How Far Can a Paintball Gun Shoot – How to Increase Range

Understanding the maximum range of a paintball gun can be advantageous in numerous scenarios. If you’re curious about the feasibility of shooting an opponent off the break during a speedball match, read on for more information. Perhaps you are curious about the safety of playing paintball in the wooded area adjacent to your residence.The maximum range of a paintball gun is a common inquiry among enthusiasts.

What is the Precise Distance That a Paintball Gun Can Shoot?

When a paintball gun is pointed upward at an angle of 30 degrees, it may hit targets 250 feet distant or more. A paintball gun may reach targets more than 350 feet distant if its barrel is designed to impart backspin on the paintball. But accuracy at such distances will be all over the place.

The effective maximum range for shooting a paintball gun is typically between 80 to 100 feet. At this range, the paintball is more likely to be accurate and less likely to bounce. Paintball guns can be accurate at distances over 100 feet, but achieving accuracy at this range requires favourable conditions.The range of a paintball gun is discussed more below;

How Far Can a Paintball Gun Shoot?

As we’ve already said, a paintball gun can shoot as far as 280 feet if you raise the front end of the barrel up by an angle of 30 degrees.

When shooting a paintball gun at 280 FPS, you can get the most distance if you tilt the barrel up at a 31° angle. I’m sure,though, that the angle wouldn’t change no matter how fast you shot. Now, if you want to make your paintball gun even more accurate, you have two choices. You can either use a paintball tube to make the paintball spin backwards, or you can use a paintball gun with a magazine and shoot First Strike rounds. If you use a gun that gives a backspin, you can shoot up to 350–375 feet away. If you use a magfed marker with First Strike rounds, you can shoot up to 500–530+ feet away. 

At those distances, of course, you won’t have very good accuracy, and even if you do manage to hit something, the paintball isn’t going to crack very easily even if it does. According to the same study that was mentioned before, the initial velocity of a paintball will be reduced to half after it has travelled a distance of one hundred feet. Additionally, the paintball’s velocity will slow down proportionately to the distance it has travelled. 

This applies to standard paintball barrels as well as backspin barrels. No matter if you give the paintball a backspin before firing it or not, it will still have the same effective range as if it were fired from a standard paintball barrel. Backspin or no backspin, it will still have the same range. If you have a longer range, there is a greater chance that you will be able to fire someone further downrange; but, there is also a greater chance that the paintball will simply bounce off of the player because its velocity will be incredibly low by the time it reaches them. Only First Strike rounds are able to keep their forward velocity at a greater level as they travel downrange. If we compare them to standard paintballs, at least. 

How Far Can a Paintball Gun Shoot Effectively?

Accurate shooting with a paintball gun may be done out to a distance of between 80 and 100 feet at its greatest effective range. However, this number can be much lower if the paintballs have a significantly underbored or overbored hole, if the paintballs are of poor quality, or if they were carelessly kept, causing them to become deformed and full of dimples.

There are some circumstances in which you might be able to fire accurately at distances more than 100 feet, but in most cases, you will need a well performance marker, high-quality paintballs, and a quality paintball barrel with a good paint-to-bore match in order to do this. On the other hand, the converse is also possible: you may have a marker that doesn’t perform well, paintballs that aren’t of good quality, and a paint-to-bore match that doesn’t work very well.

All of these factors may contribute to poor performance. If this is the case, it is possible that you will not even be able to correctly shoot your paintball pistol at distances of up to 80–100 feet. Depending on the condition of your paintball gun and/or paintballs, you might not even be able to shoot correctly at all. Even if you are able to aim correctly at distances more than 100 feet, you still need to take into consideration the quick reduction in velocity that will occur once the paintballs hit the ground. This will reduce the likelihood that the paintballs will shatter. 

How to Increase the Range of a Paintball Gun

There are two ways to make a paintball gun shoot farther. The first way is to use a paintball gun that gives the ball backspin, like the Tippmann Flatline, Empire Apex, or Empire Apex II. The second way is to use First Strike paintballs and a paintball gun with a magazine. We will discuss both ways below:

Use a Backspin Barrel

Paintball barrels, like the Tippmann Flatline and Empire Apex I and II, make your paintball gun’s range longer by giving the paintball a backspin. This pushes the air down and lifts the ball up. The Magnus effect is the name for this.

By using the Magnus effect, you can improve the range of your paintball marker by up to 100 feet or more. However, you may also lose some accuracy. You have to decide if you are ready to give up accuracy in order to increase your general range. So how does the Magnus effect work with the Tippmann Flatline and the Empire Apex I and II?

The Tippmann Flatline uses a tube with a bend that acts like a ramp for the paintballs to roll down. As the paintball goes up the hill, it gets a backspin. By the time it leaves the barrel, it is using the Magnus effect to its fullest. Both the Empire Apex I and II and the Flatline barrel work in a similar way, but in a slightly different way. The Apex I and II are connected to the end of a barrel and use a small rubber ramp at the top of the barrel to push the paintballs down, giving them a backspin and taking advantage of the Magnus effect.

The good thing about this design is that it has a slider that can be moved to one of nine different positions to change the height of the ramp at the end of the barrel. This will let you decide how much backspin you want to give the paintball, letting you change its range and direction. 

You can also turn the Apex I and II to change where the rubber pad is and which direction the paintball spins out of the barrel. This can be both a plus and a minus, though, because many players waste time trying to change their Apex tip when it’s not needed and doesn’t help. 

Shoot First Strike Rounds

You must compromise accuracy for paintball gun range. You may now boost your range and accuracy with a magfed paintball gun and First Strike ammunition.

How much? First Strike claims on the packaging that their shaped projectile rounds fly twice as far and are 25x more accurate than conventional paintballs. From what I’ve seen, this is correct, but the maximum range is somewhat less than double a standard paintball’s.

First Strike rounds have a maximum range of 530+ feet when blasted from a paintball gun at 280 FPS, compared to ordinary.When fired at the same velocity, 68 calibre paintballs from a normal barrel may reach 280+ feet. First Strike rounds have a maximum effective range of 400+ feet before they slow down and bounce off an opponent player.