Indoor vs. Outdoor Shooting Range: Pros & Cons

Once you buy your new firearm at Pennsylvania’s Largest Gun Show, you need to know whether an indoor or outdoor shooting range offers you the best venue to zero in and practice your shooting. Range time is vital to skills development. When it comes to better shooting, the old adage of “ain’t nothing to it but to do it” definitely rings true. You need to understand, however, that different ranges offer different practice opportunities and limitations.

Indoor Vs. Outdoor Shooting Ranges

Broadly speaking, you can divide shooting ranges into either outdoor shooting ranges or indoor shooting ranges. While there are standouts and outliers in each category that go beyond the normal characteristics of their type, for the most part, all indoor ranges share some common characteristics, and all outdoor ranges share their own characteristics. This makes it easier to understand which range type is best for your specific shooting needs.

Choosing the Gun Range For You

Before taking a look at the characteristics of indoor and outdoor gun ranges, you need to know what you’re looking for in a range. After all, if it were as simple as preferring natural or fluorescent lighting for your Gunstagram, we could have covered everything in the first paragraph of this post.

• Capabilities – Know what skill you want to work on with your gun, then choose a range that has the capability to let you work on that skill set. You can’t practice tactical movement on a static firing line, and there’s only so much you can do to practice distance accuracy in 25 yards.
• Cost – Shooting is an expensive hobby to get into, with hundreds of dollars already invested in your gun, shooting range kit, ammo, and accessories. That being said, some ranges are more affordable than others. Gun ranges may offer per-day rates, require an annual membership fee paid in advance, or offer both as alternatives.
• Accessibility – You need a range you can get to for practice during the hours of operation. That means it needs to be conveniently located and available around your shooting schedule.
• Culture – Some people just want to pull up and shoot. There’s nothing wrong with that, but your range experience can also be a good chance to meet and network with knowledgeable professionals and hobbyists.

The Particulars of Outdoor & Indoor Gun Ranges

Let’s take a look at what makes indoor and outdoor gun ranges different from each other. Those differences often translate into the benefits they offer while working on your shooting skills and the limitations for the type of shooting practice you can perform at that range.

Outdoor Shooting Ranges: Real and Robust

Outdoor shooting ranges tend to be large, and they’re often situated in more rural settings to accommodate their size. This size allows for longer-range shooting, more elbow room, and freer movement, often with the potential addition of a tactical course or rudimentary tactical movement area. They’re open to the elements, may fall anywhere along the broad range of primitive to developed, and can be either self-managed or have professional staff on hand. 

Pros

• Longer and Shorter Ranged Shooting Welcome – One of the biggest reasons shooters choose outdoor shooting ranges is because they let them take out the long guns and “stretch their legs” with distance shooting, making them perfect for hunters.
• Tactical Spaces – Some outdoor ranges may have separate tactical ranges set up for everything from movement to room-clearing drills. Others may simply have a free-movement area that allows you to set up simple shooting exercises that incorporate basic cover and moving position drills.
• Real-World Training – Outdoor shooting ranges offer natural light gradients, temperature ranges, wind, glare, and other factors found in real-life shooting scenarios. This provides more realistic practice and lets you field-test your skills.
• Fewer Restrictions – Many of these benefits are possible because outdoor shooting ranges usually have lighter restrictions on the guns you can use, gear you can bring, techniques you can practice, and how you go about using your gun as long as you’re safe. 

Cons

• Exposed to the Elements – While real-world training is good, you don’t get more real than sunburns, dust storms, rain, hail, and freezing temperatures. Open-air shooting can sometimes come with conditions that are anywhere from uncomfortable to dangerous for humans and our guns.
• No Quick Trips – Since they’re usually in more remote locations, outdoor shooting ranges take more time to reach and could include rough roads that are subject to flooding or damage.
• Lack of Support – Outdoor ranges are more likely than their indoor shooting range counterparts to be unmanned or lack basic amenities, like water, modern bathrooms, or even shelter. If you run into trouble, there may not be a gunsmith or range master on hand to help you out. 

Indoor Gun Ranges 

Indoor gun ranges are popular in more urban areas where busy city lives and the need for self-defense practice intersect. They tend to be small but often feature plenty of firearms support shoehorned into their retail-shop-sized footprint. The indoor range experience tends to be more uniform because of the regulatory and safety considerations that go into setting up shop in residential or business districts.

Pros

• Climate Controlled – There are no rainouts, dust storms, or nightfalls in an indoor gun range. They are heated and air-conditioned, well-lit, and have ventilation fans to take the smoke out of the air.
• Support On-Hand – These gun ranges frequently have gun rentals and sales of ammo and shooting gear, if not a complete pro shop. Staff may include a range master, a safety officer, and even a gunsmith to keep things running smoothly.
• Easy to Get To – Like most businesses, indoor gun ranges are usually located in an easy-to-reach retail space, which means a short drive if you want to get in a few magazines of practice during your daily errands.
• Standardized Practice – Because it’s a controlled environment, you can really drill down on fundamentals under shooting conditions that eliminate as many variables as possible.

Cons

• More Restrictive – Indoor ranges usually have more restrictions on gun type, allowed accessories, and shooting behavior, such as not allowing rapid fire. Movement and tactical drills are rarely allowed.
• Shorter Ranges – Urban space comes at a premium, so indoor gun ranges are usually shorter than outdoor gun ranges, often maxing out their lanes at 25 yards or less. That’s fine for most self-defense shooting, but hunting and some tactical shooting may be impossible to practice.
• Too Much Support – While knowledgeable staff is a plus, an overzealous attendant or fellow range goer can ruin your shooting trip. There’s less elbow room and less privacy in the smaller confines of an indoor shooting range.

Get Ready With Range Gear From Your Local Gun Show

There’s a show near you on our gun show calendar, and it’s coming up fast. Now is the time to start your planning so you can get the best deals on gear for indoor or outdoor shooting ranges. Order your tickets online for an Eagle Shows Gun Show today.