No matter what the game or where you hunt, these five cartridges will get it done for everything from pronghorns to the biggest bears.
by Brad Fitzpatrick
Many great hunting cartridges are available today, but which are the most versatile? Versatility depends on the cartridge’s design and other factors such as bullet and ammunition selection and available rifle options.
It’s been tough to choose just five, and I’ve had to kill some of my darlings like the .25-06, .270 Winchester, 7mm Remington Magnum, and the .338 Winchester Magnum. Even the .30-06 doesn’t make the list (I’ll explain later). There was stiff competition, to be sure.
These are my picks for the five most versatile hunting cartridges. Yours may be different. Either way, it’s good to know that we have enough options. It makes choosing favorites difficult.
.243 Winchester
The .243 Winchester arrived in 1955 and was an immediate success because it offered lots of flexibility from a low-recoil round. Based on a necked-down .308 Winchester, the .243 can push a 100-grain bullet to around 3,000 feet per second and a 58-grain bullet to almost 4,000. It shoots flat enough to work in open country, yet it has sufficient killing power for deer-sized game. I hunted with a guide in North Carolina who likes it for bear, and the great African professional hunter Harry Selby had his clients shoot most of their leopards with a .243 because the cartridge was easy to shoot accurately.
The .243 has been offered in a wide range of guns in various platforms, including autoloaders, lever-actions, and bolt-actions. It’s an outstanding option for hogs, antelope, deer, and coyotes, and it will kill bigger stuff in a pinch. There are also good loads and lots of rifles available.
6.5 Creedmoor
I struggled with the 6.5 Creedmoor since it’s so new (2007), but this cartridge has taken the shooting and hunting world by storm. The design was game-changing, and Hornady hit the nail squarely on the head when they decided that cartridges designed to accommodate heavy-for-caliber bullets would be the future wave. The 6.5 Creedmoor will comfortably hold high BC bullets up to 150 grains, and recoil is so mild that most anyone can shoot it well. Because of the chamber design, it’s also quite accurate.
No wonder the 6.5 Creedmoor has been a best-seller. It’s suitable for small game animals like antelope and Coues deer and better suited than the .243 for larger game like black bear, sheep, and caribou. It has been used on elk with varying levels of success, though it’s certainly on the light side. The 6.5 Creedmoor’s great advantage is that it’s inherently accurate and easy to shoot. There are also loads of rifles and ammunition available for the Creedmoor, and almost every new gun to hit the market arrives in 6.5 Creedmoor first. It has been around long enough that you can find ammo in far-flung places like Canada’s backcountry and rural Africa.
.308 Winchester
I wrote a piece on new hunting rifles for the year a few years ago. Know what the top chambering was? .308 Winchester. Is the .308 Winchester better than the .270 or .30-06? Not necessarily. However, it has been offered in almost every rifle configuration possible since the 1950s, from M1s to lever-action and sniper rifles. There are gads of hunting loads for the .308, and it’s the most potent cartridge many shooters can handle because of its moderate recoil. The old-school .308 is actually gaining in popularity. Far more new rifles are being released in .308 than .30-06, which is shocking.
.308 ammo is available loaded with bullets ranging from 130-180 grains, so there’s lots of load versatility. There’s .308 ammunition specialized for varmints, .308 ammo for whitetails, and .308 ammo for tough game like elk. And believe me, the .308 can handle elk. I killed my first bull with one and made a 406-yard shot on an antelope with a .308. The short action design allows rifles to be built light without being abusive, and if you can’t find .308 hunting ammunition available, you probably aren’t looking very hard.
.300 Winchester Magnum
Not everyone can shoot the .300 Winchester Magnum well, but if you can handle its 30 or so average foot-pounds of recoil push there’s very little you can’t hunt. Developed by Winchester in the 1960s, the .300 Win Mag is a product of the belted magnum era. It’ll drive a 180-grain bullet over 3,000 feet per second, so it shoots flat enough for most hunting situations, and with over two tons of muzzle energy, it’s suitable for elk, moose, bears, and all the African plains game. Yet the .300 Winchester magnum isn’t overkill for whitetails, and I have shot mule deer, antelope, and even a 90-pound African springbok with the .300.
There are so many rifle and load options for the .300 Winchester Magnum that you’ll have difficulty choosing the right setup. Once you do, you’ll have a hunting rifle suitable for almost anything on earth. Sure, new cartridges like the 7mm PRC outperform the .300 Win Mag on paper, especially as distances increase, but the .300 Win has been around for so long that there are guns and ammo in every backwater region worldwide. The reason? The .300 works everywhere.
.375 H&H Magnum
An oldie but goodie, the original African big game round arrived in 1912 and has been dropping big game ever since. The .375 H&H has a long, nicely tapered Victorian-era case with ample powder to push a 300-grain bullet around 2,500 feet per second. If the shooter does their job, that’s enough oomph to kill an elephant, cape buffalo, or brown bear.
But there are two things I particularly love about this cartridge. First, it doesn’t destroy smaller game. In fact, in many areas of Africa, it is used to hunt the smallest antelopes because it doesn’t do extensive damage to the animal. I’ve used the .375 on a cull hunt to harvest kudu and hartebeest, and unless the bullet struck bone, meat damage was minimal.
The second thing I love about the .375 H&H is that it offers world-class stopping power without beating the snot out of the shooter. All three .375s I own are easy to shoot. An experienced gun hunter should have no problem punching small groups with a good .375.
Ammunition has been available for over 100 years so there are plenty of options, and there are also lots of rifle choices. I do think that the .375 Ruger is a better all-around choice because it fits in a standard action (the .375 H&H requires a true magnum action), but the H&H has been so popular for so long that it has earned a spot on this list.
