Best Budget Hunting Shotgun (What to Look For)

A note on why there are no buy buttons on this page. Amazon does not sell firearms and we have joined no firearm retailer program, so we earn nothing from anything written here. We also do not handle the gear we write about, and comparing shotguns responsibly requires handling them — fit, recoil and trigger feel are the specifications that matter most and none of them is published. So this page tells you what to look for and deliberately names no models. Buy from a shop that will let you shoulder the gun.

With that said: a shotgun is the most versatile firearm a budget hunter can own, and it is not close. One gun covers turkeys, ducks, geese, doves, rabbits, squirrels, and in many states deer with slugs or buckshot. A rifle does one job well. A shotgun does eight jobs adequately, which for someone buying one gun is the better proposition.

Gauge: 12 or 20, and how to decide

These two cover essentially all budget hunting. The others — 16, 28, .410 — are either expensive to feed, hard to find, or too small for general use.

12 gauge

The most versatile and the cheapest to feed. Ammunition is available in every store that sells any, in the widest range of loads — light target shells, heavy waterfowl steel, turkey magnums, buckshot, slugs. If you intend to hunt geese, or to shoot slugs at deer, the 12 is the answer.

The cost is recoil. A 12 gauge with heavy loads kicks meaningfully, and that matters more than most buyers expect — a shooter who has developed a flinch misses with any gauge, and flinches are built by unpleasant practice sessions.

20 gauge

Noticeably lighter recoil, lighter gun, and entirely sufficient for turkeys, upland birds, small game and ducks over decoys. The NWTF states directly that both 12 and 20 gauge do a good job at taking down a turkey, which is the game where people most often assume they need the bigger gun.

The cost is load selection and price. Fewer options on the shelf, generally a bit more per box, and less availability in heavy waterfowl loads.

How to choose

If you will hunt geese or shoot slugs at deer, take the 12. If you are recoil-sensitive, smaller-framed, buying for a younger hunter, or hunting turkeys and upland birds, take the 20 — and do not let anyone tell you it is a compromise. A 20 you shoot well beats a 12 you flinch with, every time.

Action: pump, semi-auto, or break

Pump-action — the budget answer

A pump gun is mechanically simple, tolerant of dirt, cheap new and extremely cheap used, and it will cycle any load you put in it including the light target shells that semi-autos sometimes refuse. Several models have been made essentially unchanged for decades, which means parts, chokes, barrels and stocks are everywhere and cost very little.

It also transmits full recoil to your shoulder, and cycling it is a deliberate action that some hunters fumble under pressure. Both are manageable with practice.

For a first hunting shotgun on a budget, this is the recommendation.

Semi-automatic

Softer felt recoil, because part of the energy goes into cycling the action, and faster follow-up shots. Genuinely more pleasant to shoot, particularly in 12 gauge with heavy loads.

It costs more new, needs more cleaning, and cheaper semi-autos can be picky about light loads. A used semi-auto from a well-known maker is a reasonable buy; a very cheap unknown one is where reliability problems live, and a shotgun that jams is worse than a pump that does not.

Break-action (single and double)

A single-shot break gun is the cheapest new firearm you can buy and is genuinely fine for turkeys and small game where you get one shot anyway. It is also the safest action to teach a new hunter on, because it is obviously and visibly open.

Its limitation is exactly what it says: one shot. Over-unders and side-by-sides are lovely and are not budget guns.

Chokes: the accessory that makes one gun into three

A choke is a constriction at the muzzle that controls how quickly the shot column spreads. It is the single most useful thing about a versatile shotgun, and a gun with a removable choke system is worth paying more for than almost any other feature.

Three cover almost all hunting:

• Improved cylinder— open pattern, spreads fast. Close-flushing upland birds, rabbits, and most buckshot.
• Modified— the general-purpose choke. Most upland hunting, ducks over decoys, doves. If your gun has one fixed choke, this is the one to want.
• Full or extra-full— tight, dense pattern. Turkeys, where the target is a head and neck, and long-range waterfowl.

A fixed-choke gun is cheaper and locks you into one pattern for the life of the gun, which limits what it can hunt. On a used gun, check whether it takes screw-in chokes before anything else.

Nontoxic shot: the rule that can affect an old gun

This is the part of shotgun buying that budget hunters most often do not know about, and it is a safety issue as well as a legal one.

The legal side.The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service phased in a ban on lead shot for waterfowl hunting starting with the 1987–88 season, and it became nationwide in 1991. The requirement applies to waterfowl — the family Anatidae, meaning ducks, geese including brant, and swans — plus coots. Hunters may possess only approved nontoxic shot types while in the field, as identified in the federal regulations, and the approved list includes bismuth-tin, iron (steel), various tungsten compositions and corrosion-inhibited copper, among others. Many states extend nontoxic requirements beyond waterfowl on particular areas, so check your own regulations.

The safety side, which matters when buying used.Steel is significantly harder than lead. Lead pellets deform as they squeeze through a choke constriction; steel pellets do not. A barrel or fixed choke designed before nontoxic shot was standard — particularly a tight fixed full choke on an older gun — may not be rated to have steel driven through it, and firing steel can bulge or damage it.

So: if you are buying an older shotgun and you intend to hunt waterfowl with it, find out from the manufacturer whether that specific barrel and choke are approved for steel before you shoot any. On a gun with removable chokes this is usually solved by buying a steel-rated choke tube. On a fixed-choke gun made in the 1970s it may not be solvable, and that is worth knowing before you hand over the money.

The waterfowl-specific costs are in our duck hunting on a budget guide, where the shell price difference is a bigger line item than most beginners expect.

Barrel length and fit

Barrel length matters less than the internet suggests. Twenty-six or twenty-eight inches suits general hunting; longer barrels swing more smoothly on flying birds, shorter ones are handier in a blind or thick cover. Anything in that range works for everything.

Fit matters far more, and it is the specification nobody publishes. A shotgun is pointed rather than aimed, so if the stock length and comb height suit you, your eye lands naturally where the gun is looking and you hit things. If it does not, you miss and cannot explain why.

This is the one reason to buy from a shop rather than a listing. Shoulder the gun with your eyes closed, open them, and see where you are looking. If you are looking at the back of the receiver, the comb is too low; if you are looking over the barrel, it is too high. Length of pull — the distance from trigger to butt — matters especially for shorter shooters and for anyone shooting in a heavy winter coat.

Patterning, which is free and decides everything

The NWTF is emphatic about patterning a shotgun before the season, and it applies to every kind of shotgun hunting, not just turkeys.

A shotgun’s pattern is a property of the particular combination of gun, choke and shell. Two shells that pattern beautifully in one gun can pattern poorly in another. The only way to find out is to shoot at paper.

Shoot at a large sheet at the ranges you intend to hunt. Look at where the center of the pattern sits relative to where you were pointing — many guns shoot high, some shoot off to one side — and how evenly the pellets are distributed. For turkeys, count the strikes in a head-and-neck sized area at 20, 30 and 40 yards, and let that number set your honest maximum range.

This costs about ten shells and it is the highest-return thing you can do with a shotgun before a season.

What to check on a used shotgun

• Look through the barrel at a light. It should be smooth and even. Pitting, bulges or rings are reasons to walk away.
• Check for screw-in chokes and find out which ones come with it.
• Work the action repeatedly. It should be smooth and positive with no grinding.
• Check the stock for cracks, especially at the wrist and where it meets the receiver.
• Confirm steel-shot suitability if you will hunt waterfowl, per the section above.
• Buy through a licensed dealer and follow all applicable federal, state and local law.

The budget summary

A used pump-action in 12 or 20 gauge, from a maker that has built the same model for decades, with screw-in chokes, that fits you when you shoulder it. That is the best value in hunting firearms and it will hunt everything a budget hunter is likely to pursue.

Then pattern it, buy the three chokes, and put the money you saved into boots and a license. And take a hunter education or introductory shooting course if you have not — the NSSF and state agencies run programs for exactly this, and competence with the gun you own is worth more than any gun you could upgrade to.