Penn Authority 2500 and 3500 spinning reel reviews - £400+ in the UK

As much as I have now fished a hell of a lot with both the Penn Authority 2500 and 3500 spinning reels since I wrote an initial thoughts post back in October 2022 - see here - in many respects the fishing which I have been doing with these reels isn’t really a proper test of what they are capable of doing. For sure we can put gear like this through some decent saltwater hassle, but one thing our bass are not doing is testing how fish-strong these Authority reels are when faced with bigger, much more powerful target species…………

Bearing in mind then that my experience with these Authority reels has only with our saltwater lure fishing so far, I will tell you how I have been getting on with these higher end spinning reels for about the last year or so. A comparable size Shimano Stella is far more spinning reel than any of us technically need for a fish like a bass, but then you can say that about a lot of different gear - cars, mobiles, some lure rods etc. One thing which I won’t bang on about but which I need to mention is that for the price of one Penn Authority 2500/3500 you could buy nearly two of the same size Penn Slammer IV 2500 or 3500 spinning reels. Both are going to land any bass we might ever connect with, and as far as I can tell both reels are also going to last for a long time in a saltwater environment. But the more expensive Authority range exists and I really like fishing with them.

I get to use them via my working with Pure Fishing/Savage Gear, so I can’t tell you if I’d have dropped the necessary readies on these two reels. I like to think I would have, and especially on the smaller Authority 2500, but with how much I like the cheaper Slammer IV 2500 I just don’t know. For sure the Authority is a smoother reel than the Slammer, but how much does that really matter in a real fishing environment and not just turning handles at home and trying to balance rod/reel combinations on your forefinger as well? What I do know is that if I had my way with Penn I’d get them to make the exact handle/grip to fit on any spinning reel I might ever fish with. I absolutely love the grip on the Authority handles, to the point that I know I have missed at least a couple of bass due to literally stroking the grip on the retrieve and not being able to react fast enough when the hit comes! I wasn’t going to admit to that but what the hell eh?

Apologies then for the slight cop out here, but I would urge you to go back to my initial impressions blog post here and have a read of it - because nothing has really changed with how I view these two Penn Authority spinning reels. There are also all the technical details you might want to know contained within that blog post. I fish with the smaller Authority 2500 a hell of a lot of the time and it’s been strapped to a number of different lure rods over the last year or so. I tend to bring the larger Authority 3500 out when the surf is going off and my go-to “more budget end but bloody incredible” Savage Gear SGS5 9’6’’ 12-46g rod comes out to play. The smaller Authority 2500 works just fine in the surf by the way, as does the cheaper Slammer IV 2500 of course, but for the most part I’ve got the Authority 2500 strapped to various lure rods which I would fish with day to day. I also fished with the larger Authority 3500 for most of my first attempt at bass fishing in Portugal earlier in the year for example.

Neither reel are what would be termed “light” these days, and especially not when they are compared to the equivalent size Shimano or Daiwa spinning reels. That though was never meant to be the point of these Authority and indeed Slammer reels from Penn. If you are obsessed with the lightest possible rod and reel outfits for your bass fishing then I would urge you to stay away from reels like these. If you need the extra saltwater-resistance that these reels offer though, or you are interested in how a heavier reel can sometimes make a light lure rod feel even lighter, then peruse away and have a go. I am very much sold on how heavier spinning reels can often feel so good on some of the shorter rods. I fish with the outstanding, roughly £200 Savage Gear SGS6 8’3’’ 12-42g lure rod a lot, and as much as I have played with a bunch of different weight spinning reels on this rod, for me it’s the (heavier) Authority 2500 or Slammer IV 2500 which make the rod feel best in my hands.

I have treated both my Authority reels the same as I would my Slammers. Before using them I did what I always do to a new spinning reel - check this blog post here - and then I got on with fishing them hard. To date I haven’t felt the need to re-oil or re-grease either of the reels because they continue to feel great, indeed I could make an argument for the stainless gears feeling like they have been sort of bedding in and the reels feel smoother than they did when I first fished with them. There’s nothing scientific here by the way, it’s only what I think I can feel at the end of the day, but whatever the case I can’t get enough of fishing with these two Authority reels. To me they feel like better Slammers - a bit smoother, more refined, and a bit more “together”. But then the Slammer is a hell of a lot of reel in my book.

I can only quote the numbers that Penn do when it comes to saltwater resistance - IPX6 on the Slammer IV and IPX8 on the Authorities - and I know that both my Authority reels have been splashed and dunked and drowned over the course of the year. When this happens to any spinning reel I am using I will take it off the rod when I get home, tighten the drag right down, fill a sink with warm water, drown the reel and turn the handle for say 30 seconds, take the reel out of the water, shake it off, slacken the drag off, then leave it to drip-dry. I don’t know if I need to do this with the IPX8 rating on an Authority, but I do so anyway and both reels continue to feel great. Note that Penn are not saying you can submerge an Authority in saltwater and turn the handle like you might expect to do on some of the Van Staal reels. Do this sort of thing at your own risk I guess.

One thing which I can’t get away from is that it still seems to be a bit of pot luck what sort of line-lay you get out of the box with a Penn spinning reel. I am used to it and because I like what some of the Penn reels do for me I just get on with it, but from experience and speaking to other anglers I know that these expensive Authority spinning reels share similar quirks to the cheaper Penn reels. One reel will have perfect line-lay out of the box and then the next one won’t. It’s relatively easily corrected via the use of included shims in the box, but it’s a pain, and I have never had the same issues with a Shimano spinning reel for example. The thing is that I would not put a Shimano or Daiwa reel through what I put my Slammers and Authorities through, so I live with it.

I also know to fill a 2500 size Penn spinning reel up to a lower line-level than I do their larger 3500 reels, and again you will find this quirk on the (expensive) Authority reels. The actual way the braid lays on these Authority reels looks really good, but I know from experience that I have to underfill the 2500 size a bit, and especially if I am going to be fishing weedless soft plastics into a headwind - which I do a lot of the time. Once you’ve got the “correct” line-levels these reels have performed flawlessly for me, and not for one second do I feel that a slightly lower line-level is affecting how far my lures can go out. I would politely suggest that a percentage of lure anglers could learn to cast better before worrying about a lower line-level affecting their potential distance. I have fished mainly with the Berkley Sick X8 24lb and 36lb braids on my Authority 2500 and 3500 and I just can’t fault the stuff. Serious braid for serious reels.

So there you go. I am not for one second suggesting that you go and drop north of £400 on a spinning reel for your bass fishing, but I get the impression that a number of anglers have already done so. I am also talking from the point of view of shore fishing here, and there’s a whole world of boat based lure fishing which I have not been putting these reels through. As with anything in life you are going to spend what you can or want to on your fishing. I get to fish with these Authority spinning reels and I know how lucky I am that my work gets me access to gear like this. I can’t make you believe me, but nobody at Savage Gear or Pure Fishing ever asks me to review any of the gear I get to use, indeed they will only know I have done this review because I will email it to them. If they read it they will most likely not enjoy me pointing out the typical Penn spinning reel “quirks”, but I get to fish with the gear and I should be pointing this sort of thing out. What I know about these awesome Penn Authority spinning reels is contained within this review and also that initial impressions blog post from nearly a nearly a year ago - check here. I am not catching any more bass on these expensive reels, but damn I love fishing with them. As I do my Slammers. Money absolutely no object and I’m going for the extra refinement of the Authority, but with how much I like the Slammer IV 2500 and 3500 reels it’s a tough one.

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