The Best Weight Distribution Hitch to Control Your Load

If you have a heavy trailer to tow with your truck or SUV, you probably already have a Class III, IV or V receiver and hitch. But what you need to go with the receiver is a weight distribution hitch to level your rig and prevent sway.

A weight distribution hitch, which is also referred to as a sway-control hitch, anti-sway hitch*, or trailer equalizer, helps to distribute the downward force from heavy trailers across both of your axles.

It’s important for this downward force, referred to as tongue weight, to be distributed across the vehicle’s axles and the trailer’s axles, as it can put too much weight on the rear of your vehicle. Too much weight in the back is not only bad for your truck or SUV, it's bad for ride and handling. It can evenor contribute to vehicle control problems and damage your trailer receiver hitch.

There is a wide price range among weight distributing hitches, from a few hundred dollars to several thousand. A decent affordable model will probably be all you need if you’re towing a smaller trailer shorter distances, but you’ll find that people who tow large loads long distances tend to end up with more premium models in the long run. For this article, we’re only looking at weight distribution hitches under four figures.

Most weight distribution hitches come with a shank, which you can leave in your receiver, and tow without the arms or chains. However, that will lower both the tongue and maximum trailer weight, usually by about 40% (depending on shank length and drop). Still, it’s handy if you want to leave the components of your weight distributing hitch on your big trailer and not have to buy a second shank to use with a smaller trailer.

A weight distribution hitch can help keep you safe while out on the road and towing, so you’ll definitely want to read up on them before making your purchase. That’s why we’re going to go over some of the best weight distributing hitches on sale in this post. We’ll also talk about the different types of weight distributing hitches available today, what sets them apart, and which are best for which applications.

*These are actually a different type of hitch—see the Table of Contents for more.

A weight distributing hitch uses leverage to spread the weight of the trailer from just the hitch to the whole tow vehicle. A trailer without a weight distributing hitch will focus all of its weight onto the small surface area of the hitch ball and shank. This can cause the rear end of your truck or SUV to sag, which may make it susceptible to trailer sway and bounce, and reduces your ability to remain in control of the vehicle when traveling.

A weight distributing hitch is specially designed to spread the weight of your trailer to a larger surface area, reducing rear end sag and helping to keep the trailer even and in line with your vehicle. They can also help with cornering stability when towing, when directing the weight of the trailer to one side of the vehicle.

Think of it this way: Take a frying pan with a handle on it and press down a half inch out on the handle. If the pan is your vehicle, where you're pressing down is like the weight of a trailer on the hitch, which sticks out a little bit from the end of your vehicle. Adding the arms of a weight distributing hitch is like keeping one finger pressing down where it was but lifting up on the end of the handle with your other hand. Now, you're pressing the front of the pan (your car) down, too.

The other thing a weight distributing hitch can help with is sway control—fishtailing side to side. Proper weight distribution already helps with trailer hop, which can lead to sway. The arms of a weight distributing hitch resist side to side motions. A recent Cal State study showed they are very effective at controlling sway in extremely unsteady loads.

As we mentioned above, there are three types of weight distributing hitch: round bar, trunnion bar, and Andersen. Round bar and trunnion bar weight distribution hitches perform about the same, but trunnions are able to handle higher weights and work best when the coupler is on the bottom. Round bars work great with top mounted couplers but have lower clearances.

Round Bar Hitches: A round bar weight distribution hitch uses round-shaped sway bars that attach to the trailer ball mount and assembly. They don't deal with bumps and potholes as well as an Andersen style kit, but will work just fine for most applications.

Trunnion Bar Hitches: A trunnion bar kit looks similar to a round bar kit, except the sway bars are straight, square in shape, and don't require a clip to be fastened to the receiver.

They are more difficult to adjust the height of the head on than a round bar kit, but provide more ground clearance than round bar type kits. Many kits use bars that have a hybrid round and square profile.

Andersen Hitches: Instead of using a sway bar, an Andersen style hitch uses dampers and chains to help reduce and mitigate trailer sway and bouncing. A nut is also used to tighten the chains and dampers so you don't have to mess around with chains. This hitch design helps to reduce trailer bounce in addition to sway.

We'd focus less on the type of hitch when shopping and more on the tongue weight rating and GTWR. As long as your weight distributing hitch has the correct weight rating for the trailer you are towing and fits your receiver properly, you should be good to go.

Weight distribution hitches are elegantly simple in concept, using leverage to spread the trailer's tongue weight to the tow vehicle's front wheels through a pair of bars. You can accomplish this with several different designs (see above) of varying complexity, but the core concept is the same. These are the parts you'll find on the most common bar-type hitches, although different manufacturers may have different names. We've tried to include the most common, and a round bar hitch is shown.

In an Anderson hitch, you have tension chains in place of the arms (4); and an anti-sway assembly built-in to take the ball as part of the riser (2). Trunnion-style weight distribution hitches either hook directly to the brackets (5), or use short bars.

There are two different weight ratings used when talking weight distributing hitches: tongue weight and gross trailer weight.

The tongue weight of a trailer is how much downward force it puts on your trailer hitch receiver when it's hitched up. The gross trailer weight rating (GTWR) is how much the trailer weighs in its entirety.

Having too much tongue weight is obviously bad, but having too little tongue weight can also cause trailer sway problems. Ideally, you'll want your tongue weight to be 10 to 15 percent of your GTWR so your trailer sits evenly with your vehicle. If your trailer weighs 10,000 pounds, you'll want to have a tongue weight rating of around 1,000 pounds. Getting tongue weight at the 10% mark or a little more is the single biggest thing you can do to prevent trailer hop and fishtailing.

Having the proper weight rated hitch is the most important aspect of shopping for a weight distributing hitch .Even the best weight distribution hitch is not a substitute for an adequately sized tow vehicle, but but will make towing safer in all conditions.

Weight distribution hitches help control trailer sway—fishtailing—but only as a side effect of helping equalize weight. A trailer sway control kit is even simpler. It's basically a big shock absorber that connects to the hitch ball area on one side, and the trailer tongue on the other. Most weight distribution hitches have a hole to install a second ball hitch just for an anti-sway device, and a sway bar kit will include a plate to bolt or weld onto the trailer, as well as both balls. You'll probably have to drill and bolt, at least, to install one, but they're easy to take on and off.

Inside the sway bar is either a friction material—like brake pads—or sometimes a hydraulic cylinder. Both do the same thing, resisting turning at the hitch point. This literally takes the energy out of the motion, so small effects can't get going and become big ones.

Photo credit: Utah Department of Public Safety

If you don't want to void your truck or SUV's warranty, yes. Most manufacturers actually require them at a certain gross weight. For half-ton and midsize trucks the rule of thumb is you need one at 5,000 pounds total load, including any cargo in the tow vehicle, going up as you move into a 3/4- or one-ton truck, but an owner's manual will specify. Almost all towed campers of any weight require them, too, as their height makes them prone to uncontrolled motions.

You might need one at a lower weight, too. The important factor in when you need to use a weight distribution hitch isn't how much your trailer weighs, but how much it weighs in relation to your tow vehicle's capacity, and how it affects towing experience. If your steering gets light or the back end of the tow vehicle sags noticeably, even if you're not near the weight limit, then you need a weight distribution hitch.

A weight distribution hitch will never make your towing experience worse, and you'll never go wrong erring on the side of caution.

Each hitch has different installation needs and we're not going to try to cover them all here, but we can provide some broad tips that might help. If you have specific questions, try asking them at our sister site, RV Itch. For information on towing safety in general, there are a lot of guides available. We really like Purdue University Cooperative Extension Service's Keep the Trailer Connected to the Truck, which is the best overall guidebook to trailering we've ever read. The US Department of Agriculture also has a short, easy-to-read Safe Trailering brochure that we found helpful.

That said, here are some basic tips on using a weight distributing hitch that are true for all equalizer hitches.

January 3, 2023: Removed promoted product recommendation.

December 2, 2022: Updated photos and added product links.

June 30, 2022: Added additional link for Andersen 3344.

June 10, 2022: Updated links for existing products. Removed Reese Pro 49903 due to poor reviews.

September 20, 2021: Expanded FAQ section.

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Photo credit: Chevrolet