 Win Mag, and .50 AE, on up to .505 Gibbs – along with plenty of more mainstream chamberings.

Let’s be honest: we don’t usually shoot or hunt extensively with lead-free ammunition unless it’s mandated by the hunting location. That said, we wanted to test the accuracy of these rounds, especially in the more classic chamberings. DoubleTap’s Lead Free SC-HP refers to non-toxic solid copper (SC) in hollow point (HP) or tipped hollow point (THP). 
 

.25-06 Rem at the Range

For the sake of this piece, we used Savage’s new-for-2025 Axis 2 Pro rifle topped with the Vortex Viper HD illuminated riflescope, a rig that has already proven itself exceptionally precise with several other loads. Not surprisingly, the DoubleTap rounds put out impressive three-shot groupings. We found several sub-MOA groups and most at MOA, with two different shooters. 
 

For those unfamiliar, the .25-06 is an underrated, useful, pleasant shooting, and accurate round that we’ve appreciated on everything from long-distance prairie dogs to antelope and whitetail deer. 

It’s essentially a necked-down .30-06 that has been around since 1969, and though not wildly popular today, it’s far underrated. 
 

.35 Whelen at the Range

The .35 Whelen is known not so much for pinpoint precision and soft shooting, but rather, brush-busting, minute-of-deer-heart type work.

The single-shot Traditions Outfitter G3 scoped combo proved itself a shooter beyond our expectations. DoubleTap’s 200-grain Lead Free rounds punched out several cloverleaf groupings, a notable feat for many .35 Whelens, but especially for a budget single shot partnered with Lead Free projectiles. 
 

Most every other Whelen group fell at or inside the 1.35-inch mark. We’d go deer or bear hunting with that performance any day of the week. If you don’t care for lead free, DoubleTap has the bases covered with: 180-grain DT Lead Free SC-THP, 225-grain Sierra Game King (and 250-grain JSP), and a 250-grain Controlled Expansion. 

All the DoubleTap rounds we fired, including .300 Win Mag and the .50 AE handgun, ran with 100-percent reliability. It’s noteworthy that DoubleTap offers multiple flavors in some of the more obscure chamberings, including.25-06, .35 Whelen, and the .50 AE. 
 

Field Notes

With the .25-06 and .35 Whelen, one is a lower-recoil, longer-range finesse hunter, and the other a hard-hitting thumper, but both shot well with DoubleTap ammunition. 

Our biggest complaint is about as nitpicky as it comes and has nothing to do with the ammo or its performance. The packaging is not the greatest, a fairly nondescript cardboard box with what seems a one-size-fits-all insert, which is too big for the Whelens and even more oversized for the .25-06. The rounds rattle around, don’t sit well in the container, and when carried in a hunting pack or backpack, they end up askew. There are no ballistics or other data on the box. 
 

To clear up one point – we’ve heard from some shooters that DoubleTap uses reclaimed brass or other components. We’ve verified with the company that’s untrue. It’s even listed on the DT website that they “only use new components, never preciously fired or reclaimed brass.” 

Depending on the chambering, the brass has headstamps of Hornady, Starline, and PPU. Apparently, some of DoubleTap’s brass is proprietary, while others are new stock outsourced from other manufacturers.
 

Another point of clarification speaks to the advertised performance. DoubleTap’s ammunition is developed and tested at the company’s home of Cedar City, Utah. That location sits more than a mile above sea level, so shooters at lower elevations may need to temper expectations when it comes to advertised velocities. 
 

Final Thoughts

Though our primary interest is the company’s hunting rounds for both rifles and handguns, there’s far more in the DoubleTap portfolio. Don’t let this brand fly under your radar. We’re especially impressed by both the richness of chambering selections, including some harder-to-find offerings, along with ample in stock options at the time of this writing. 

So, next time you’re in the market for hunting rounds, whether lead-free or more traditional, give DoubleTap a look, especially if you’re a fan of old-school cool.