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An assault rifle is a
rifle A rifle is a long-barreled firearm designed for accurate shooting, with a barrel that has a helical pattern of grooves ( rifling) cut into the bore wall. In keeping with their focus on accuracy, rifles are typically designed to be held with ...
that uses an intermediate cartridge, a detachable magazine, and can switch between semi-automatic/ fully automatic fire. Assault rifles are currently the standard
service rifle A service rifle (or standard-issue rifle) is a rifle a military issues to regular infantry. In modern militaries, this is typically a versatile and rugged battle rifle, assault rifle, or carbine suitable for use in nearly all environments. M ...
s in most modern armies. Some rifles listed below such as the AR15 also come in semi-auto models which would not belong under the term "Assault Rifle".


Definition

By strict definition, a firearm must have the following characteristics to be considered an assault rifle: * It must be an individual weapon; * It must be capable of selective fire, which means it has the capacity to switch between semi-automatic and burst/ fully automatic fire; * It must have an intermediate-power cartridge: more power than a
pistol A pistol is a handgun, more specifically one with the chamber integral to its gun barrel, though in common usage the two terms are often used interchangeably. The English word was introduced in , when early handguns were produced in Europe, a ...
but less than a standard
rifle A rifle is a long-barreled firearm designed for accurate shooting, with a barrel that has a helical pattern of grooves ( rifling) cut into the bore wall. In keeping with their focus on accuracy, rifles are typically designed to be held with ...
or battle rifle. For full-power automatic rifles, see List of battle rifles; * Its
ammunition Ammunition (informally ammo) is the material fired, scattered, dropped, or detonated from any weapon or weapon system. Ammunition is both expendable weapons (e.g., bombs, missiles, grenades, land mines) and the component parts of other we ...
must be supplied from a detachable box magazine; * It should have an effective range of at least . Rifles that meet most of these criteria, but not all, are technically not assault rifles, despite frequently being called such. For example: * Select-fire M2 carbines and Amogh carbines are not assault rifles; their effective range is only 200 yards.''Jane's Gun Recognition Guide''. Ian Hogg & Terry Gander. HarperCollins Publishers. 2005. page 330 * Select-fire rifles such as the FN FAL are not assault rifles; they are battle rifles and fire full-powered rifle cartridges. * Semi-automatic-only rifles like the
Colt AR-15 The Colt AR-15 is a lightweight, magazine-fed, gas-operated semi-automatic rifle. It is a semi-automatic version of the M16 rifle sold for the civilian and law enforcement markets in the United States. Colt's Manufacturing Company currently o ...
are not assault rifles; they do not have select-fire capabilities. In contrast, the original
ArmaLite AR-15 The ArmaLite AR-15 is a select-fire, gas-operated, air-cooled, magazine-fed rifle manufactured in the United States between 1959 and 1964. Designed by American gun manufacturer ArmaLite in 1956, it was based on its AR-10 rifle. The ArmaLit ...
would meet the criteria. * Semi-automatic-only rifles with fixed magazines like the
SKS The SKS (russian: Самозарядный карабин системы Симонова, Samozaryadny Karabin sistemy Simonova, 1945, self-loading carbine of (the) Simonov system, 1945) is a semi-automatic rifle designed by Soviet small arms ...
are not assault rifles; they do not have detachable box magazines and are not capable of automatic fire. Several of the rifles on the below list have non-assault rifle variants. Because they lack the selective fire capability as they only fire semi-automatic even though it fulfils the other requirements of the definition above.


List


See also

* List of battle rifles * List of bolt-action rifles * List of carbines *
List of grenade launchers This article lists all forms of grenade launchers around the world, that is to say weapons that launch grenades with more accuracy, a higher velocity and to greater distances than a soldier could.''Small Arms Illustrated'', 2010 Below is the ...
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List of machine guns This is a list of machine guns and their variants. The tables are sortable. See also *List of firearms *List of multiple-barrel firearms References {{Reflist * Machine guns A machine gun is a fully automatic, rifled autoloading f ...
*
List of multiple-barrel firearms Below is a list of multiple-barrel firearms of all forms from around the world.Small Arms Illustrated, 2010 Pistols Rifles Flare launchers Less lethal Automatic rifles Submachine guns Shotguns Machine guns Grenade launchers S ...
* List of pistols *
List of pump-action rifles A pump-action rifle is a rifle where the forend can be moved forward and backward in order to eject a spent round of ammunition and to chamber a new one. Pump-action mechanisms are often regarded as faster than a bolt action and somewhat faster ...
* List of revolvers * List of semi-automatic pistols * List of semi-automatic rifles * List of sniper rifles *
List of straight-pull rifles Straight-pull rifles differ from conventional bolt-action mechanisms in that the manipulation required from the user in order to chamber and extract a cartridge predominantly consists of a linear motion only, as opposed to a traditional turn-bolt ...
*
Service rifle A service rifle (or standard-issue rifle) is a rifle a military issues to regular infantry. In modern militaries, this is typically a versatile and rugged battle rifle, assault rifle, or carbine suitable for use in nearly all environments. M ...


References

{{Firearms Assault rifles List