How to Tie the Double Ring Hitch

Usage

The Double Ring Hitch takes a rope through a metal ring twice before the hitch is finished, so two parts of line share the bearing surface instead of one. It's used to tie off to any ring whose own material is thinner than the rope — a mooring ring, an anchor ring, a halter ring, a small fob loop.

The extra pass exists for one reason: wear division. A ring's edge concentrates load onto whatever touches it, and putting two strands on that edge instead of one cuts the pressure each strand carries roughly in half.

Why Learn the Double Ring Hitch?

Any time you tie off to a ring that's thinner than your rope, a single-pass hitch wears fastest exactly where you can't easily inspect it — inside the ring's curve. Learning the doubled form lets you extend the working life of a mooring point or anchor ring without changing rope or hardware.

Running the rope through the ring twice doesn't make the knot hold more weight — it spreads the load over two strands where the rope touches the metal, so a thin ring stops chewing through your rope. That's the entire engineering value of the second pass.

Common Uses

Mooring & Ring Attachment

• Tying off to anchor rings, wharf or float mooring rings, and ship's rings, whenever the ring's own material is smaller in diameter than the rope.
• Fastening a boat's painter to a pier ring for a temporary hold — a doubled ring pass has long been rated the sturdier way to tie off there.

Fobs & Small Rings

• Securing a key or watch to a ring — the doubling-in-place technique was written up for exactly this scale.

Farm & Halter Rings

• Halter and livestock tie-rings, where a single pass is the customary ashore default because the rope is usually already oversized for the job — doubling is the optional upgrade, worth doing whenever you have the opportunity.

Rope Access (Practitioner-Documented, Not a Standard)

• One documented forum thread applies the doubling technique to Purcell prusiks and stretcher/litter rigging tied to a ring for an adjustable rescue anchor — real-world practice from named practitioners, but one thread, not a cited standard.

Other Names Lark Boat Knot / Double Boat Knot Double Lark's Head Category Boating · Camping · Transport · Utility (Everyday Life)

Notable Features

• Two Ring Passes: The rope goes through the ring twice before the hitch is finished, adding a full wrap of friction against the single-pass form.
• More Secure Than a Single Pass: The doubled pass divides strain and wear across two strands instead of one — a security and durability upgrade, not a strength claim.
• Simple and Quick: One extra reeve on top of a trivial base — it's still a matter of seconds to tie around a fixed ring or eye.

Similar Knots

Cow Hitch / Lark's Head vs. Double Ring Hitch

The Cow Hitch / Lark's Head — the same structure Wikipedia catalogs as the Cow hitch — is the single-pass base of this family: the ring reeved through only once. The Double Ring Hitch is that same structure with the ring reeved a second time, which the Ashley Book of Knots frames as a wear-division upgrade, not a strength increase.

• Advantage: The single-pass form wins on speed, rope economy, and universal documentation.
• Disadvantage: A single pass concentrates all the wear on one strand at the ring — exactly what doubling exists to divide.

Round Turn and Two Half Hitches vs. Double Ring Hitch

Modern boater-facing guides teach the Round Turn and Two Half Hitches for ring and mooring attachment and don't mention the Double Ring Hitch by name at all — it delivers the same two-strands-on-the-ring benefit while adding a locking half-hitch finish and a body of modern strength testing this knot has never had.

• Advantage: The Double Ring Hitch is faster to tie and uses less rope for small, low-stakes attachments like a fob.
• Disadvantage: It has zero modern strength testing behind it and isn't taught by any major boater-facing resource for today's mooring or dock-line work.

Security Level

Treat the Double Ring Hitch as a wear and security upgrade over its single-pass sibling, not as a tested load-bearing knot: it's a pure friction wrap with no nipping loop, so its hold scales with how tight the wraps are pulled and how much surface grip the rope offers. No breaking-strength or security test exists for it in any form, and on slick modern line the same friction weakness that limits a single-pass ring hitch limits this one too — the second pass adds contact area, not a locking mechanism. Use it where tradition and low stakes meet: fobs, halters, and old-rope mooring work, not a load you'd stake safety on.

Downsides

• Uses More Rope: The second pass through the ring eats slightly more rope than a single-pass hitch.
• Can Bind After Heavy Load: It can tighten firmly after prolonged loading, so budget a little extra effort to work it free.
• Bulkier at the Ring: Two ring passes plus the finishing hitch pack more material into the ring's opening than the single-pass form.

History

The Ashley Book of Knots (1944) shows the doubled ring hitch only as a chart label, with no standalone tying paragraph of its own — the actual technique is spelled out separately, where Ashley states a ring should "if possible be passed through the ring twice in order to divide the strain and wear." A British trade manual from 1907 independently documented two different doubled ring-fastening methods under other names, years before Ashley's catalog existed. In 2018, members of the International Guild of Knot Tyers discussed applying Ashley's doubling technique to modern rope-access rigging, tying it onto Purcell prusiks for adjustable rescue anchors.

How to Tie the Double Ring Hitch

Step 1

Pass the rope end through the ring a first time.

Step 2

Pass the rope end through the ring a second time, reeving twice at the outset rather than doubling an already-tied hitch, so two parts of line bear on the ring.

Step 3

Finish the hitch as a standard Ring Hitch around the doubled reeving, seating both ring passes flat and parallel — never crossed — so each strand genuinely shares the load.

FAQ

Is a "double ring hitch" the same as the macrame double half hitch on a ring?

No — they only share a name. Search demand under this name is dominated by an unrelated macrame or keychain technique. This hitch is the nautical structure with the rope passed through the ring twice, so two strands share the metal instead of one. If a tutorial is building a decorative pattern, you're on the craft technique, not this knot.

The Knot IQ app is a good way to practice keeping the two ring passes parallel before you try it on a real mooring ring, and the Knot Tying Kit (Camping Knots Edition) gives you a spare length of rope to drill the doubled reeve on before you commit it to hardware that matters.