handload

handload verb: to load (cartridges for firearms) by hand.

Verb

handload (third-person singular simple present handloads, present participle handloading, simple past and past participle handloaded)

(ambitransitive) To load (cartridges for firearms) by hand.
- He handloads his match ammunition. For long range he uses 49½ grains of 4064 powder, the Sierra Match King (boattail) bullet and Government (F.A. [Frankford Arsenal]) primers. How does he get Government primers? He pulls the bullets out of […]1956, Sports Afield, volume 138, page 85
- You need what all of us could do with more of—off-season practice on running targets. That moral thought is all very fine if you live where jack rabbits skitter twelve months a year. The man from Butte or Boise can shoot moving-target rifle practice until he handloads or goes broke. But what of the...1956, Field and Stream, volume 61, page 118
(ambitransitive) To load (a firearm, usually a pistol or rifle) by hand.

Antonyms:

autoload

handload (plural handloads)

A cartridge that is handloaded.
- Factory pressures on these items don't run over 46,000 but your handloads undoubtedly would, and the old action design seems to me a poor bet. If you want to build a 6 mm. single-shot, I'd suggest a Winchester high wall, or the action made by Wilbur Hauck of West Arlington, Vermont. —W.P.1956, [columnist] W.P., Field and Stream, volume 61, page 89

The man from Butte or Boise can shoot moving-target rifle practice until he handloads or goes broke.1956, Field and Stream, volume 61, page 118:
Of course he handloads, and American primers are easier to punch out than the foreign Berdan, a simple cup primer, for the anvil is formed in the case's primer pocket.1958, Henry M. Stebbins, Rifles: A Modern Encyclopedia, Stackpole, page 111:
[…] adequate power for the game in question, and as a matter of course he handloads.1958, Henry M. Stebbins, Rifles: A Modern Encyclopedia, Stackpole, page 348:
He handloads his shells with less powder than factory loads have.1988, John E. Phillips, Outdoor Life: Complete Turkey Hunting, →ISBN, page 208:

Verb
third-person singular present	handloads
present participle	handloading
past participle	handloaded
past	handloaded
Noun
plural	handloads

By surface analysis, hand + load; possibly a back-formation from handloading (noun).

What does handload mean?: Handload means to load (cartridges for firearms) by hand.
How do you use handload in a sentence?: The man from Butte or Boise can shoot moving-target rifle practice until he handloads or goes broke.
What part of speech is handload?: Handload can be a verb or a noun.
What is the past tense of handload?: The past tense of handload is handloaded.

Adapted from Wiktionary: handload (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “handload.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/handload. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.