Excitation functions of proton-induced reactions for the natural iron and zirconium targets were measured from their respective threshold energies to 22 and 20MeV. The conventional stacked foil technique was used in combination with the off-line γ-ray spectroscopy at the BARC-TIFR Pelletron facility, Mumbai. The computer code SRIM 2013 was used to calculate the energy degradation along the stack and the proton beam intensity was measured via the ^natCu(p, x)⁶²Zn monitor reaction. The measured excitation functions were then compared with the literature data available in EXFOR database as well as with the theoretical values from the TALYS-1.8 code and the TENDL-2017 data library. The shapes of the excitation function for all the reactions were reproduced well by TALYS-1.8. In terms of absolute values, for some reactions the data are in good agreement with both the literature data and TALYS-1.8 whereas, for others there is a slight deviation either from the literature data or from the theoretical values of TALYS-1.8 and TENDL-2017.