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7.92×33mm Kurz

7,92 × 33 mm Kurz

Introduced 1938Polte ammunition works, MagdeburgCIP standard

Also known as 7.9mm Kurzpatrone, 8mm Kurz — the same cartridge under different names, all of which find this page.

Dimensions and pressure

Generated from the schema, like every specification table on this site, so a figure recorded on this entry cannot be missing from the table.

Identity
Designed by
Polte ammunition works, Magdeburg
Introduced
1938
Production
not recorded
Standards body
C.I.P.
Case type
Rimless
Case shape
Bottleneck
Dimensions
Bullet diameter
8.22 mm0.3236 insource

C.I.P. G1, maximum bullet diameter.

Bore diameter
not recorded
Case length
33 mm1.299 insource

C.I.P. L3, maximum case length.

Overall length
48 mm1.890 insource

C.I.P. L6, maximum cartridge overall length.

Rim diameter
11.95 mm0.4705 insource

C.I.P. R1.

Neck diameter
9.04 mm0.3559 insource

C.I.P. H2.

Base diameter
11.94 mm0.4701 insource

C.I.P. P1.

Pressure
Maximum pressure
340 MPa49,313 psisource

C.I.P. Pmax 3400 bar; 1 bar = 0.1 MPa exactly.

Pressure standard
C.I.P.

SAAMI and C.I.P. measure pressure differently and their figures are not interchangeable, which is why the body is always named beside the figure.

Loads

Velocity is recorded per barrel length as published. A gun page interpolates between these points and never projects beyond them.

Service ball

Bullet mass
8.1 g125.0 grsource

Ballistics table of the cited article, which publishes bullet mass in grams.

Cartridge mass
not recorded
Bullet type
FMJ
G1 BC
not recorded
G7 BC
not recorded
Sourced velocity by barrel length
BarrelVelocity
419 mm16.50 in685 m/s2,247 fps

Chambered in

Computed from every entry that lists this cartridge. Nothing here is hand-maintained.

No entry on the site is chambered in it yet.

Gallery

A 7.92×33mm Kurz cartridge standing on a wooden surface in warm light, noticeably short for the width of its case.

Image credit

Title
File:German 7.92x33mm Kurz.jpg
Author
User Cbh on en.wikipedia(attribution required)
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Source
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:German_7.92x33mm_Kurz.jpg
A 7.92×33mm Kurz round — the short case that gives the intermediate cartridge its name.

Detail

The first intermediate cartridge to be issued in quantity, and the argument that every rifle cartridge since has had to answer. German infantry studies in the 1930s established that almost all rifle fire happened inside 400 m, and that the 7.92×57mm round every soldier carried was specified for four times that. Polte’s answer was to keep the bullet diameter and cut the case nearly in half.

The result gives up roughly half the muzzle energy of the full-power round and becomes controllable in automatic fire from a shoulder weapon, which is the trade the assault rifle is built on. The Soviet 7.62×39mm followed it in 1943 and the American 5.56×45mm followed both, by a different route, twenty years later.

Its name is the argument in miniature: Kurz simply means short, and what was shortened was the case of the cartridge Germany had been issuing since 1888.

References

  1. C.I.P. TDCC datasheet — 7,92 x 33 kurz · 2014-05-20 · read 2026-08-31
  2. 7.92×33mm Kurz · 1345370824 · read 2026-08-31

Last verified 2026-08-31 · review status: agent-populated