How Many Magazines Do You Keep On Hand For Guns You Regularly Carry?

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Trunk Monkey

Trunk Monkey

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The question is pretty self explanatory I think. For my carry gun I think 13 OEM magazines will be more than enough to last the rest of my life.

I also have 5 Pmags for range use. At 10 bucks a pop I don't particularly care if I step on one and break it.

I decided to stock up to that number because they're cheaper now than they will be next year and they're legal now and they may not be next year. I have 6 17 round magazines for my M&P and that's all I'm ever going to legally have as long as I live in Colorado. So that's a lesson I learned the hard way.

So again my question is, for guns that you regularly carry what do you think an adequate number of magazines is? And do you take into consideration the price of the magazines when you buy a particular gun?
 
Minimum of 4. 2 loaded for use, 2 resting/ready for range use. Yes, I take mag price into consideration-to a point- on every firearm purchase. All Ruger factory mags are pricey. S&W can be too, unless you find a deal. HK mags will take you to the poor house.
 
I have 3-5 magazines for carry and practice. I generally carry the gun with one spare magazine.

Depending on the cost of magazines, I'll have a bunch in storage to replace one I may damage in use. This is mostly a hedge against some new idiotic law that gets passed.
 
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Almost universally 3 for mine, but one gun had 5, although I can only find 4 at the moment. I don't keep more than that but I do keep spare springs for some.
 
My carry guns are revolvers or single stacks, so I don't worry about my carry mags going illegal... Yet. So 3 is my magic number. I do more for comp guns, ARs, etc. but I feel okay with three for carry.
 
Always at least 2. I prefer at least 3, and have an eye open for a good deal if I stumble across it.
The non-SD guns aren't as important. I'll spend a bit on the larger calibers. I was lucky with the prices on the SR9c and Mec-Gar's price for my CZ. But for the first gun, a S&W 469, $40+ for un-neutered mags was a bit much.
 
I consider 5 magazines to be about the minimum for a gun that I actually intend to shoot or carry. I don't really have a set top limit, but I have noticed that I seem to stop looking for deals somewhere between 10 & 15 mags per gun. Of course that doesn't really tell the whole story since I tend to have multiples of guns I carry or shoot a lot. So, for example, although nominally speaking I only have 10 mags for my CW9, I also have a P9 (takes the same mags & fits the same holster) with another 10 mags for it.

Living through the AWB probably pushed those numbers up a little from what they would have been otherwise. I still remember the experience of owning a gun with 5 mags and having the mags be worth much more than the gun was.
 
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5 seems to be my magic number. 3 for carry, 2 for the range.

Sometimes I'll keep another one in the truck, but not always.
 
My EDC is a Glock 26, no idea how many I have that could fit in it and be used. But I have owned Glocks for over 30 years and things accumulate. But I have stock magazines, +2 OEM magazines, magazines with Gap floor plates, 17 round G17 magazines and to top it off 6 33 round G18 magazines that I bought for my Kel-Tec Sub 2000.

I have a few magazines in my car, a some stashed around my home, an assortment of different sizes that total up to a dozen in my range bag, 3 12 round that are carried. Some in a safe some in ammo cans and some I seem to just find in odd places when looking for something else.

For my G42 which I have carried and is a relatively recent purchase. 3 go in my EDC rig. I have 12 more for the range and one more for dry fire. Sounds like a lot but I take lessons once a month and I like to avoid wasting time loading magazines at the start.
 
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I like to have 8-10 magazines for each gun. I probably should consider magazine price more than I do, but I don't buy or sell very frequently. Magazine price tends to dictate the speed with which I stock up on mags, but not whether or not I do so.
 
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I usually keep 4 or 5, but I have haven't bought more than the two magazines that came with my full size SIG P320 simply because I'm hoping some 3rd party mags hit the market as it works it's way into military action.

I do keep my eyes open for P250 magazines at gun shows that people don't know will run in the 320. No dice yet.
 
I was always a 3-5 mags per pistol guy...and 4-6 for my AR, M1A, Carbine....And for .22 rifles 2 was fine.

Then We had the IDIOTIC Clinton years with the magazine RESTRICTIONS. Even living in a free State, Montana...The situation was a real eye opener. I saw AR mags go from $10 for good GI , 20 rounders....to $100. Tough to find magazines multiplied in value four to five times overnight. And that idiocy lasted TEN yrs.

Better to HAVE and not need, than NEED and NOT HAVE. Now if I find a quality mag....CHEAP. Or for some guns, like HK's or something discontinued, if it's even REASONABLE....I buy it.

I have three Smith 1000 series ten mm's. Smith stopped making their mags several years back. They are currently $100 on up. I have seen NIW mags go for $120. I bought them a dozen years back for $15 and $20. Very HAPPY I did. Same for ANY HK mags....find them...if reasonable or cheap....BUY them.

If You don't need them...you can sell them later on. They require little maintenance. Take up minimal space and are legally , easily shipped. Few restrictions.

Recently counted AR mags...I have 120 thirties and 30 or so Twenties. So I have enough. 90% of those have been bought at bargain prices; Ten Gen 2 P-Mags for $89, etc.

They don't eat, don't require maintenance....buy a bunch when they are cheap!
 
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I have three for every semi I own and feel that's a minimum. However I don't see any need for umpteen mags for any gun.

My two carry guns get the mags rotated every few months as I usually only carry one mag, the other two sit for range use.


I probably will pick up 2 or 3 more for my AR at some point just because they're so cheap, but that's a little off topic.
 
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I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 25-30 double stack Glock magazines. 5 are loaded with JHP: 1 in the gun and a spare rides along, 1 in the car, and a couple of extended mags for the night stand. The remaining pool feed a stock of Glocks for range use, training, competition, etc. If it’s zero degrees outside, I want my time spent at the range to be shooting rather than loading. If I’m at a competition I want to do my part to help with pasting targets. If I’m at a training class I want my attention on the instructor. Having a good stock of a magazines helps me get more out of my allotted trigger time.
 
For me a minimum of four with most guns having on average six magazines. Some, like my 1911, I have more of mainly because I have several of them in the same caliber.
 
The 94 AWB really colored my behavior in terms of 10+ capacity mags. Buy them while you can. Once I decided on my gun of choice I just kept accumulating mags. The problem is that my carry gun has changed a few times. It’s currently a CZ P-07 and those mags are expensive. I think I have eight of them. But since I also have one in 40 S&W as a backup I had to buy a handful for that gun as well.
 
When I was going to a by the hour range I had at minimum 6 magazines per pistol. Full capacity for my G34 I have nine now and might pick up a few more.
EDC is a G26 for which I have two 10 and four 12 round mags.
 
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