How to Bore Sight a Rifle (and Pistol) with a Laser Bore Sighter

A laser bore sighter is the cheapest ammunition you will ever buy. It drops into your chamber, projects a dot exactly where your bore is pointing, and lets you line your sights up with that dot before you fire a single round — so your first live shots land on paper instead of somewhere in the berm. This guide covers what bore sighting can and cannot do, how to do it safely step by step, and the mistakes that undo the whole exercise.

What bore sighting does — and what it doesn't do

Bore sighting aligns your optic or sights with the axis of the bore at one set distance. That is all it does, and it is worth being clear about the limits: a bore-sighted rifle is not a zeroed rifle. The laser travels in a perfectly straight line; your bullet does not. Gravity, muzzle velocity, and the height of your sight above the bore all mean the bullet's path only crosses your line of sight at the distances you confirm with live fire. What bore sighting buys you is a starting point — first shots on paper at 25 yards instead of off the target entirely — which saves ammunition, range time, and the frustration of chasing a zero from nowhere. The final zero is always confirmed and refined with live rounds.

Choosing the right bore sighter

The first rule is fitment: a bore sighter only works if it matches your chamber. Cartridge-style sighters are machined to a specific caliber — a .22LR bore sighter fits .22LR chambers, a 7.62x39 bore sighter fits 7.62x39 chambers, and so on through 30-06, 300 Win Mag, .338 and 8mm. There is no cross-compatibility: a sighter that does not match the chamber will not sit on the bore axis, and its dot is worse than useless. Shotguns take gauge-specific sighters, like this 20 gauge shotgun bore sighter. The full set lives in our Bore Sight & Laser collection. The other style, the arbor or muzzle sighter, fits into the muzzle with caliber adapters and covers many guns with one tool, but it depends on the adapters seating squarely. Whichever style you choose, confirm the batteries are fresh before you start — every sighter in our range ships with batteries included, and a fading battery makes a fading, hard-to-read dot.

Step by step: bore sighting at home or at the range

1. Make the firearm safe. Remove the magazine, open the action, and visually and physically verify the chamber is empty. Keep all live ammunition out of the work area entirely — the only thing that goes in the chamber during this process is the bore sighter.

2. Secure the gun. Put the rifle or shotgun in a rest, vise, or solid bags so it cannot move while you adjust. Any shift between looking at the dot and turning the turrets ruins the alignment.

3. Insert the sighter. Seat the cartridge-style sighter in the chamber and close the action gently, exactly as its instructions describe. The laser dot now projects downrange along the bore line.

4. Set your target. Place a plain, high-contrast target at your chosen distance (more on distance below) and note exactly where the dot lands — that spot is your reference point.

5. Align the sights to the dot. Without moving the gun, adjust your scope turrets, red dot, or iron sights until the reticle or sight picture sits on the laser dot. On a scope, dial windage and elevation until the crosshair covers the dot. On a red dot, co-witness the dot to the laser spot. Work in small adjustments and re-check that the gun has not shifted.

6. Remove the sighter. Take the bore sighter out, close the action on an empty chamber, and store the sighter separately from live ammunition. Then confirm your work with live fire on paper, starting close.

Pistols follow the same idea: a chamber-style sighter in a handgun lets you align fixed or adjustable sights and slide-mounted red dots to the bore line on a short indoor distance, which is usually enough to get the first shots on a close-range target.

What distance should you bore sight at?

Most shooters bore sight at 15 to 25 yards — indoors at home that might be a hallway-length wall, at the range the 25-yard line. Two things to expect at that distance. First, your sight sits above the bore, so the relationship between dot and reticle at 25 yards does not translate directly into a 100-yard zero; it simply gets you close enough that your first group is on the paper. Second, the laser dot grows and softens with distance, so shorter is more precise: sight at the longest distance where you can still see a small, sharp dot, then move to live fire at 25 yards and walk the zero out to your final distance from there.

Safety: the rules that matter

Never look into the beam, and never point it at people, animals, or reflective surfaces. A bore sighter is a real laser and an eye hazard, not a toy — treat the dot discipline the same way you treat muzzle discipline.

Remove the bore sighter before live fire — every time, no exceptions. This is the most important sentence in this guide. Firing a round with a bore sighter still in the chamber or bore obstructs the barrel and can seriously damage the firearm and injure the shooter. Build the habit: sighter out, chamber checked empty by eye and by finger, then live ammunition comes out. Many shooters keep the sighter in a bright case for exactly this reason — if the case is empty, ask yourself where the sighter is.

Double-check the chamber when you finish. End every bore-sighting session the way you started it: action open, chamber verified empty, no live rounds anywhere near the gun until you are deliberately ready to shoot.

The bottom line

Bore sighting is a five-minute job that saves real money in ammunition and real time at the range: match the sighter to your caliber, align your sights to the dot at 15 to 25 yards, take the sighter out, and confirm the true zero with live fire. Browse the Bore Sight & Laser collection — from .22LR to 6.5 Grendel — and start your next range session on paper instead of hunting for it.