Types of Arrows: Five Materials, Every Diameter, Matched to Your Bow

Arrows come in five shaft materials: carbon, aluminum, alloy-carbon (an aluminum core wrapped in carbon), wood and fiberglass. Carbon is the default for most compound and recurve shooters, aluminum is the consistent, forgiving choice for new and indoor archers, alloy-carbon is the Olympic target shaft, wood is the traditional choice, and fiberglass belongs on youth sets and bowfishing rigs.

Material is only one of three ways to sort them. Diameter runs from about 5 mm micro shafts for wind and penetration up to the 9.3 mm World Archery limit for indoor line-cutting, and the job decides the tip and fletching: field points for practice, broadheads for big game, blunts for small game, barbed points on a heavy fiberglass shaft for fish.

• +3 to 4
  points per 60 arrows from a 9.1 mm aluminum over a 6.7 mm carbon on a 40 cm face, same group (modeled)
• 10.1 gpi
  an 11/32 Port Orford cedar shaft, modeled from wood density: heavier than an X10 at 6.7
• ~1,450 gr
  a listed fiberglass fish arrow, over four times a 317 gr target arrow

The question that keeps coming back on ArcheryTalk is some version of wood or carbon arrows for a recurve, a thread started in 2015 that was still getting answers in 2023. One reply sums up the aluminum case: woods are a bit more labor intensive and less accurate than aluminum. Another owner with an ILF recurve ruled wood out on safety. Those are opinions, so I put numbers next to them: published shaft charts, my speed and FOC engines, and a scoring model for diameter.

What Are the Main Types of Arrows?

Five shaft materials cover almost everything sold in the US. The table sorts them by what actually changes on the bow: weight per inch, diameter, and how each one fails. For individual carbon and alloy-carbon models, the Arrow Comparison Engine lines up each maker's published GPI and diameter spine by spine.

Swipe the table sideways to see every column.

Weights and diameters from Easton's X10, Sonic 6.0 and 5mm Axis charts, my XX75 aluminum spine chart, a cedar shaft modeled from wood density, and a retail listing for a fiberglass fish arrow (both explained below).

What Are the Parts of an Arrow?

Six, counting the two that are easy to forget. Every type of arrow above uses the same layout; only wood skips the insert because the point glues straight onto a tapered shaft.

Each part has its own guide on the site: fletching types and feathers vs vanes, nock sizes, insert glue and broadheads.

Does Arrow Diameter Matter?

Yes, and in opposite directions depending on what you shoot. A slim shaft drifts less in wind and drags less through an animal. A fat shaft touches more scoring lines. Here's the spread, to scale.

Target archery sets the ceiling. World Archery's rulebook says the maximum diameter of arrow shafts shall not exceed 9.3 mm, and points may not exceed 9.4 mm. Indoors, where there's no wind and every line counts, archers shoot as close to that limit as they can, because an arrow that touches the line scores the higher ring.

How Many Points Does a Fat Indoor Arrow Buy?

About 3 to 4 per 60 arrows. I wanted a number instead of “fat arrows catch lines,” so I modeled it: one archer's group as a round normal spread on a 40 cm, 10-ring face, scored with the line-cutter rule, sized so a 6.7 mm shaft averages 9.5, 9.0, 8.0 or 7.0 an arrow. Then I swapped only the shaft diameter.

Modeled, expected score per 60 arrows. All rows are in the types of arrows data (CSV).

Three or four points won't turn a 480 shooter into a 540 shooter; tighter groups do that. But in a close match it's free, which is why indoor shooters reach for 2315-class aluminum and fat carbon shafts. Outdoors, flip it: the slimmest shaft your spine allows, because wind drift grows with the side area the shaft shows.

How Do the Materials Compare Off the Same Bow?

I built a 28 in arrow on each material for the same 40 lb recurve at a 28 in draw, each in a spine that suits that bow, and ran it through my speed and FOC engines.

Swipe the table sideways to see every column.

Modeled: 100 gr point (110 on the X10, which takes no insert), nock, about 15 gr of fletching, inserts as each maker supplies them. Drop gaps are drag-free. My recurve speed model holds limb efficiency at 72%, so it shows heavier arrows slower but carrying the same energy; real bows give heavy arrows slightly more.

The split isn't carbon against everything else. It's light against heavy. The three carbon-based shafts land within about 1.5 in of each other at 20 yards; aluminum and cedar land together about 4 in lower, because at a spine that suits 40 lb they weigh 10 grains per pound of draw. That's not a flaw. A traditional hunter often wants that weight, and the arrow weight vs speed comparison shows what it buys.

The cedar weight is the one number here I had to model. Port Orford cedar's specific gravity is 0.43 dry in the Forest Products Laboratory's data, which also lists arrow shafts among its uses. A solid 11/32 in rod at that density weighs 10.1 grains per inch. Real shafts vary dozen to dozen, which is why wood arrows get weighed and spined one at a time. The wood arrow spine calculator handles the spine side.

What Are Carbon Arrows Good For?

Almost everything with a sight on it. Carbon is light for its stiffness, so it shoots flat, and it comes in three bore sizes that decide which nocks and inserts fit: 4 mm (about .165 in inside), 5 mm (.204 in) and the older standard 6.5 mm (.244–.246 in). The nock and insert fitment finder sorts 18 current hunting shafts into those three.

Its weakness is how it fails. A carbon shaft can crack and still look whole, then break on the shot. Flex and twist every carbon arrow after it hits something hard, and throw out any that creak or show a split. My carbon vs aluminum comparison goes deeper on durability, and the carbon spine calculator picks the size.

What Are Aluminum Arrows Good For?

Consistency you can read off the shaft. Easton's aluminum sizes are a code: the first two digits are the outside diameter in 64ths of an inch, the last two the wall in thousandths. A 2213 is 22/64 in across with a .013 in wall. Weight follows from that geometry, which is why aluminum dozens match so closely. My XX75 aluminum spine chart decodes every size.

Aluminum bends instead of cracking. A bent shaft is visible and can sometimes be straightened; a badly bent one is done. It's the forgiving way to start, and the fat sizes are the indoor favorite for the reason in the diameter section above.

What Are Alloy-Carbon (Aluminum-Carbon) Arrows?

Two different builds share the idea. The target version wraps carbon around metal: Easton's X10 is high-strength carbon fiber bonded to a 7075 alloy core, barreled (fatter in the middle), listed at ±.001 in straightness, and Easton says it has been used to win every Olympic title since 1996. It's a precision outdoor recurve shaft, not a beginner arrow.

The hunting version flips it: a carbon core inside an aluminum jacket. That's Easton's FMJ line, and it behaves differently, heavier and more prone to bending than cracking. I compared it head to head in Easton Axis vs FMJ.

What Are Wood Arrows Good For?

Traditional bows and the archers who like building their own. Cedar is the classic shaft; pine, ash, birch and bamboo show up too. Wood is heavy for its spine, varies from shaft to shaft, and breaks more easily than the other materials, especially on a miss. One longbow shooter in a 2016 thread put the trade plainly: wood arrows were required for some of the events he'd competed in, and on field courses a miss often meant destroying one.

Two cautions. Some traditional classes do require wood, so check your organization's rules before a shoot. And wood doesn't belong on a high-poundage modern recurve or a compound; the forum owner who ruled it out for his ILF recurve wasn't being fussy.

What Are Fiberglass Arrows Good For?

Two jobs that need toughness over speed. Youth and camp sets use fiberglass because it survives misses into fences and gravel. Bowfishing uses it because a fish arrow has to punch through water and come back on a line: one listed fiberglass fish arrow weighs roughly 1,450 grains overall at 31½ in, more than four times the target arrows in the table above. Fish arrows have no fletching and use a barbed point and a safety slide for the line.

What Are the Different Types of Arrow Tips?

Most carbon and aluminum hunting arrows take screw-in 8-32 points, so one shaft can switch between field point and broadhead. Wood takes glue-on points on a tapered end.

How Do You Pick Spine and Weight Once You Know the Type?

Spine is the shaft's stiffness, and it has to match your draw weight, arrow length and point weight; a mismatched shaft won't fly straight from a well-tuned bow. GPI (grains per inch) times length gives shaft weight; add the point, insert, nock and fletching for the finished arrow. The site's tools do each step: the arrow shaft finder, the carbon, recurve and wood spine calculators, the arrow build and GPI weight calculator and the arrow length guide.

What Does Spine Do After the Release?

It lets the arrow bend around the bow. On a finger release the string rolls off the fingers sideways, the shaft flexes, and the fletching snakes past the riser instead of hitting it. That’s the archer’s paradox, and it’s why spine has to match the bow: too stiff and the tail slaps the riser, too weak and the arrow overbends.

Once it leaves the bow, an arrow can move in more ways than straight ahead. The classic diagram below names them in pairs: forward travel, spin, sideways drift, vertical drift, and two oscillations, porpoising (up and down) and fishtailing (side to side). A well-tuned arrow keeps the last two small and short-lived. The paper tuning guide and the bare shaft tune assistant show how to read them.

Something you'd like to see measured here? Send it through the contact page.

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