Remington Core-Lokt Ammunition 270 Winchester 150 Grain Core-Lokt Soft Point Box of 20

Core-Lokt Ammunition 270 Winchester

The .30-30 Winchester/.30 Winchester Center Fire cartridge was first marketed in 1895 for the Winchester Model 1894 lever-action rifle.^[2] The .30-30 (or “thirty-thirty”), as it is most commonly known, and the .25-35 were offered that year as the United States’s first small-bore sporting rifle cartridges designed for smokeless powder. Since its introduction, it has been surpassed by many cartridges in the long-range shooting attributes of speed, energy, and trajectory,^[3] yet remains in widespread use because of its practical effectiveness in forested hunting situations.^[4]

The .30-30 is by far the most common cartridge shot from lever action rifles.^[5] The .30-30 is substantially more powerful than the Magnum handgun cartridges (e.g., .357, .44, et al.) also often paired with lever actions, and produces that energy with mild recoil.^[6] While its old rival .35 Remington produces more muzzle energy and recoil, the .30-30 will often retain more terminal energy.^[6] The .30-30 is not commonly used for extreme long-range shooting across wide-open spaces, but modern innovations in ballistic tipped bullets for leverguns have moved the long-range capabilities of the .30-30 somewhat closer to parity with higher-velocity cartridges.^[7][8] In any case, a hunting-specific advantage of the .30-30 over those cartridges is that it leaves lower volumes of spoiled (destroyed or bloodshot) venison after a kill, leading to less wastage.^[9][10]

The .30-30 is often said to have killed more whitetail deer in North America than any cartridge in history, and it remains highly popular today.^[11][12][13]