If you play paintball regularly, one of the biggest expenses behind your entire kit will be paintballs. Because of this, some people choose to buy the cheapest paintballs they can get their hands on, while others are willing to buy the most expensive brands. So, in this article, I’ll outline the main differences between cheap and expensive paintballs, so you can decide for yourself which route you want to take.

As you would expect with more expensive brands of paintballs, the quality is higher and it has been designed specifically with paintballers and the game in mind. The more expensive brands of paintball tend to have more reliable cartridges, which reduces the number of paintballs that will explode in the barrel of your gun. The flight paths of the best paintballs also tend to be more accurate, because the projectiles tend to be more spherical, which means more hits against opposing players.

These superior features of the best paintballs are achieved through better quality control during manufacturing and also by using higher quality materials during the manufacturing process. The higher standard of paint will result in brighter colored paint marks, which are more difficult to erase when you are on the field and hitting an opposing player.

Cheaper paintballs tend to be less accurate and more prone to exploding in your marker barrels causing a dreaded barrel shake. They are also much more likely to swell or shrink from pressure drops or moisture in the atmosphere, which will likely negatively affect paintball performance.

So, in conclusion, if you opt for more expensive paintballs, you will generally have a better and more accurate paintball experience, but like all good things, you will have to pay a premium for it.