Phantom

I LOVE these shoes.

I first tried a friend's pair and was abolutely blown away by their ability to generate power on small overhung feet, and those were 1.5 US sizes above what I use now! I've used these shoes almost exclusively outdoors on hard boulder and sport projects and have fallen in love with their performance. 

Overall Performance

These were developed for hard, steep outdoor climbing, and they most definitely reflect that. They give you the upmost confidence in tiny feet on more than vertical climbing, while the liberal rubber placement will enable a wide variety of heel and toehooks in atypical positions. The biggest advantage I can see in these shoes is their ability to generate off of small feet. 

The Phantom's construction lacks some sensitivity all-round, but this gives you the support you need to fully utilize overhung feet. These shoes have struck an excellent balance between sensitivity and stiffness. The only caveat I can think of is this might take away some confidence in flash attempts, as this takes away from your ability to intuit the nuance of footholds on the fly. This stiffness combined with Evolv's TRAX SAS rubber subtracts from these shoe's smearing ability, but I don't see that as a major issue with the shoe's intended use case (this will also give the shoes a longer lifespan). 

Design Intention

These shoes were designed in collaboration with Daniel Woods and Paul Robinson, hence they are made for hard overhung climbing with emphasis on outdoor projecting. These are not optimal for anything less than vertical - they will work, but it will be less than stellar. I've also found these shoes to not perform amazing on more modern style indoor bouldering, as they lack the smearing capibilites and sensitivity you see in most indoor oriented shoes nowadays. That said, these shoe will still crush board climbing and more "old school" style problems. The majority of complaints I see about these shoes stem from people not understanding their designed specialization. 

Fit

These shoes have a great amount adjustability due to their new closure system, but I suspect these shoes were designed with slight preference to wider/higher volume feet. That said, I have a pretty median foot volume, maybe with a slight leaning towards lower volume, and they still work great. The heel feels great for me too, but that's very subjective. These shoes don't feature the "love bump" seen in the Shamans, but the NEOFLEX knuckle box gives a huge amount of comfort for how aggresive these shoes are. It's hard to find these shoe in-person to try on for sizing - I'd recommend talking to someone at Evolv's customer service as they're super helpful with sizing in comparison to other shoes you wear. 

Closure System

I've seen a handful of people have problems with the Phantom's atypical closure system. I have not had a single issue with this, and I am honestly pretty happy with it. I haven't had any problems with the velcro coming undone, and I find the interior placement of the strap to be particularly nice when placing high-contact toe hooks that utilize the exterior of your foot. 

Bottom Line

These shoes are highly specialized in their design, so I would not recommend them if you plan on these being the exclusive shoes you wear. That said, if you are looking for a new pair of shoes to push your limits projecting outdoors or on the spraywall, get these shoes.