Shopping for paintballs can be someone confusing.  Believe it or not, there are a wide range of paintballs available based upon a variety of factors.  Let’s break them down into the following categories:

Tournament Grade Paintballs

Professionals spend the most amount of money on their paintball guns, gear and paintballs.  This category of paintballs is designed for those who are looking for the best of the best paintballs that fire with the most accuracy possible.  This grade of paintball is manufactured with great care to ensure the thin shell can be produced as perfectly round as possible.  Durability is also drastically important.  It’s takes more labor and resources to make a paintball that is as close to round as possible and will be durable enough to be fired without breaking prior to hitting the opponent.  The paintballs in this category are best paired with higher end, low pressure paintball guns due their fragile state they can’t be fired using a lower end marker that are designed to use a more versatile ball.

Premium Grade Paintballs

These paintballs are not as thin in construction as the tournament grade but that allows the price to be a bit more favorable and the ball to be a bit more durable. These paintballs are a great choice for the paintballer that is willing to spend a little extra for more accuracy and marking on the opponent. 

Field Grade Paintballs

Thicker in construction and probably the most commonly used paintball is what you will find with the Field grade balls.  These are used in most of the rentals at paintball parks across the country.  Obviously you will sacrifice a bit of accuracy and marking when moving into this category vs. the Premium grade.  The paint in these paintballs is typically thinner to make cleaning up a shot a bit easier.

Whitebox or Second Paintballs

These paintballs are sometimes considered manufacture defects.  They might not be completely round, have paint issues, dimpling or were packaged incorrectly.  This category of paintballs can be bought at a bargain but will most likely cause a loss in accuracy and many of the balls in the batch could be unusable.