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Handgun Recoil Chart

A Guide to Handgun Recoil Energy, Velocity and "Kick"

Recoil is that stiff kick you get from a handgun after pulling the trigger. When you fire a cartridge, the force of the explosion that propels the bullet is also directed right back at you. That's why larger cartridges have more "kick" because there is a stronger explosion.

However, the perceived recoil that a shooter feels can be influenced by many factors. Those factors mainly include the powder load, bullet weight, bullet speed, handgun weight, and the size of the person shooting it.

If you want to make an accurate shot, you need a handgun with recoil you can manage. The recoil of a given cartridge in a given handgun is hard to describe if you have never shot it. Recoil itself is described in terms of free recoil energy and recoil velocity. However, those numbers do not mean much to the average shooter.

So to help you better understand the recoil of a specific cartridge fired from your handgun, we have taken those values and created a normalized recoil score for you to compare. The Sportsman's Normalized Recoil Score ranges from 1 to 10 and allows you to compare cartridges you have never shot to those you have shot with a single straightforward number.

The following chart provides a handgun's recoil level based on its recoil score*.

Recoil Score* Recoil Level
1-2 Low Recoil
3-4 Moderate Recoil
5-10 High Recoil

The following table provides handgun recoil energy, recoil velocity and normalized recoil score for the most common handgun cartridges based on respective projectile weight, projectile velocity, powder charge and handgun weight.

Note: Bw = Bullet Weight; Mv = Muzzle Velociy; Rw = Rifle Weight
Cartridge (Bw;Mv;Rw) Recoil Energy (ft-lbs) Recoil Velocity (fps) Recoil Score*
.25 ACP (50; 800; 12) 0.9 8.7 1.094
.30 Carbine (110; 1400; 48) 4.9 10.2 1.657
.32 ACP (71; 910; 16) 1.7 10.5 1.284
.32 H&R Mag. (100; 1100; 32) 2.7 9.4 1.349
.32 S&W Long (100; 700; 32) 1.2 6.2 1
.32-20 Win. (100; 1018; 32) 2.8 9.4 1.361
.357 Mag. (110; 1300; 44) 4.1 9.8 1.539
.357 Mag. (125; 1209; 28) 8.9 18.1 2.554
.357 Mag. (125; 1220; 44) 4.6 10.4 1.631
.357 Mag. (125; 1450; 44) 7.2 13 2.082
.357 Mag. (140; 1022; 44) 4 9.6 1.517
.357 Mag. (140; 1323; 44) 7.9 13.6 2.198
.357 Mag. (158; 1070; 28) 9.4 18.6 2.641
.357 Mag. (158; 1250; 44) 8.7 14.3 2.332
.357 Mag. (158; 925; 44) 4 9.7 1.522
.357 SIG (125; 1350; 28) 7.4 16.6 2.294
.38 Spec. (125; 850; 16) 5.6 18.9 2.195
.38 Spec. (130; 819; 36) 2.2 8 1.215
.38 Spec. (130; 950; 36) 3.1 9.5 1.402
.38 Spec. (140; 825; 36) 2.7 8.8 1.317
.38 Spec. (148 HBWC; 738; 36) 2.1 7.8 1.193
.38 Spec. +P (110; 1150; 36) 4 10.7 1.574
.38 Spec. +P (125; 975; 36) 2.9 9.2 1.362
.38 Spec. +P (158 LHP; 900; 36) 4.3 11.1 1.631
.38 Super (125; 1250; 36) 4.9 11.9 1.746
.38 ACP (90; 1000; 24) 2.5 10.4 1.376
.38 ACP (95; 900; 9.6) 5.4 24.2 2.447
.40 S&W (155; 1200; 24) 10.6 21.3 2.927
.40 S&W (165; 1080; 24) 9.3 19.9 2.696
.40 S&W (180; 1027; 24) 10.4 21.2 2.897
.41 Mag. (210; 1300; 44) 15.6 19.1 3.42
.41 Mag. (210; 925; 44) 6.6 12.4 1.978
.44 Rem. Mag. (200; 1000; 48) 6.7 12 1.97
.44 Rem. Mag. (200; 1219; 65.6) 6.3 10 1.817
.44 Rem. Mag. (200; 1295; 65.6) 7.2 10.6 1.957
.44 Rem. Mag. (200; 1326; 48) 11.9 16 2.809
.44 Rem. Mag. (225; 1239; 48) 12.4 16.3 2.885
.44 Rem. Mag. (240; 1144; 65.6) 8 11.2 2.086
.44 Rem. Mag. (240; 1172; 65.6) 8.4 11.5 2.15
.44 Rem. Mag. (240; 1200; 65.6) 8.9 11.8 2.226
.44 Rem. Mag. (240; 1271; 65.6) 10 12.5 2.396
.44 Rem. Mag. (240; 1450; 48) 22.5 21.9 4.403
.44 Rem. Mag. (300; 1187; 48) 22.6 22 4.42
.44 Spec. (240; 750; 48) 4.5 9.9 1.593
.45 ACP (185; 1000; 36) 7.7 14.8 2.237
.45 ACP (185; 1047; 40) 6.8 13.2 2.044
.45 ACP (200; 1010; 40) 7.6 13.9 2.178
.45 ACP (230; 850; 36) 7.9 15 2.271
.45 ACP (230; 916; 40) 7.5 13.9 2.166
.45 Colt (200; 1081; 44) 8.2 13.8 2.245
.45 Colt (200; 945; 44) 7 12.8 2.048
.45 Colt (230; 936; 44) 7.9 13.6 2.198
.45 Colt (255 LFP; 914; 44) 10.4 15.6 2.606
.45 Colt (255 LRN; 860; 44) 8.2 13.8 2.245
.45 Colt +P (250; 1200; 44) 17 20 3.636
.45 Colt +P (300; 1150; 44) 23.9 23.7 4.667
.45 Win. Mag. (260; 1200; 64) 10.6 13.1 2.5
.454 Casull (260; 1800; 51.2) 39 28 6.724
.454 Casull (300; 1650; 51.2) 38.6 27.9 6.67
.460 S&W Mag. (250; 1400; 72) 12.8 13.5 2.788
.460 S&W Mag. (260; 1590; 72) 20 16.9 3.839
.460 S&W Mag. (300; 1784; 72) 32.1 21.4 5.542
.475 Linebaugh (385; 1525; 48) 52.2 33.5 8.612
.475 Linebaugh (400; 1300; 51.2) 38.1 27.7 6.599
.480 Ruger (325; 1330; 52.8) 23.1 21.2 4.439
.480 Ruger (325; 1477; 52.8) 33.3 25.5 5.902
.50 Action Express (325; 1294; 51.2) 29.3 24.3 5.353
.50 Action Express (325; 1431; 70.4) 25.5 19.3 4.632
.500 Linebaugh (400; 1550; 48) 62.3 36.6 10
.500 S&W Mag. (350; 1446; 72) 25.2 19 4.58
.500 S&W Mag. (350; 1739; 72) 45.6 25.5 7.395
10mm Auto (180; 1295; 36) 11.4 18.1 2.858
9mm Makarov (95; 1025; 24) 3 11.2 1.479
9x19 (115; 1100; 16) 7.4 21.8 2.564
9x19 (115; 1155; 32) 3.8 11.1 1.571
9x19 (115; 1155; 24) 5.2 15 1.944
9x19 (124; 1125; 24) 6 16 2.093
9x19 (124; 1157; 32) 4.4 11.9 1.685
9x19 (147; 1000; 32) 4.6 12.2 1.725
9x19 +P (115; 1250; 24) 7.3 17.7 2.339
**Much of the above data (cartridge, weight, recoil energy, and recoil velocity) was collected from the Chuck Hawks handgun recoil table. The normalized recoil score is unique to the Sportsmans Recoil Handgun Table.

Calculating Handgun Recoil

Newton's third law states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. If you were to push on a wall with 10 pounds of force, that wall is technically pushing back on you with 10 pounds of force. The same thing happens when we set off an explosion in our action.

The force from the cartridge sends the bullet flying down the barrel, but that same force must also be applied in the opposite direction. This force is what you feel as recoil. This force is soaked up and spread out over the whole firearm and into your arms and down into the ground, which is why recoil feels much better than getting hit with a bullet. The recoil you feel from that force is a function of recoil energy and recoil velocity.

What is Recoil Energy

Recoil energy is the raw kinetic energy created when a cartridge is fired. This energy is the opposite component of the energy used to accelerate a bullet out of the end of the barrel. Energy is measured in joules(J), but we use foot-pounds(ft-lbs) to represent energy in the imperial system.

You may also see this called free recoil energy. Recoil energy and free recoil energy are related but are not the same. Recoil energy is the gross energy produced by the cartridge. Free recoil energy is the net energy you feel. The net is different from the gross energy because different firearms have different energy transferring inhibitors. Things like a muzzle brake or suppressor can inhibit the energy transfer. Once these inhibitors are accounted for, we are using free recoil energy.

The free recoil energy will feel different based on the size of the person shooting the firearm. For example, if you have a handgun with a moderate amount of recoil, a large man weighing 300 pounds will be able to soak up that recoil a lot easier than a young boy weighing 120 pounds. As a result, the large man will not feel the recoil nearly as much as the young boy. This is purely a function of mass, and it does not matter how much stronger the man is than the boy.

The weight of a handgun will also heavily affect its recoil. You can shoot a 9mm cartridge out of a standard size Glock and a smaller 380 ACP out of a pocket-size S&W Bodyguard 380 and find that the Bodyguard has much more recoil than the larger Glock with a larger cartridge. A larger firearm can dissipate more recoil than a smaller firearm.

What is Recoil Velocity

Recoil velocity simply measures how quickly the recoil impacts you after you shoot. You can think of it like this; recoil energy is how hard a punch you feel, and recoil velocity is how quickly that punch gets to you. We use feet per second(ft/sec) as the unit for recoil velocity.

Calculating a Normalized Recoil Score

So now that you have a good idea of what recoil energy and recoil velocity are, you should be able to tell how a gun shoots based on those two numbers, right? Yeah, me neither. Instead, we calculate a recoil score. Our recoil score is a weighted average between recoil energy and recoil velocity. We weigh them 7:3, respectively. We use this weight because recoil energy is the dominating factor in felt recoil, but recoil velocity is still important and must be considered.

handgun recoil score equation

A recoil score is nice to have, but it still does not quite help you compare two cartridges on a normalized scale that is easy to understand. So we normalized our recoil scores on a 1 to 10 scale using a basic normalization equation like this:

normalized recoil score equation

Our range is 1 to 10, so Range Max is 10, and Range Min is 1. Then we take the recoil score for a particular cartridge and handgun and subtract the minimum recoil score from our data set. The minimum recoil score in our data comes from the 100 grain .32 S&W Long traveling at 700 ft/sec out of a 32-ounce handgun. Next, we divide by the difference between the maximum and minimum recoil scores in the data set. The maximum recoil score in our data comes from the 400 grain .500 Linebaugh traveling at 1550 ft/sec out of a 48-ounce handgun. Lastly, we add our range minimum.

This calculation gives all of the cartridges in the data set a score between 1 and 10. You can then use that score to get a good idea of how a cartridge you have never fired compares to one you have fired.

For example, if you have shot a 115 grain 9mm out of a 32-ounce handgun, you experienced a recoil score of 1.571 on our normalized scale. Then if you look at the 158 grain 357 magnum out of a 44-ounce handgun and see it scores a 2.332, you can see that it has about 50% more recoil than the 9mm you are used to.

Disclaimer: Sportsman's Warehouse assumes no responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions of the information on this page. All table data provided are approximates. Although we strive to provide the most accurate information as we can the information contained in this page is provided on an "as is" basis with no guarantees of completeness, accuracy, usefulness or timeliness. There are many quantitative and qualitative factors that influence handgun recoil and how it impacts the individual shooter. Do not use this guide as a basis for purchasing a handgun. It is design for informational purposes only.