See exactly where your bullet hits at every distance from 50 to 400 yards based on your zero range, muzzle velocity, and ballistic coefficient. Find your maximum point-blank range and the best zero for deer and big game hunting.
Positive = above aim point | Negative = below aim point. Zero crossing rows are highlighted.
| Range (yds) | POI (inches) | Velocity (fps) | Energy (ft-lbs) | Time of Flight (s) |
|---|
Estimated lateral drift in inches. A 5 mph wind drifts half as much; a quartering wind roughly half as much as a full-value crosswind.
| Range (yds) | Wind Drift (inches) | Velocity (fps) |
|---|
Your rifle's zero is the distance at which your bullet's path crosses your line of sight (through your scope) on its way back down. Because your scope sits roughly 1.5 inches above your bore, the bullet actually crosses the line of sight twice: once on the way up (usually around 25–35 yards with a 100-yard zero, or 50–60 yards with a 200-yard zero) and once at your actual zero distance. That first crossing is why a rifle zeroed at 200 yards will also shoot to point of aim at roughly 25–50 yards, which surprises new hunters who try to confirm their zero close-up.
The zero distance you choose determines where your bullet is high and where it's low for every other distance you might shoot. With a 100-yard zero, most deer cartridges are zeroed dead-on at 100 yards, then drop increasingly below aim point from there — roughly 7–10 inches low at 200 yards and 20–30 inches low at 300 yards, depending on the cartridge. With a 200-yard zero, the same rifle shoots about 2–3 inches high at 100 yards, dead-on at 200, and only 8–12 inches low at 300. The practical effect: a 200-yard zero gives you a much flatter-shooting rifle for woods-to-field transitions without any hold-over changes out to 250 yards.
The classic argument for the 200-yard zero comes from the concept of maximum point-blank range (MPBR): the farthest distance at which your bullet stays within a given vertical window of your aim point without any hold-over or holdunder. For deer, most hunters use a ±3-inch window — the approximate size of a deer's vital zone when the shot placement needs to stay within the lung/heart area. With a 200-yard zero on a typical .308, .30-06, or .270, that ±3-inch window extends to roughly 240–280 yards. That means you can hold dead-on at any deer out to 250 yards without thinking about hold-over at all — just aim at the center of the vitals and squeeze.
With a 100-yard zero, you're already 7–9 inches low at 200 yards on those same cartridges, which means you need to hold over at virtually every distance beyond 100 yards in the field. A 200-yard zero eliminates hold-over for the vast majority of hunting shots, which is why it's the standard recommendation for hunters who take shots anywhere from 50 to 250 yards.
The exception is close-range hunting: if you're hunting exclusively in heavy timber where shots rarely exceed 60–80 yards, a 100-yard zero may actually be simpler because you never need to think about the slight high-at-100 that comes with a 200-yard zero. But for mixed terrain — fields, clear-cuts, food plots, mountain hunting — the 200-yard zero is almost always the right choice for deer-sized game with standard deer cartridges.
The vertical distance between your scope's optical axis and your bore centerline is not a rounding error — it has a real effect on trajectory, especially at close range and at very long range. A typical hunting rifle with a standard-height ring has a scope about 1.5 inches above bore. A rifle with an AR-15-style flat-top mount and a low-profile scope may be 2.5–3 inches above bore. The difference matters in two places: at very close range (inside 50 yards), higher scope mounts mean the bullet is farther below the line of sight, making it hit low on close-range targets. And at long range, scope height affects the angle of departure and therefore the exact shape of the trajectory arc.
For big game hunting purposes, the difference between 1.5 and 1.75 inches of scope height is small enough to ignore in the field. But if you're setting up a precision long-range rifle with a high scope mount, use the actual measurement from your setup rather than the default. Measure center of scope lens to center of barrel with a caliper for the most accurate input.
The most reliable zeroing process starts at 25 yards. Fire one careful shot and adjust your scope so the bullet hits where you're aiming at 25 yards. This gets you on paper quickly and avoids the frustration of a cold rifle shooting off the edge of a 100-yard target. Once you're hitting at 25 yards, move to 100 yards and make your final adjustments. If you're setting a 200-yard zero, zero at 100 yards with your bullet hitting approximately 2–3 inches high (the exact amount depends on cartridge — use this calculator to find your predicted 100-yard POI with a 200-yard zero). Then confirm at 200 yards.
Always zero from a stable shooting position. A sandbag front rest and a rear bag give you the consistency you need — a freehand zero is essentially meaningless. Fire at least three-shot groups and use the group center, not your best single shot, to make adjustments. One flyer does not represent your rifle's zero; a three-shot group tells you where the rifle actually prints. Adjust by half the distance between your group center and the bull, confirm, then make any remaining fine adjustment.
Most hunters' first shot of the season — or the first shot of a hunting morning — is a cold-bore shot: the barrel has not been fired recently and is at ambient temperature. For some rifle and ammunition combinations, the cold-bore shot hits measurably different from subsequent warm-bore shots. This happens because the fouling in the barrel from the last time you cleaned changes slightly with temperature, and some barrels have slight bore diameter changes with temperature due to stress in the steel.
The magnitude of cold-bore shift varies widely: some rifles shoot every shot to the same point regardless; others show a consistent cold-bore shift of 0.5–1.5 inches. To know whether your rifle has a cold-bore shift, fire a single shot at a clean target from a cold barrel, note where it hits relative to your zero, then fire a follow-up group after the barrel has warmed from several shots. If the cold shot consistently hits in a different spot, document that shift. On the hunt, that's the shot that counts — the first bullet in the chamber. Some precision hunters deliberately run a single fouling shot through their barrel before a stalk to eliminate cold-bore shift, then re-chamber for the hunt. For most deer hunting at practical distances, cold-bore shift of under an inch is irrelevant inside 200 yards, but it's worth knowing about for any open-country shot beyond 300.
For the vast majority of deer hunters shooting standard cartridges (.308, .30-06, .270, 6.5 Creedmoor, 7mm Rem Mag), a 200-yard zero is the better choice. It keeps you within ±3 inches of aim point out to roughly 250 yards, meaning you can hold dead-on at any normal hunting distance without thinking about holdover. The only time a 100-yard zero makes more sense is if virtually all your shots will be under 100 yards in dense cover — in that case the slight high-at-100 from a 200-yard zero is unnecessary complexity.
Maximum point-blank range (MPBR) is the farthest distance at which your bullet stays within a defined vertical window of your aim point — without any holdover correction — given your zero. For big game, the standard window is ±3 inches, which keeps your bullet within the vital zone of a deer-sized animal. If your MPBR is 250 yards, you can aim dead-center vitals at any deer from 0 to 250 yards and get a solid hit without adjusting. Beyond MPBR, you need to hold higher than the animal's vitals to compensate for drop.
The G1 ballistic coefficient (BC) is a number that describes how efficiently a bullet retains velocity as it flies through the air. A higher BC means the bullet sheds velocity more slowly, resulting in less drop and less wind drift at longer distances. A .308 Win 168gr Sierra MatchKing with a BC of 0.47 will drift and drop significantly less at 400 yards than a .308 Win 150gr soft point with a BC of 0.32, even though they leave the muzzle at nearly the same speed. For hunting purposes, higher BC bullets are especially valuable beyond 200 yards, where the difference in drift and drop between a 0.30 BC and a 0.60 BC bullet becomes very significant. The 6.5 Creedmoor's popularity in hunting is largely due to its ability to fire high-BC bullets (0.50–0.65) at respectable velocities, giving very flat trajectory and low wind sensitivity for a standard-pressure cartridge.
Yes, completely normal. With a 200-yard zero, most standard deer cartridges will print 1.5–3 inches high at 100 yards. This is by design — the bullet rises above the line of sight after crossing it the first time near the muzzle, stays above line of sight through the midrange, then drops back down to meet the line of sight at 200 yards. Use this calculator to see the predicted 100-yard POI for your specific cartridge with a 200-yard zero — it varies by muzzle velocity and BC. A 6.5 Creedmoor with high BC might be 2.5 inches high at 100 with a 200-yard zero, while a slower .308 load might be only 1.8 inches high.
At higher altitude, the air is less dense, meaning there is less drag on the bullet. The practical effect: at 5,000 feet elevation, your bullet will hit slightly higher and drift slightly less in wind than at sea level. For most hunting distances under 300 yards, the difference is small enough to ignore — less than an inch at 300 yards for most cartridges. At extreme altitude (above 8,000 feet) or for long-range shots beyond 400 yards, altitude correction becomes more meaningful. This calculator uses sea-level standard atmosphere. If you're hunting elk in Colorado at 10,000 feet with a mountain rifle, your actual drops will be a bit less than shown here.