How Far Can a Staple Gun Shoot?

A staple gun is an excellent alternative whenever a nail gun seems overkill. That’s right. Not only can you use a staple gun to combine canvases, papers and flyers but your pneumatic, as well as normal heavy-duty staple guns, can also be used on both hard and soft surfaces.

At your best bet, a manual, electric or pneumatic heavy-duty staple gun will be able to shoot as far as around 9.8 to 16.4 feet. This is also exactly why you need to understand the difference between a staple gun and a nail gun.

Difference Between a Staple Gun and a Nail Gun

The terms nail gun and staple gun are often used interchangeably but there’s a fine difference between the two. For instance, a nail gun may be used to fasten two wooden splits in any orientation, depending upon the size of the nail.

When it comes to a staple gun, you can only use it two join the edge of one object to another’s. Since stapler gun pins aren’t as big as nails are and won’t normally pierce through and come out the other end as a nail does, their application is limited to less intensive tasks.

This is exactly why a nail gun can shoot with a better projectile and range as compared to a staple gun — nails have a pointy shape and more volume, giving them a decent push when shooting from afar. While staple guns may also be shot from afar, they’ll deliver noticeably less-strong impact.

What Are the Different Types of Staple Guns?

Manual

These are spring-loaded models that shoot staples when the lever is pressed.

Electric

Electric staple guns are very easy on the arm and use either a battery or plugged-in cord to work. These staple guns fire staple pins at the pull of a trigger and are used in carpeting or upholstery jobs.

Pneumatic

These are usually the most powerful staple guns and come close to nail guns. You may be able to shoot at a 13 to 16.4 feet range with these ones. They use air pressure to fire heavy gauge staples into the wood and other materials.

Flooring

These too are air-powered guns but work at the strike of a mallet.

Tack-hammers

These guns are struck against the face of a surface to fire a staple into the material.

What Is a Heavy-duty Staple Gun?

A heavy-duty staple gun lets you staple both hard and soft and thick and thin materials. Manual, hand-held heavy-duty staple guns are pretty common, as well as pneumatic ones.

The problem with pneumatic ones is that they need an air compressor to operate and can be noisy. On the other hand, manual ones are far less noisy than a hammer and you can handle most tasks with them.

Which Staple Gun Is Best for Woodworking?

You can either go with a manual heavy-duty staple gun or a pneumatic staple gun. We suggest going with the first one if you’re a DIYer. If you’ve got a proper workshop and your job is intense, you can purchase a pneumatic staple gun but it’ll need to be powered with an air compressor. If you can handle the hassle, go for it.