Shop for Browning A5 Hunter online at GunBroker.com

The Browning A5 Hunter 4+1 12-gauge is part of Browning’s short-recoil operated autoloader A5 shotgun series. The modern A5s share beneficial branding and name recognition with their original A5 – that’s short for Automatic 1905 - namesake from a century earlier designed by John Browning himself. But the new A5s are the result of repeated tweaks and upgrades that make them very, very different.

There are six variants, all 12-gauge. You can get 26”, 28” and 30” barreled guns in 3” or 3 ½” chambers. All have a 14 ¼” length of pull, and a 1 ¾” drop at comb that drops down to a 2” drop at heel. The first two are 47 5/8” overall. The 28” guns are 49 5/8” long while the 30” guns are 51 5/8” long. The guns weigh 6 pounds 11 ounces for the 26” barrel and then step up in two-ounce increments from there.

The Grade I Turkish walnut has an excellent 18 LPI (lines per inch) cut checkering on the forend and stock. The checkering sits in trapezoidal stylized pennants. The result is effective, comfortable and reassuring.

The primary metal components are blued. The barrel has a lengthened Vector Pro forcing cone between the bore and chrome-plated chamber and interchangeable Invector-DS chokes. These DS (Double Seal) chokes have a gas and grit-sealing brass band at their base. These are the upper end of the choke tube sets Browning offers. They are the longest chokes but they actually thread into the muzzle front instead of at the back like the short Standard Invector and medium-length Invector-Plus tubes. The longer the tube, the longer the taper, and thus the less shot deformation and greater accuracy. The DS tubes are lighter and thinner and require less barrel reinforcement. The A5 Hunter comes with three flush tubes (Full, Modified, Improved Cylinder), but there a total of seven choices in flush and extended styles. A cool detail is that Browning has engraved which chokes their guns are compatible with on the barrels and the receiver’s monoblocks.

The result of all this hard development and years of experience is what Browning calls the planet’s “most reliable, fastest cycling, best performing and softest shooting recoil-operated” autoloader shotgun. Browning backs its reliability claims with a compelling 100,000 round or five-year guarantee.

A5 bolts are hard chrome plated. The rest of the bolt carrier group is nickel Teflon coated for a durable protective coating. A5s feature an oversized bolt latch in front of the trigger guard, right where you want it. The trigger guard is also oversized so you can operate the gun while wearing gloves. And within is a gold-plated trigger.

The new A5 range’s visual signature is its characteristic raised rear lightweight aluminum alloy receiver everyone calls a humpback, just like in the original ones. Its long sight line makes for easy sighting and leads to an ivory mid-bead and a red fiber optic front bead sight on a 1/4" width vent rib. But one of the many upgrades in this modern gun is the versatile, all-weather, recoil-operated Kinematic Drive System.

A5s have tube magazines and can handle various ammunition down to one-ounce loads without requiring adjustments. Cleverly designed venting outlets evacuate gases from the barrel and keep parts cleaner and operating more smoothly than they might otherwise.

The A5 Speed Unload feature easily empties shells all at a touch. The butt stock is straight with .25” and .5” stock spacers for length of pull adjustments that can be combined for a total .75” length of pull adjustment. In back is an Inflex recoil pad that Browning uses with quite a few models. They’re highly absorbent and direct felt recoil forces down instead of straight back.

Do you have a Browning A5 Hunter for sale? click here.