9×18 Makarov Ammo (2026): Who Still Makes It, What It Costs and What Not to Buy

Last updated October 2026

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Yes, 9×18 Makarov ammo is still made, and it’s listed online. Sellier & Bellot, PPU, Fiocchi, Winchester and Hornady all had 9×18 Makarov ammo at the dealers our price cards searched on October 2, 2026, with full metal jacket boxes of 50 from $18.99.

That’s 38 cents a round for brass-case practice ammo. What stopped is the supply of cheap Russian steel-case ammo, and one dated government action explains why.

The trap with 9×18 Makarov ammo is the name. A listing that says 9×18 can be the German 9×18 Ultra, a box that says 9mm can be 9mm Luger, and .380 ACP fits well enough to fire. None of them belongs in a Makarov.

This guide covers who still makes 9×18 Makarov ammo, what it costs per round, which boxes not to buy, and what +P means on this cartridge. New to buying online? Our ammo buying guide covers the basics.

9×18 Makarov at a Glance

The 9×18 Makarov is a straight-walled rimless pistol cartridge adopted by the Soviet Union in 1951, firing a 95-grain bullet of .365 inch at about 1,000 fps. SAAMI limits it to 24,100 psi, between the .380 ACP and the 9mm Luger.

9×18 Makarov Ammo: The Good and the Bad

At least eight makers listed 9×18 Makarov ammo on their own sites in October 2026, and brass-case full metal jacket started at $18.99 for 50 rounds at our dealers. The bad news is how easy it is to buy the wrong 9mm.

Table of Contents

Who Still Makes 9×18 Makarov Ammo in 2026

Eight makers had a current 9×18 Makarov listing on their own sites on October 2, 2026: Sellier & Bellot, PPU, Fiocchi, Winchester, Geco, Hornady, Underwood and Buffalo Bore. Their loads run from 1,000 to 1,125 fps with bullets of 93 to 115 grains.

Is 9×18 Makarov ammo still made? Yes, by European and American makers. The table gives each maker’s own figures, with the test barrel length beside every muzzle velocity where the maker states one.

Barrel length differs by maker, so read that column before you compare. Geco’s figure comes from a 6-inch barrel that no Makarov pistol has, while Hornady tests in a 4-inch barrel and Buffalo Bore adds figures from real pistols.

Bullet weight is the easy part. Nearly every load carries a 92 to 95-grain bullet, and the heavy exception is Buffalo Bore’s 115-grain hard cast. Sellier & Bellot, PPU, Fiocchi and Winchester all sell brass-case practice loads.

Winchester and Geco pack their 9×18 Makarov ammo for sale in boxes of 50, and Hornady packs its 95-grain FTX load in boxes of 25.

Who makes 9mm Makarov ammo?

The same companies, because 9mm Makarov ammo and 9×18 Makarov ammo are the same thing. SAAMI accepts both names. We found no current listing on the maker’s own site for a Federal, Speer, Norma, Magtech or Igman load.

Fiocchi needs a second look. It sells two loads in the same Heritage line: the 95-grain 9MAK, which is Makarov ammunition, and a 100-grain 9X18 Ultra, which is not. More on that below.

What Happened to the Cheap Russian Ammo

A State Department measure announced on August 20, 2021 put new and pending import permits for Russian-made ammunition, 9×18 Makarov included, under a policy of denial from September 7, 2021. That one action, and not a factory closure, is why new Russian steel-case ammunition stopped coming in.

The State Department fact sheet puts it in one sentence: “New and pending permit applications for the permanent importation of firearms and ammunition manufactured or located in Russia will be subject to a policy of denial.”

So it’s a freeze on new permits, not a recall, and Treasury’s guidance describes it the same way. American Rifleman’s report said at the time that existing permits were not canceled, and named the brands affected as “Tula, Barnaul, Brown Bear and Silver Bear, among others.” Shooting Industry reported that one importer’s approved permits would let it “continue importing BarnauL products for up to 24 months.”

The plants were sanctioned later. Commerce put Tula Cartridge Works on its Entity List in May 2023, Treasury listed it that July, and a State Department action dated December 12, 2023 added the Barnaul Cartridge Plant.

For scale, a Firing Line poster in 2005 called the round “Common as grass. Any gun shop will have 9×18.” Another quoted a store price in the same thread: “They have 50 rounds of wolf FMJ for $6.49.”

That’s 13 cents a round. Brass-case ammo costs three times that today.

Our live cards still showed Silver Bear and Tula steel-case boxes at two dealers on October 2, at 44 to 50 cents a round. We’d treat those as the last of it and plan around brass.

What 9×18 Makarov Ammo Costs in 2026

Prices for 9×18 Makarov ammo ran from $0.38 a round for Sellier & Bellot full metal jacket in boxes of 50 to $1.90 a round for Buffalo Bore on October 2, 2026, with Hornady Critical Defense from $1.24 a round.

One thing is different on this page. The practice loads come from our dealers’ live feeds and aren’t in our stored catalog, so the first card fills in when the page loads in your browser. Its headline is the trusted-dealer price, $22.99 on October 2, with the $18.99 row in the list under it.

The same goes for the other cards: each leads with a dealer we trust, so a headline can sit above the lowest row in the table below. Prices move, and so does what’s listed.

Three rows in the dealer feeds can fool you. One is that Fiocchi Ultra box, which turned up under a plain Makarov search with the words run together as 9x18mmUltra. Another is a 1,000-round case at $326.99, a bulk price of 33 cents a round that reads like a box price until you see the count.

The third is a 9mm Luger row. A search for one maker’s 9mm Makarov load returned its 115-grain 9mm Luger box as the top result, at $19.69. The cards on this page filter all three out.

Is 9×18 Makarov ammo hard to find? Online, no: about 45 listings turned up across the dealers we searched. On a local shelf it’s another story, and owners on the forums say so. Our ammo price report tracks the common calibers for comparison.

The Trap: 9×18 Ultra vs 9×18 Makarov, .380 and 9mm Luger

Four cartridges get confused here, and the 9×18 Makarov’s .365-inch bullet is the odd one out: the 9×18 Ultra, the .380 ACP and the 9mm Luger all use bullets of about .355 inch. Nothing in this group interchanges.

Why do the numbers collide? The Soviet 9 mm is a bore measurement. SAAMI’s drawing gives a bore of .3543 inch, which is 9.00 mm, and a groove of .365. The bullet is groove size, so a 9mm Makarov bullet is wider than the other three.

9×18 Ultra vs 9×18 Makarov

The 9×18 Ultra is a German cartridge with nearly the same case length and a smaller bullet. Firearms News states it plainly: “The 9x18mm Ultra uses a .355-inch bullet, while the 9x18mm Makarov uses a .365-inch bullet.” C.I.P. even files the Ultra under the bare name 9 x 18.

The Ultra was developed in 1936 for the Luftwaffe and not adopted, and Walther revived it in the Walther PP Super in the early 1970s. A Walther PP Super takes the Ultra, so its ammunition is not Makarov ammunition.

This is the wrong box people really do buy. On the Gunboards forum one owner’s first Makarov came with a box of Fiocchi 9×18 Police that the shop had labeled as Makarov ammunition, and another got one from a gunsmith. In our own stored catalog, 6 of 21 loaded rows for this caliber are Fiocchi Ultra.

SAAMI’s unsafe-combinations sheet doesn’t cover the Ultra at all, since SAAMI has no standard for it. The dimensions do the talking: an undersize bullet in a wider barrel. The box has to say Makarov. 9×18 alone isn’t enough.

9×18 Makarov vs 380

The .380 ACP is a millimeter shorter and uses a narrower bullet, and it will chamber in a Makarov. Don’t fire it: SAAMI lists 380 Automatic among the cartridges not to use in a 9×18 Makarov chamber.

One High Road poster summed it up: “It works, but it’s NOT safe. The .380 won’t headspace correctly in a 9×18 chamber.” The 9×18 Makarov vs 380 question has one answer for a buyer. They’re two cartridges for two sets of guns.

SAAMI’s sheet has no row for .380 chambers, but a .365 bullet has no business in a .355 barrel.

9×18 Makarov vs 9mm Luger

9×18 Makarov vs 9mm Luger is the most-asked question on this cartridge, and the answer is no in both directions. SAAMI lists 9mm Luger as unsafe in a Makarov chamber and 9×18 Makarov as unsafe in a 9mm Luger chamber.

Barnaul prints the warning on its own product page: “The 9×18 Makarov is not the same as 9×19 Luger. Do not mix!” A Luger round is also longer, at up to 1.169 inches against .984.

The 9mm Luger also goes by 9mm Parabellum and 9x19mm, and none of those names means Makarov. SAAMI’s sheet for 9mm Luger chambers lists 9×18 Makarov beside 9mm NATO and 40 S&W as cartridges not to use. Our Makarov pistol guide covers the guns, and our best 9mm ammo guide covers the Luger round.

The Standard: 24,100 psi and No +P

SAAMI limits the 9×18 Makarov to a maximum average pressure of 24,100 psi by transducer, with a 95-grain bullet at 1,000 fps from the test barrel. There is no crusher figure and no +P entry for this cartridge.

One popular reference says SAAMI has no pressure specification for the round. It does. The SAAMI standard carries the row, a proof load and a drawing issued in 1993.

So the Makarov sits a little above the .380 and far below the 9mm Luger. For scale, SAAMI’s limit for the .38 Special is 17,000 psi, well under the 24,100 psi it sets for the 9×18 Makarov.

Europe’s C.I.P. sheet for the 9 mm Makarov gives 1,600 bar by transducer. It’s a different test from SAAMI’s, so don’t convert one into the other.

What +P means on a 9×18 box

SAAMI defines +P as ammunition loaded to a higher pressure and marked +P on the case headstamp, and it lists that grade for the 9mm Luger but not for the 9×18 Makarov. On a Makarov box, +P is the maker’s own label.

Max Popenker’s cartridge table also lists a Cor-Bon jacketed hollow point marked +P among the commercial loads for this round.

Buffalo Bore sells two loads it calls +P. Its pages state no pressure, name no pistol as suitable or unsuitable, and give no recoil spring advice. What the maker does say is that its 95-grain load is “roughly 200 fps faster than normal ball 95gr. Makarov ammo.”

It also says this: “We noted no accelerated wear from the use of +P loads in our test pistols, although common sense suggests that any +P ammo will wear any pistol at a faster rate than weaker ammo.” Its test pistols were an East German Makarov and a CZ 82.

Which Ammo for Which Pistol

No maker we read approves or rules out any named 9×18 pistol for a load hotter than the 24,100 psi standard, and the 2 pistol manuals we found call for standard factory ammunition. What separates the guns is weight, frame material and what their owners have learned.

The owners’ rule for the P-64 and the PA-63 is forum consensus. In the threads we read, posters on Gunboards, The High Road and AR15.com said to keep hot loads out of those two pistols. One PA-63 owner put the reason this way: “the frame and slide do get battered more than most.”

The CZ 82 is the one common 9×18 pistol with a polygonal bore. CZ’s own manual lists the 9 mm Makarov barrel as polygonal, while American Rifleman’s Makarov history describes the Makarov’s barrel as having “four grooves with a right-hand twist.” That matters only if you shoot cast bullets, and CZ’s manual doesn’t address them.

And the Russian high-impulse round? It exists, and sources put it at roughly 1,350 to 1,380 fps. Max Popenker writes that it “was never adopted for safety reasons.” It was made for the PMM, and we found nobody selling it here.

Steel Case, Magnets and Corrosive Surplus

Steel-case 9×18 Makarov loads carry bimetal jackets and Berdan primers by a 2025 archive copy of Wolf’s own table, which lists a 92-grain load at 1,033 fps and a 94-grain load at 1,014 fps.

Brass-case loads are Boxer primed by their sellers’ descriptions, and only Underwood says the rest on its own page: “new production, non-corrosive, in boxer primed, reloadable brass cases.”

Bimetal bullets and steel cases stick to a magnet. Some indoor ranges check for that, so carry a magnet and ask before you unpack. Soviet service ammunition went further: Popenker writes that its bullet core was partly mild steel.

Is surplus 9×18 corrosive? Some of it was. Leroy Thompson wrote in Firearms News, “In the early days of my Makarov shooting, the only ammo I could get was corrosive.” Our sources don’t document which lots, so treat any military surplus as corrosive unless the seller documents otherwise, and clean the same day.

If an old round clicks and doesn’t fire, keep the muzzle downrange and wait. The NRA’s range safety guidance says at least 60 seconds before you open the action. And if a shot sounds weak, stop and check the bore for a stuck bullet before you fire again.

Best 9×18 Makarov Ammo for Self Defense

Owners split on the best 9×18 Makarov ammo for self defense: in a 2008 poll of 68 owners, 38 picked Hornady’s 95-grain XTP hollow point, and at least 14 forum posters chose full metal jacket.

That Hornady load has moved on. Shooting Illustrated notes that Hornady has offered XTP loads in this caliber, and we found no current XTP listing on Hornady’s own site. Critical Defense is what it sells now.

Both camps have a case. Hornady lists Critical Defense at 1,000 fps and 211 foot-pounds from a 4-inch barrel, and it carries no +P label.

The case for ball is expansion. Buffalo Bore says it outright: “I am not a fan of using expanding bullets for self-defense in smaller less powerful cartridges like the 9X18 or the 380 Auto.” That’s the reason it sells a 115-grain hard cast load.

For home defense and concealed carry the same choice holds, and one Gun Digest writer carries Hornady’s FTX load in this caliber. Recoil matters more than it sounds. A P-64 is a snappy little gun with any load, so pick the round you’ll practice with. Our best defensive ammo guide covers the other calibers.

9×18 Makarov Ballistics, and How It Compares to .380 and 9mm

Hornady lists its 9×18 Makarov load at a muzzle velocity of 1,000 fps and a muzzle energy of 211 foot-pounds, against 200 foot-pounds for its .380 load and 329 for its 9mm Luger load, all from 4-inch test barrels.

Is 9×18 Makarov more powerful than .380? A little. On Hornady’s own pages the gap is 11 foot-pounds, and Sellier & Bellot’s figures put it at about 15 percent. The 9mm Luger is in a different class, with half again as much energy or more.

Stopping power claims for the 9×18 Makarov need a source, and Hornady’s own pages give energy only. We found no citable terminal test for this cartridge, so this page ranks no load by stopping power.

That’s 9×18 Makarov ballistics in one line. Gun Digest’s Cartridges of the World entry calls the round “intermediate in size and power between the .380 Automatic and the 9mm Luger” and “A solid self-defense cartridge, though a little underpowered.”

Athlon says most shooters accept it as the most powerful practical round for a compact blowback pistol. Our best .380 pistols roundup covers the guns on the lighter side of it.

9×18 Makarov Myths vs. the Truth

The 9×18 Makarov ammo myth that costs buyers most is that it’s no longer made: eight makers list it and brass-case boxes started at $18.99 on October 2, 2026. Here are the others.

Our Range Notes: Five Loads in a Makarov, a CZ 82 and a P-64

We shot five factory loads through a Bulgarian Makarov, a CZ 82 and a Polish P-64. That was 400 rounds of 9×18 Makarov ammo over two September afternoons, in ten-shot strings over a Garmin Xero C1 chronograph.

Groups were the best of three five-shot groups from a rest. Of the four standard loads, only the Fiocchi beat its listed figure, and it was a fireball next to the others. The Sellier & Bellot ran about 70 fps under its number, which no steel plate will ever notice.

We kept the Buffalo Bore out of the P-64. No maker tells you to, but its own test guns were a Makarov and a CZ 82, and those are the two we fired it in. The CZ gave it 1,181 fps, close to the 1,192 the maker reports from the same model.

The P-64 left a faint bulge near the base of the fired PPU and Fiocchi cases. None split. And every box passed the magnet test, which is what you’d expect of brass cases and copper jackets, though it’s worth ten seconds before an indoor session.

A Short History of the 9×18 Makarov

Boris Semin is credited with the 9×18 Makarov cartridge, which Gun Digest dates to 1946, and the Soviet armed forces adopted it in 1951 with Nikolay Makarov’s PM pistol. The PM served until about 1991, which makes this the Soviet pistol round of the Cold War.

The cartridge spread across the Eastern Bloc as Warsaw Pact armies took it up from the 1960s on. Poland adopted the P-64 in 1965, Hungary used the PA-63 from 1963, and Czechoslovakia’s vz. 82 entered service in 1983. The round is commonly said to descend from the German Ultra of 1936, but American Rifleman says that link “has not been documented.”

Americans met it through imports. Small Arms Review reported in 1999 that the first Makarovs to reach the United States in quantity were Chinese Norinco pistols, with Russian, East German, Hungarian, Bulgarian and Polish guns following. Our military surplus pistols roundup and our 7.62×25 Tokarev ammo guide cover the other Soviet pistol round.

A Note on Reloading

New 9×18 Makarov brass exists and takes a small pistol primer, but the bullet diameter is the catch: SAAMI’s drawing calls for .364 to .365 inch, and ordinary 9mm bullets at .355 are undersize for the groove.

Starline sells the cases, and Speer lists a 95-grain component bullet made for this cartridge. Cartridges of the World notes that components for the round are available from various manufacturers. Steel-case Berdan-primed empties aren’t practical to reload, and the P-64 importer’s manual tells owners not to use handloads at all.

We don’t publish load data on this page. Use a current manual from a bullet or powder maker, and start with our beginner’s guide to reloading if you’re new to it.

Bottom Line: Which 9×18 Makarov Ammo to Buy

For most owners the 9×18 Makarov ammo to buy is a 50-round box of brass-case 95-grain full metal jacket, which cost $0.38 to $0.58 a round from Sellier & Bellot and Fiocchi at our dealers on October 2, 2026. The gun and the job decide the rest.

• For range days with a Makarov or a CZ 82: Sellier & Bellot, PPU or Fiocchi brass-case full metal jacket by the case.
• For a P-64 or a PA-63: the same standard 95-grain loads. Owners keep the hot loads out of both.
• For self defense and concealed carry: Hornady Critical Defense, or full metal jacket if you side with the ball camp. Buffalo Bore argues against expanding bullets in a cartridge this small, which is the reason it sells a hard cast load.
• For steel case: it’s magnetic, so ask before you shoot it at an indoor range.
• For military surplus: treat it as corrosive unless the seller documents otherwise.
• For anything marked Ultra or Police: leave it. It’s a different cartridge.

If you’re shopping for the pistol too, our C&R guns guide covers how these surplus imports are sold.

We’ve done the same job for other old calibers: the 8mm Mauser ammo guide, the .30-40 Krag ammo guide, the .32-20 ammo guide, the .303 British ammo guide, the .44-40 ammo guide and the .45 Colt ammo guide.

Lead image: composite based on a photo of a CZ 82 by Asams10 and a photo of a 9×18 Makarov cartridge by Joymaster, both public domain, from Wikimedia Commons.

9×18 Makarov Ammo FAQ