While our country dedicated virtually every resource at her disposal to winning WWII, Vernon Speer still saw a need to supply hunters with high quality component bullets. This made perfect sense: Every deer an American ate meant that much more food available to our heroes on the frontlines. Decades later, Mr. Speer’s company remains devoted to giving shooters the best solutions for target practice, hunting, and personal protection. Gold Dot is Speer’s flagship line of factory loaded self-defense ammo. Hailed as the nation’s number one choice for law enforcement ammunition, Gold Dot is trusted by thousands of prestigious agencies. Those agencies include the New York Police Department, the Pennsylvania State Police, and the California Highway Patrol.

Gold Dot Hollow Point

Close-up view of hollow point bullets used for self-defense Speer’s Gold Dot bullet is a remarkable little feat of engineering. In order to effectively neutralize a target, a bullet must fly straight, penetrate deeply, and expand reliably. To appreciate how well the Gold Dot hollow point bullet accomplishes these first two tasks, it’s important to understand Speer’s proprietary Uni-Cor process. A Gold Dot bullet starts out as a pressure-formed, alloyed lead core. Its weight is uniformly distributed. This gives it superior stability as it rotates in flight, and the addition of strengthening metals to lead grants it that much greater ability to remain intact as it plows through a target. With the bullet core cast, Speer then treats it with their Uni-Cor process. The electrochemical process creates the Gold Dot’s jacket one single molecule at a time, and is indeed the first bonding process ever used to create a handgun bullet.

The benefits of the Uni-Cor bonding process are two-fold:
  1. The jacket is virtually perfectly concentric. It possesses no deviation in its weight distribution that could cause it to spin off course.
  2. The jacket is virtually inseparable from its core. This enables the two components to stay firmly rooted together as they penetrate barrier and target alike.

Because the Gold Dot does not shed its weight as it penetrates thick fabric, wallboard, plywood, sheet metal, and especially soft tissue, the bullet retains the momentum it needs to reliably arrive at its target’s vital organs. As the Gold Dot tunnels through the target, its exactingly engineered hollow point nose cavity begins to go to work. Whereas a lesser bullet’s nose cavity is merely drilled into its tip, a Gold Dot’s is created via a series of precision die presses. The first stage programs the Gold Dot to expand to a uniform width; The second stage programs the Gold Dot to expand at a uniform rate. In this fashion Speer’s engineers are able to fine-tune a Gold Dot to best perform according to its caliber’s terminal ballistic performance.

The Gold Dot G2

Gold Dots vs. Speer G2

Speer G2 ammunition box Never one to become complacent, Speer further revolutionized the Gold Dot with the recent introduction of their G2 bullet. Instead of a conventional hollow point nose cavity, the G2’s tip features a shallow dish filled with elastic polymer. When the G2 connects with its target, that supple material is forced down into the symmetrical, internal fissures within the bullet’s structural-plated core. This causes the G2 to fan out in an extremely uniform fashion. That helps deliver a catastrophic wound channel in the process.

Gold Dot vs. G2 ammunition

Notice the polymer filling inside the hollow point bullet of the G2 ammunition on the right.

The G2 still features an alloyed lead core and electrochemically bonded jacket, and as such offers the same superior accuracy, barrier penetration, and weight retention that have made its predecessor so famous.

The Gold Dot Soft Point

You can also find the Gold Dot available in rifle cartridges. The Gold Dot soft point takes the classic hunting bullet’s proven design and improves upon it with the addition of an electrochemically bonded jacket. So strong a jacket ensures that the soft point bullet will conquer a variety of common urban barriers with ease, remain composed as it enters its target, and avoid tearing apart as its exposed core commences rapid, catastrophic terminal expansion.

The Gold Dot Cartridge

Shooting Speer Gold Dot ammo into ballistic gel at a shooting range To create so technologically an advanced bullet and deprive it of superlative supporting components would be a serious misstep on Speer’s part. That is why Speer cuts no corners when it comes to giving their Gold Dot bullet the shell casing, primer, and propellant it needs to perform at its peak potential. A Gold Dot cartridge features a new production brass shell casing. They manufacture that casing to tight tolerances and it’s supple enough for repeated reloadability.

The casing is nickel plated, which conveys three primary benefits:

  1. Less metal-on-metal friction to promote more reliable feeding and extraction in a semi-automatic firearm
  2. Improved resistance to corrosion from humidity
  3. Greater visibility during a chamber check in environments with poor lighting

Speer loads a consistent charge of clean burning propellant into every Gold Dot cartridge. Why does it matter? Consistent propellant ensures that each and every shot delivers the same recoil, chamber pressure, and ballistic performance. Speer exclusively loads their G2 ammunition with CCI’s non-corrosive Boxer primers to guarantee reliable ignition when a failure to fire could spell certain disaster.

Speer’s Gold Dot bullets are available in a variety of America’s favorite cartridges for self-defense, including 9mm, 38 Special +P, 380 ACP, 357 Magnum, 40 S&W, and 45 ACP, as well as 223 Rem, 300 AAC Blackout, and 308 Win. And because the Gold Dot Short Barrel label is specially designed to best serve a compact weapon, so you can count on superior performance no matter the weapon you would entrust your personal safety to.

Where to Buy Speer Gold Dot Ammo

where to buy speer gold dot ammo

We carry the full line-up of Speer Gold Dot ammo at AmmoForSale.com. Click the banner above or see below to see all the loads Speer makes and we carry. You’ll get good prices and fast shipping when you order from our friendly crew at AFS!

22 WMR Gold Dots

9mm Gold Dot Options

38 Special Gold Dot Ammo Options

40 S&W Gold Dot Ammo Options

45 ACP Speer Gold Dot Options

357 Magnum Speer Gold Dot Ammo

44 Magnum Gold Dot Ammo