Winchester introduced the .218 Bee in 1938 for lever guns, it was outrun by the .222 within twenty years, and it has been quietly beloved ever since by people who own one.
There is one factory load left.
The load
| Brand | Load | Grain | Bullet | BC | Test barrel | Muzzle | 200 yd | 300 yd | Muzzle energy | 300 yd energy | Drop at 300 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hornady | Custom | 45 | HP | 0.108 | 24” | 2,750 | 1,362 | 1,019 | 756 | 104 | -23.2” |
| Winchester | Super-X † | 46 | Hollow Point | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
What it does
Inside 150 yards it is a lovely little cartridge and past 200 it falls apart, and the published figures are blunt about it.
At 200 yards the 45 grain is already subsonic-adjacent at 1,362 feet per second and down to 185 foot-pounds. At 300 it is doing 1,019 feet per second — below the speed of sound — carrying 104 foot-pounds, and sitting 23 inches below the line of sight. At 500 the drop is 182 inches, which is fifteen feet.
That is a 0.108 ballistic coefficient, the lowest number on this site, doing exactly what a low BC does.
For coyotes: a hundred yards, maybe a hundred and fifty, and only with a bullet placed properly. It is in the same honest bracket as the .22 Hornet, which has a fractionally better bullet and considerably more ammunition available.
Nobody should buy a rifle in .218 Bee to hunt coyotes. People should absolutely keep shooting the ones they have, which is why this page exists — a cartridge with one surviving factory load is exactly the thing that vanishes from comparison charts, and then you cannot find out what your ammunition does.
Notes on the data
The figures are Hornady’s published ones, from a 24 inch test barrel at a 200 yard zero. Source: Hornady 218 Bee 45 gr HP, item #8307, in the Custom line.
† Winchester’s Super-X 46 grain has been the other traditional load and is not currently listed by Winchester. If you find it, it is old stock rather than current production.
† marks a load that exists and whose published figures are not yet on this table. The rows are here so the list is honest about being incomplete rather than looking finished.
Know a load that should be here? Tell me and I will add it. And check your state’s rules before you go — several states set a minimum caliber for predators, and several prohibit rimfire outright.