In this work, the improvement of thermal and ablative properties of the phenolic resin by the addition of silicon carbide (SiC) and montmorillonite (MMT) were studied. The phenolic composites were fabricated by hot compression. The thermal stabilities, mechanical properties and ablative properties of the neat phenolic resin and the SiC/MMT phenolic composites were examined using a Lloyd universal testing machine, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and ablation tests (an oxyacetylene torch), respectively. Mass ablation rates were measured after flame exposure. The results showed that SiC/MMT provided the higher thermal stabilities and lower ablation rates to the phenolic resin.