Maybe you’ve been shooting for a few months, or even a few years at the same draw weight, and now you’re wondering: In archery, when should I increase my draw weight?

The simple answer is: It’s time for an archer to increase their draw weight when:

• Your muscles are able to comfortably shoot your bow for a long time with no fatigue.
• You need to shoot further distances than your current draw weight allows, or…
• Your arrows are consistently falling short of your targets.

For bowhunters, there’s one more rule: If you want to hunt an animal that your current draw weight is too weak to hunt humanely, you should increase your draw weight to have more stopping power.

Most adult beginners will pick up a bow with around a twenty pound draw weight to start with. If you can shoot consistently for a few hours at this weight, you can confidently increase your draw weight. You can increase your draw weight by two pounds at a time, if you’re regularly shooting twice a week. This will give your muscles enough practice and time to become strong enough to control the bow correctly.

Transitioning from a beginner shooting twenty pounds to higher draw weights will take time and practice.

Shooting archery twice a week consistently for a few months is a good idea until you’re able to shoot your bow for at least a half hour with no muscle fatigue. If you’ve been doing this for quite some time now without increasing your draw weight, it might be time that you gave yourself a bit of a challenge and have your bow adjusted if you’re shooting a compound bow.

Just two pounds more draw weight will help you build focus, muscles, and accuracy. Plus, you’ll get a competitive edge when you become comfortable with the increased draw weight.

However, increasing your draw weight too soon can cause fatigue, frustration, and tired muscles, not to mention injuries. The same thing happens when you increase your draw weight too much at once. Both the right amount of time and draw weight are important when you’re thinking about shooting a heavier bow.

Instead of going crazy, only increase your draw weight when you feel sure that you need to, and without straining your muscles too much. Remember, you need to retain complete control over your bow and never let bad archery form become a habit.

Also, if you recently increased your draw weight and feel your muscles straining too much, go back to your original weight and just increase it by one pound more, rather than the usual two pounds of increase.

How Heavy Should My Bow Be?

Your bow should be as heavy as you can safely manage while still being in total control the whole time. This means that during every part of the draw, aim, and follow through, you are in command of your bow and not the other way around.

Many archers struggle with their bow weight. Lots of beginners getting into the sport will start with bows that are just way too heavy for them. This is also true of newer archers that try to increase their draw weight by too much at once. Be sure that you’re not buying gear that’s simply way too heavy for you.

Remember, there’s no rush to increase your draw weight! You’ve got plenty of time, so focus on what you can safely, comfortably and accurately shoot for now.

Lots of people are forced to take a break from archery, after experiencing injuries that come from drawing bows that are just way too heavy. Keep in mind that an injury from shooting too much draw weight can actually take you out of the game! Trying to shoot too heavy a draw weight for you could lead to an injury that actually prevents you from shooting for months at a time.

Increasing Draw Weight is Easier with Compound Bows and Takedown Recurve bows.

One of the benefits of takedown recurve bows and compound bows is how easy / inexpensive it is to increase your draw weight. Unlike other types of bows, where you would have to buy a whole new bow to adjust your draw weight, you only need to buy a new pair of limbs (takedown recurve) or make a simple adjustment (compound bows) to change your draw weight.

Take your compound bow to any archery shop to adjust your bow’s draw weight. The staff there will be able to check the draw weight and tighten the limbs to increase the weight. Usually, one full turn on the limb bolt alters your bow’s draw weight by about two pounds.

Before Deciding on a Draw Weight, Test Your Strength

So you’re in your local archery shop, you’re holding that bow you like and you’re able to bring it to full draw. Before you go for your wallet, hold on a second! Just because you can draw that bow back fully doesn’t mean that’s not too heavy for you.

It’s one thing to bring a bow back to full draw once. Now try doing it over and over again for a half hour, an hour or more, as you would be when you’re out there actually shooting. If, after drawing a bow back for any length of time, you find that you’re straining or your muscles are shaking trying to keep the bow at full draw – you’re overbowed.

Unique challenges are involved in archery, including shooting in different positions, holding at full draw, muscle fatigue, among many others. Things like that make aiming and drawing a bow a lot harder than most people think.

For those reasons, you should adequately test your strength first, before you increase your draw weight.

A simple test is to use one smooth motion to pull your bow straight back. How easy / hard is it for you to perform this action smoothly? Another test is to pull back to full draw and hold the bow for a minute or two. How long can you comfortably do this? Are you able to hold steady and aim, or are your muscles convulsing and causing your aim to go all over the place?

Stronger Archery Muscles Make All the Difference

Simply put, you will need stronger muscles in order to shoot at increased draw weights. This means frequently shooting your bow to build up your strength. One great way to increase your strength is to shoot a target just a few yards from you.

This way, you get to shoot tons of arrows, retrieve them and start shooting again quickly. This type of drill will give you the most practice in the shortest amount of time. Try to perform this drill several time a week for best results.

You can also use an archery training device or one of these to help strengthen those muscles for archery. Simply pull all the way back as you would with your bow at full draw and hole this posture for as long as you can. Repeat several times a day. You should also be sure to workout all of your archery muscles:

The shoulders, upper back muscles and the rotator cuff muscle group are the most important. Try to focus your workout specifically on these muscle groups.

A Heavier Bow Gives You an Advantage… Sometimes.

You want your bow to be as heavy as you can safely manage. Try to think of it like throwing lawn darts. If you’ve ever seen someone throw them, they tend to throw upwards and out diagonally at the same time.

When the lawn dart falls and lands, it flies straight down in a line at the ground. That is similar to shooting a light weight bow at a far away target, you’ll have to aim way above the target in order to get the arrow to actually land where you want it to.

While it can be possible to shoot accurately this way, it simply makes way more sense to shoot the arrow from a bow with more power, propelling it directly at the target. Not only will the arrow travel faster and more accurately, it will have more stopping power behind it as well. And the only way to do this is with a bow with more draw weight.

If you attempt to increase the shooting distance but you’re still shooting a lighter weight bow, your shots will fall short, be very inaccurate, or both. Shooting at distances that are just to far away for your draw weight will tend to also cause bad shooting form and stance, another reason to avoid doing so.

Again, the more in shape your primary muscles are, the better archer you’ll be. Strength and stamina are big parts of the game when it comes to archery tournaments and other forms of competitive archery. Hitting the gym and doing some weightlifting that specifically targets the muscles that you use in archery wouldn’t hurt at all!

Increasing your draw weight takes time, practice, and stamina. The more you can increase your overall strength and stamina, the better your archery skills become. If you are comfortable handling your bow’s weight at the moment, you might want to increase it by just one pound of draw weight if you have the option.

Don’t Rush It!

Nothing will tank your game quite like being over bowed. It means that you can’t control your bow, your accuracy will drop, you’ll be practicing bad form and you could possibly even injure yourself. You should never be shooting any bow (yours or anyone else’s) unless you feel that you are in complete control of both the bow and the shot. Safety first, in every aspect of archery.

Building Your Strength – Slowly But Surely

Archery becomes more fun when your shots get to be consistently more accurate. And your accuracy will increase when you comfortably increase your bow’s draw weight. Small upticks in your draw weight will pay off over time.

It can sometimes feel intimidating to build strength, yet just a few simple exercises at home can yield great results. For example, push-ups will build strength and won’t require any equipment. You can start with a set of five a day and then work up to ten, then twenty and so on.

The same can be said for pull-ups. The largest muscle in the upper body is the latissimus dorsi, and pull ups are ideal for tightening and building this muscle.

It’s one of the primary muscles used in archery, so it’s obviously a pretty good idea to build it up as efficiently as possible! Plus it’s pretty cheap and easy to get started, as a pull up bar like this one is all you need to get you going.

It can sometimes feel overwhelming to start a workout that builds real strength. Keep in mind that there’s no rush… you’ve got all the time in the world. So don’t start by setting goals that are too high at first, which might just make you give up altogether.

Instead, set smaller, reasonable milestones to work towards, and congratulate yourself when you reach them. Over time you’ll start to see great improvements in your archery skills. You might just like the overall look of your body more too!

And finally, one last thing. Since we’ve covered when to increase draw weight, how to know if and when you should as well as how to go about doing so, there’s one more thing I haven’t mentioned.

You might want to consider not increasing your draw weight at all. Yup, I said it…

Think about it, if you’re comfortable and in control of your bow, and your shots have enough speed, distance and stopping power, while your accuracy is on point – you may want to keep shooting the draw weight that you’re at right now.

As I said before, the main reasons that you would want to increase your draw weight are if you’re falling short in any of the above factors. If you’re doing great at your current draw weight, there may be no real reason to increase it at all. After all, increasing your draw weight when there’s no real reason to might cause more problems than it fixes.

So consider all your options, and hopefully I’ve helped you figure out if you need to increase your draw weight or not. Whatever you do, be safe, good luck and get shooting!