As recreational airgun shooting continues to grow in popularity across the UK, many novice and casual shooters wish to develop their skills and achieve better accuracy. While high-end equipment plays a role, proper shooting technique is vital for getting tight shot groups. 

We explore key areas of focus and methods that can help airgunners shoot with precision.

Maintaining Proper Stance

The foundation of accurate airgun shooting is a balanced standing position. The basic principles used by competition marksmen also apply to recreational shooters: 

• Place your feet roughly shoulder-width apart, keeping your knees unlocked and posture upright to avoid muscle tension.
• Bring the rifle tightly into your shoulder and move your head down to meet the sights. This creates a triangular shape for stability. 
• Use a flat surface or shooting sticks as support when possible.

Controlling Breathing

A controlled breathing method is essential for minimising rifle movement while aiming down the sights. Breathe normally while acquiring your target, then inhale and exhale deeply. After the full exhale, draw another deep breath and hold for 5-10 seconds as you squeeze the trigger. This provides a window of stability between breaths.

Counting helps pace your breathing. Determine an optimal exhale/hold time through practice. 

Maintaining Focus and Follow-Through

It’s crucial to keep your focus all the way through each shot, avoiding distraction while keeping your sights aligned on the target. Visualise the pellet’s flight path after the trigger pull and avoid reacting to the discharge or lifting your head immediately to check results.

Keep your posture fixed for 5-10 seconds during “follow-through.” This avoids flinching motions that can throw off alignment. 

Using Correct Trigger Control

Proper trigger pull technique is also vital for precision: 

• Use the pad of your index finger, keeping the grip light. 
• Align your trigger finger to keep the sights steady, and squeeze smoothly. 
• Avoid jerking or abruptly yanking the trigger, as this can skew alignment. 

The goal is a straight back pull, keeping the pellet path disturbance-free. Practise “dry firing” without pellets to ingrain muscle memory and consistency prior to range sessions. An airgun with an adjustable trigger weight also allows you to customise the pull force to your preference.

Prioritising Pellet Quality

In airgun shooting, the projectile itself plays a significant role in accuracy. Match the pellet type not only to your air rifle model but also for consistency in shape, weight and surface finish. Testing pellets under similar ranges and conditions to compare grouping can help determine an optimal pellet match. Lower quality pellets often demonstrate more flyers and instability.

While inexpensive for high volume practice, lower-end pellets generally have wider variations, which diminish precision. Investing in quality match-grade pellets pays off for recreational shooters seeking better accuracy.

Adjusting for Conditions

Environmental conditions also impact airgun pellet trajectories in flight. Altitude, density, temperature and lighting all play a role. Observe and adjust to conditions by potentially holding off a few millimetres or dialling down power. Maintaining an accuracy or weather logbook helps inform adjustments.

Shooting in windy weather 

Wind in particular wreaks havoc, requiring horizontal hold-off corrections. Read wind behaviour and compensate intuitively. When unsure of corrections, wait for lulls. This minimises frustration from missed shots.

Accuracy Through Range Time

While equipment plays a key role, substantial accuracy improvements happen through patient, focused practice: 

• Shoot at shorter distances to build fundamentals before extending range. 
• Analyse groups and misses to diagnose issues – are flyers from technique or equipment? Small adjustments and corrections during live firing, backed by diligence to apply lessons across sessions, drive skill improvement.
• Start a shooting journal to track progress. Be mindful of technique and learn from mistakes. 

Share and gain knowledge by shooting with more experienced marksmen when possible.

The Wolfman: Your Airgun Shooting Specialist

Proper pellet match, shooting form, breath and trigger control represent some key accuracy areas for airgunners to emphasise. Along with reading conditions and making sensible adjustments, these methods will serve recreational shooters well in mastering accuracy.

With decades of experience, The Wolfman provides leading air rifles, accessories and pellets to meet every UK shooter’s needs. Our product range includes purpose-built, high accuracy models from renowned brands like Air Arms, Weihrauch and others. 

Ready to upgrade your equipment or refinement techniques? Contact our friendly team to explore how The Wolfman can support your airgun shooting goals!