When I first got into shooting, I was obsessed with doing so on the cheap. So I bought Romanian WASRs and SARs in 7.62×39 mm and 5.45×39 mm. Back then, a case of centerfire surplus ammo could be had for under $100 and would last you through a few weeks of carefree plinking at the range. If you were into World War II firearms at that time, you had an even better market; Mosin-Nagants were around $50, and 440-round sealed “spam-cans” of ammo were around $45! (If we only knew then, we would have bought a shipping container and filled it!)
Today, the market is vastly different; Both 7.62×39 mm and 5.45×39 mm are north of 50 cents per round, and 7.62×54 mm R is closer to 65 cents per round. Not a terrible price compared to new-production battle rifle calibers like .308 Win., but not cheap enough to stack thousands of rounds a month with leftover money from a paycheck. Surely, there must be some affordable options for 2026, right?
There are, and don’t call me Shirley. So strap in, and I’ll let you know not only what calibers you should stock up on but where to find them, as we discover the most affordable surplus ammo for 2026.
Mil-Surp Ammo Bargain Hunting 101
There are two ways to effectively track down surplus ammunition on the cheap. The most old-school way is to drive around to older gun shops and pawn shops and check out their selection. I’ve had tremendous luck looking around old gun shops with ammo that was priced sky-high 15 years ago but is now comparably affordable. This also goes for accessories like magazines, FYI. Ten years ago, I found a pile of new-in-wrapper M1 carbine magazines for nine bucks a pop at a 60-year-old gunshop. Just keep looking. Deals are out there!
One piece of advice I would add is to make an offer on some of the ammo in bulk locally if it’s covered in dust. I’ve found boxes of .303 British and Chinese 7.62×39 mm that were priced a little too high for me, but when I offered to buy the store out of the ammo with cash, they were willing to cut 15 percent off the total.
The second way to find good deals on ammo is to look outside the mainstream ammo resellers online. This might seem counterintuitive, given all the different ammo price aggregate sites (websites that collect and display the average price per round from hundreds of sites, the most popular of which is AmmoSeek.com), but some of the smaller sites aren’t properly formatted to be crawled by these aggregate site bots.
This method is effective, but not without risks. Be sure to do your homework on the site before buying. As a rule of thumb, if a shop only takes Bitcoin or some other cryptocurrency, it’s not legit. Another aspect to keep in mind is that shipping can often raise the price per round to ludicrous levels if you’re not careful. I’ve found .223 online for as little as 20 cents per round, but after exorbitant shipping costs, the real price was around 65 cents per round.
Lastly, if you find a site off the beaten path that comes through and delivers cheap ammo, sign up for its newsletter. They often advertise great deals before adding them to their webstore, and if the deal is good enough, it will often sell out in minutes.
That said, let’s delve into my top three most affordable surplus calibers of 2026.
.303 British
The mainstay British caliber for two world wars, .303 British, has been stacking bad guys across the globe for more than half a century. In terms of power, the round is very close to .30-’06 Springfield, but it is still remarkably more affordable.
If this one surprises you, it should. In the past 15 years, I’ve seen .303 British sell for upwards of a dollar per round. At that price, it’s no wonder you don’t see many enthusiasts ringing steel with their Lee-Enfields. But in the last few months, a good amount of Indian army surplus ammo has hit the shelves for around 40 cents per round. It’s not crazy-cheap like it was in the early 2000s, but consider this: $100 in 2001 is worth roughly $200 now. So, adjusted for inflation, this latest batch of .303 might actually be the cheapest we’ve ever seen.
As far as what guns can use .303, there are both No. 1, Mk III and No.4, MK I Enfields still available for around $500-$600 if you shop around. And if you want to get something a little less common, there are P14s and Canadian Ross rifles available for a fair bit more cash. This is personally the most exciting change in the market, since I was sitting on a pair of Enfields that seldom saw use because of the previously high price of ammo.
9 mm Makarov
As a lifelong collector of Combloc firearms, I hold a special place in my heart for the little 9×18 mm Makarov round. It’s not quite 9 mm Luger, but it’s a little more potent than .380 ACP. The 9 mm Makarov was the pistol round of the Soviet Union and its many satellites after World War II.
While not cheap compared to more common rounds like 9 mm Luger, 9 mm Makarov is only slightly more expensive than .380 ACP. So if you’ve always wanted a Makarov or one of the many inexpensive Warsaw Pact pistols but were afraid they would cost too much to feed, rest easy. Another cool aspect of the ammo is that many companies occasionally do runs of defensive ammo for the caliber. So if you want to feel like an undercover KGB agent while you conceal carry your Makarov or Polish P64, now you can do so without sacrificing terminal ballistics.
8 mm Mauser
The Mauser 98 series is a truly timeless design; Countless bolt-action rifles used today are based on the original action. But for shooters looking to plink with the go-to rifle of the bad guys in World War II, the last few years have been tough. The average price of 8 mm Mauser hit nearly 75 cents per round a few years back.
Thankfully, the era of expensive 8 mm is over—at least temporarily—thanks to recent imports of Turkish and German surplus 8 mm ammo. Normally available in packages of 15 rounds, recent imports of the ammo come not only pre-loaded on stripper clips, but also in bandoliers! Better yet, I’ve personally seen (corrosive) examples of the ammo available during big sales for as low as 30 cents per round!
The only thing to keep in mind with the recent Turkish imports is that many folks suggest that shooters should avoid using the ammo in their semi-auto and full-auto firearms. Personally, I haven’t had any issues running a few hundred rounds through my Egyptian Hakim, but your mileage may vary, and if you’re running something very expensive like a Gewehr 43 or the like, you might want to steer clear of this ammo, just to be safe.
For the rest of us blasting away merrily with our German K98s, Yugoslavian M48s, and Czech vz.24s, we finally get to feed our bolt-guns for cheap! To be honest, the low price of the ammo makes me wish some companies would start importing modern 8 mm bolt-guns from Germany, so I can run 8 mm suppressed. One can dream.
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