About Rules FAQs Skirmishing Which Gun? Automatics Shotguns   Handguns Others Explosives Accessories Pictures Movie Clips Links Shotguns            Airsoft shotguns come in two types: spring & gas. Spring shotguns are pumped (cocked) like the real gun to load BBs into the chamber. All of the sping shotguns that I know of take shells that hold the BBs. On guns like the Spas12, the shells hold 30 BBs and each time you pump the gun, 3 of the 30 are taken out and put into the barrel. Inside the barrel there are actually 3 smaller barrels that house 1 BB each. This ensures a good spread of the BBs when fired. The effective range of some shotguns is 50 - 100 feet depending on the gun with usually no more than 300FPS. Of the shotguns that I know, the Hop-Up is fixed and you cannot adjust it. But you can use heavier BBs to see which weight your Hop-Up setting best works for. Some spring shotguns can eject the shell after the shot.            Some gas shotguns that I know of have one barrel (instead of 3 smaller ones like the Spas12) and can hold several shells which take their capacity up from 30 to 150rds! Some can even eject the shell after a shot like the real ones. Some gas shotguns don't even take shells. I guess you load them directly into the gun somehow. I have also read that using spring power gives you better performance than using 134a gas for the gas shotguns. So in general, in my opinion I would go with a spring shotgun because you don't have to purchase more gas for it, (and if you live in the U.S. like I do, gas accessories aren't widely available like they are in the U.K.) they often give better performance, and most (if not all) take shells which add to the realism of the airsoft gun!