What Is the Difference Between a Gun & a Rifle?

If it goes “Bang!” and shoots a projectile, it’s a gun

People who get most of their information from Hollywood movies might be under the impression that a rifle is not a gun, as the drill sergeant in "Full Metal Jacket" insisted while training his grunts. This is yet another example of how it may not be wise to believe what you see and hear in movies or on TV. While rifles fall into a very narrow definition, virtually all firearms are a gun of one kind or another.

Definition of Gun

artillery

Any firearm, small or large, that throws a projectile by igniting an explosive charge located behind the projectile in a barrel (a tube closed at one end) qualifies as a gun. The charge and projectile may be separate, as in musket and many cannon charges, or both contained in a single cartridge, such as a bullet. Some guns are so tiny you can hide them in the palm of your hand; others are so large, such as the cannons of a battleship, that only massive vehicles can transport them,

Definition of Rifle

All rifles are guns, but not all guns are rifles. A rifle is a firearm designed to be held at the shoulder that fires a single round at a time through a “rifled,” or grooved, barrel. Muskets and other black-powder long guns do not qualify as rifles technically because they fire a round ball through a long barrel that has no rifling grooves.

Rifling

A bullet fired through a non-rifled barrel exits the weapon without any angular spin, making it unstable. Such projectiles lose accuracy very quickly and deviate more with added distance. Rifled barrels have helical grooves running their length (two or more, side by side) that cause the bullet to spin, giving it greater stability. This angular momentum (spin) minimizes the effects of aerodynamic forces, particularly wind and variations in air pressure, thereby causing it to fly in a more or less straight path and greatly improving accuracy.

Pistols/Handguns

Virtually all modern pistols (revolvers and single-shot target guns) and handguns (semi-automatics) have rifled barrels to improve their accuracy. These are not considered rifles, however, as you do not shoot them from the shoulder.

Shotguns

Because of the nature of the shotgun round, these weapons do not have rifled barrels and therefore are not rifles, even though you may shoot them from the shoulder. Shotgun shells usually contain dozens of small pellets called buckshot fired through a wide bore barrel. For rifling to affect a projectile, the bullet must fill most of the space of the barrel’s interior diameter, so rifling is useless in a shotgun.

Small Guns vs. Large Guns

Small guns or small arms are those that a single person can hold when in use, such as a pistol, handgun, rifle, shotgun and musket. Large guns or large arms, such as cannon and howitzers, are, understandably, too big and powerful for a person to hold.

References

• Word IQ: Rifle
• Brainy Quote: Gun