5 ways to improve your handgun accuracy

As an avid competitive shooter, range safety officer and firearms instructor, I have done and seen almost all of the mistakes one can make shooting a handgun.

I’ve heard all the excuses in the world as to why bullets don’t end up going where they were intended to go. Some of my favorites are:

“This gun is not accurate”

“The trigger is too heavy”

“If I only had my rifle…”

“This gun sucks”

“Man, I just can’t hit shit with a handgun!”

Many shooters struggle for years with handgun accuracy for one reason or another but it all comes down to one very simple issue.

We are moving the sights off of the intended target area before the bullet leaves the barrel..  

1.       Press the trigger without moving the sights.

With the gun unloaded (double check the chamber is empty and the magazine is removed) and pointed in a safe direction, practice pressing the trigger without moving your sights. You should be able to balance a coin on the top of your front sight post while pressing the trigger. If the coin falls off, you may be moving the gun before the trigger is pressed.

Balance a coin on the front sight post while dry firing to ensure you are not disrupting the gun before completing the trigger press.

2.       Stop flinching.

Anticipating the recoil and flinching right before pressing the trigger will always throw off your handgun accuracy. Learn to overcome your flinch response by doing more live-fire training where you are not focused on hitting a specific area on your target. To overcome this common issue, pick a spot on the berm and fire several rounds while focusing on just watching the gun lift and settle after each shot. Try not to blink while firing and relax.

Shooting without flinching or blinking your eyes takes practice but is critical for handgun accuracy

3.       Fix your grip.

If you have a death grip on the gun with your dominant hand (right hand for right-handed shooters), It is impossible to press the trigger without moving the rest of your fingers. This in turn causes you to move the gun prior to completing the trigger press. Loosen up your grip on your dominant hand and really lock down the grip on your support hand.

4.       Use your sights!

Yes the little bumpy things on the top of your gun are important if you want to shoot what you’re aiming at. Learn to always see your sights on the target when shooting. For true handgun accuracy, ensure you have a vision focus on your front sight's top-edge. Ensure the space between the side edges of the front post and the notch in the rear post is equal on both sides. You will learn what an acceptable sight picture looks like for different size targets and differences in distance to the targets.

5.       Accept the movement.

Nobody can hold a gun perfectly still. The key is to accept the arc of movement that is inherently going to happen while you are aiming your gun on target. For precise shots, only apply increased pressure on the trigger while the sights are perfectly lined up with your target. As you move off the target, hold on your trigger pressure and continue to apply pressure only when the sights line back up. Keep re-aligning your sights and applying additional pressure to the trigger only when the sights are lined up until the gun fires. Don’t forget to keep breathing during this process!!! Blacking out due to lack of oxygen to your brain also can be a bit distracting.

Handgun accuracy can be improved drastically when you focus on preventing the one thing that causes missed shots. That one thing is moving the gun off the intended target area before the bullet leaves the barrel.