How Much Does It Cost to Open a Shooting Range?

Opening a commercial indoor shooting range typically requires a significant upfront investment. A common estimate is around $100,000 per four-foot lane for range equipment and ventilation, before adding costs for land, the building, permits, insurance, and other startup expenses.

The total investment depends on the size and design of the facility. A basic 10-lane indoor range may start around $660,000 for range systems alone, while higher-end setups can reach approximately $100,000 to $120,000 per lane depending on factors such as ventilation, target systems, ceiling construction, and other features.

These numbers come from someone who has spent decades inside the business. Doug VanderWoude of Range Systems has worked in the firearms industry since 1981 and has visited more than 600 shooting ranges. Range Systems started in 1994 building military shoot houses and now designs commercial indoor ranges, outdoor facilities, clubs, and private ranges, including work on more than 50 Range USA locations and several Midwest Shooting Centers. He uses one simple figure as a starting point:

“Plan on $100,000 per 4-foot lane. So if you’re doing 10 lanes, it’s a million dollars to do the range equipment. And then you have to add the land and the building.”

The high upfront cost does not necessarily mean the business will remain equally expensive to operate. Doug identified payroll and insurance as the main recurring expenses, while most range equipment lasts a long time because it is built from AR500 steel and rubber. Filters and paper targets are among the other regular costs, and target retrievers are the primary moving components that require maintenance.

Doug summed up the difference between startup and operating costs this way:

“Your monthly expenses are not much. Unfortunately, it’s the capital expense to get into it up front. That’s the hard part.”

Modern ranges can offset that investment through recurring revenue from memberships, training, rentals, ammunition, and retail sales. Doug noted that a range charging $40 per month with 1,000 members would generate substantial recurring revenue that can cover a large share of operating expenses.

This guide breaks down the upfront cost per lane, the expenses new owners often overlook, the ongoing costs of operating a range, and the recurring revenue streams that can support the business over time.

What Drives the Cost of a Gun Range

Three factors set the price of a shooting range business: the number of shooting lanes, indoor versus outdoor construction, and the features you choose. Lanes matter most because nearly every major cost, from the bullet trap to the ventilation systems, is priced per lane. Doug’s rule of thumb is to plan for roughly $100,000 per four-foot lane for a finished indoor range. Ten lanes puts you near $1 million for the range portion alone, and that figure sits before land, the building, and startup costs like insurance and permits.

There is a small price break at higher lane counts. Doug notes that once you pass about eight lanes, the per-lane cost stays fairly steady.

Indoor vs. Outdoor Shooting Range Costs

An outdoor shooting range costs less to build than an indoor one, mostly because it does not need a ventilation system. On an outdoor range, you can use dirt berms for the backstop and sidewalls, granulated rubber backstops, and simple wood benches at the firing line. That keeps startup costs low.

The trade-off is commercial viability. Outdoor ranges need a large amount of land to contain sound and stray rounds, which pushes them into remote areas where it is hard to attract enough paying customers. Noise complaints and zoning disputes are common, even for clubs that have operated for decades. Doug notes that new commercial outdoor ranges are less common due to land, noise, and zoning challenges. An indoor shooting range costs more, but it gives you climate control, longer operating hours, and a location close to customers.

Cost Per Lane: Range Equipment

Range equipment runs about $38,000 to $53,000 per lane, depending on the ceiling design. This covers the bullet trap, shooting stall dividers, target retrieval, acoustic materials, and the hardware along the firing line. It does not include ventilation, which is priced separately.

Two ceiling styles shape this cost. A baffled range hangs 4-foot by 4-foot AR500 steel baffles from the ceiling to stop rounds from traveling past the firing line. A concrete-lid range replaces those baffles with a solid concrete ceiling. Concrete lids have grown popular over the past several years because they cost less over time, contain sound better, make zoning approval easier, and protect the full length of the range ballistically. That last point lets a range offer downrange and tactical training, which a standard baffled range cannot safely support without added cost.

Cost Per Lane: Ventilation Systems

Ventilation is the single most expensive and most overlooked part of building an indoor gun range, running from about $28,000 to $50,000 per lane. Air handling is not visible the way a bullet trap or target retriever is, so first-time owners often leave it out of early budgets and get surprised by it later. Doug points to ventilation as the mistake he sees most often.

Premium target systems use a single master controller that runs up to 40 lanes for about $13,000, so the per-lane price drops as you add lanes. Most ranges shoot at paper targets, though outdoor ranges and some indoor bays also use steel targets, and shotgun facilities use clay targets.

The Building and Land

The building and land are separate from range equipment and vary too much by market to price per lane. You can build a range inside many existing buildings because the range itself is a concrete box built within the larger structure. Range walls are typically 8-inch concrete-filled CMU block or 6-inch poured concrete. A 10-lane, 25-yard indoor range needs roughly 4,300 square feet for the range box alone, while a shorter 15-yard range of the same lane count needs about 3,100 square feet.

Two space details catch new owners off guard. First, the range needs a double-door vestibule, or airlock, at the entrance for proper airflow. Second, parking is easy to underestimate. Shooters stay 30 minutes to an hour, and training classes can run 4 to 8 hours with every student parked the whole time, so a 20-lane range needs well more than 20 spaces.

Other Startup Costs

Beyond construction, plan for licensing, insurance, permits, and lead management before you open. These costs vary by location, but they apply to nearly every commercial shooting range.

Ongoing Monthly Costs

Monthly operating costs for a shooting range are low compared to the upfront investment. The big recurring expenses are payroll and insurance. Range hardware lasts a long time because it is built from AR500 steel and rubber, with the target retrievers being the main moving parts. Consumables are minor: ventilation filters, which you go through fewer of with a rubber trap, and paper targets that cost 30 to 40 cents and sell for around $2.

Doug frames it well. A range is one of the few businesses where customers pay for range time, buy the ammunition, and leave behind the lead and brass that the range can also sell. The hard part is the capital cost to open the doors, not keeping them open.

How Ranges Earn the Investment Back

Membership revenue is what makes a modern range profitable, and it has replaced firearm sales as the main business model. Ranges now sell monthly memberships in the $30 to $50 range, and a facility that reaches 1,000 members builds a strong, recurring base that covers a large share of monthly costs. Doug describes an industry that has flipped: where owners once ran a gun store with a range attached, they now run a range and training business with retail attached. That is why nearly every new gun store now opens with a range attached.

The math favors memberships heavily. In a SHOT Show talk with Dave Sabo of Midwest Shooting Centers, Doug worked through an example. The math favors memberships heavily; Doug compared investing $100,000 in firearm inventory with investing the same amount in memberships. 

“If you put $100,000 in your gun department, it would buy you 205 Glock 19s. If you sold all of them, perfect world, you made like $19,000.” 

He contrasted that with the membership model:

“If you put $100,000 into your membership department and sold 205 memberships, you made $80,000. And the $80,000 is going to come in over and over.”

Doug also explained that recurring membership and training revenue supports retail sales. Customers who visit and shoot more often are more likely to buy ammunition, upgrade their firearms, and purchase accessories such as holsters, eye and ear protection, and range bags. Rental and try-before-you-buy options can also introduce customers to firearms they may later decide to purchase.

Keeping membership revenue consistent requires reliable systems for tracking renewals, payments, and account activity. Manual processes can lead to missed renewals and lost revenue.

Where Gearfire Fits

Gearfire builds the software that runs the revenue side of a range. Gearfire’s shooting range platform handles lane scheduling, memberships, rentals, and retail from one system, so a lapsed membership or an unlogged rental does not slip through. The AXIS point-of-sale system adds built-in firearms compliance, including the electronic 4473 and bound book, and its RangeWorks integration connects online booking, digital waivers, and class registration to your retail counter. Indoor ranges like Iron Sights already run their operation on AXIS.

A few more pieces round out the back end. Firearm-friendly payment processing keeps credit card transactions from getting flagged or dropped by processors that avoid the industry, inventory management keeps ammunition, rentals, and retail stock accurate across the store, and an online store lets you sell gear and ammunition beyond the counter. RetailBI sales data then shows you what is selling and where to adjust. Built for firearms retailers, these tools let a new range owner focus on running a safe environment instead of stitching together generic systems.

The Bottom Line

Opening an indoor shooting range requires a large upfront investment. Plan around $100,000 per lane for the range equipment and ventilation, then add the cost of land, the building, permits, insurance, and other startup expenses. Outdoor ranges cost less to build, but their land requirements, remote locations, and noise concerns can make them harder to operate profitably.

Range Systems works with commercial range owners on facility layouts, bullet traps, lane dividers, target retrieval systems, acoustic materials, and ballistic containment. Gearfire supports the business after opening with tools for memberships, lane scheduling, rentals, classes, firearms compliance, inventory, and point-of-sale management.

Learn more about Range Systems’ shooting range equipment and planning services, and contact Gearfire to discuss the software needed to manage your range.