Archery for Beginners: Starting at a Club, Outdoors, and on a 3D Course

Starting at a club: intro sessions, no bow to buy

Do you need to buy a bow to get started? No, and that’s actually the point: you begin at a club affiliated with your country’s federation, with club equipment and a coach on the shooting line. Most of the time, clubs lend this gear for a limited period, then encourage archers to get their own before the end of their first year [1].

The French archery federation (FFTA) wants to welcome kids starting at age 7 [2]. In the United States, USA Archery clubs run programs for children as young as 8, and the federation points out that you don’t need any experience to give it a try [3].

Your first arrows will probably fly indoors. The official distance there is 18 meters (about 20 yards), but some clubs move the target in to 10 or 15 m at first [4]. The season follows the calendar: indoors from September to March, outdoors from early spring to the end of summer [5], and 3D courses from March to November [6].

Membership, insurance, and medical certificates

In France, the rule is simple: every member of a club affiliated with the FFTA must hold its license, which includes liability insurance [8]. In practice, if your arrow injures someone or breaks a window, that insurance pays for the damage done to others [9].

Your own injuries fall under separate accident coverage. The license includes a basic policy, for €0.28 a year, which you can turn down in writing; two fuller options cost €35 and €50 [9]. A doctor’s certificate is no longer required since a French law of March 2, 2022: adults and minors fill out a health questionnaire, and a single “yes” means a certificate less than six months old [10].

The cost of the license adds up. For the 2026-2027 season, the national share, insurance included, is €36 for an adult who shoots at the club and €44 for an adult who competes. On top of that come €2 for major events, the regional and departmental shares, which vary by region, and then each club’s own dues [8].

What changes from one country to the next

Elsewhere, the logic is the same, with differences that matter before your first session. In Switzerland, membership goes through the club, and the federation’s insurance also covers people taking beginner courses [11, 12]. In the UK, the National Field Archery Society (NFAS) takes new members on a provisional basis, and its insurance covers members only [13, 14]. In the United States, you can try archery at a USA Archery club without joining [3, 15]. In Germany, sports insurance comes through the club and each state’s sports confederation, the Landessportbund: in Lower Saxony, a non-member at a trial session isn’t covered, in principle [16].

Recurve, compound, barebow, or longbow: the bows you’ll come across

Four families of bows share the shooting lines, and the rules of each discipline spell out which ones are allowed [17]:

• The recurve bow: the only bow allowed at the Olympic Games. It takes apart and carries a sight and stabilizers [17].
• The compound bow: pulleys, called cams, multiply the effort, the archer aims through a magnifying lens and releases the string with a release aidA small mechanism held in the hand that holds the string and then lets it go, instead of the fingers. [17].
• The barebow: a recurve with no sight and no stabilizers [18].
• The longbow: a bow with a traditional shape whose string touches only the nocks at its tips; World Archery requires it to be at least 150 cm (59 in) long [19].

Your choice of bow also decides which disciplines are open to you. Recurve and compound bows share target archery; the barebow and the longbow have their place on courses. In Germany, the Deutscher Schützenbund runs longbow competitions only in field and 3D archery [20], while the FFTA allows the longbow in field archery, a French quirk [21].

Distances and targets: from 18 m indoors to 70 m outside

Indoors, everyone shoots at 18 m (20 yd), at a 60 cm (24 in) target face for under-15s and a 40 cm (16 in) face after that [4]. Outdoors, the target gets bigger and farther away. International rounds are measured in meters: recurve archers shoot at 70 m (77 yd) at a 122 cm (48 in) face, whose 10 ring measures 12.2 cm (4.8 in); compound archers shoot at 50 m (55 yd) at an 80 cm (31.5 in) face cut down to its inner rings [5, 22].

Young archers start closer: 20 m (22 yd) for under-11s, then 30, 40, and 60 m depending on age, and 70 m from about 18; archers 60 and older go back to 60 m with a recurve [5]. In field and 3D archery, the distance changes at every target, as the diagram shows.

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Field archery and 3D courses: archery in the woods

Field archery is shot on a marked course that you follow from target to target, a bit like golf, across fields and woods, with uphill, downhill, and side-slope shots [21]. The black and yellow faces stand up to 60 m (66 yd) away, at marked or unmarked distances; you shoot 3 arrows at each target, within 3 minutes [21].

3D archery keeps the course idea but swaps the faces for life-size foam animals: 24 targets, 2 arrows at each, from 5 to 30 m (5.5 to 33 yd), and up to 45 m (49 yd) in the class the FFTA calls “tir libre” [6]. A closer shooting stake is set aside for young archers and newcomers to the discipline [6]. Its cousin, the French nature round, uses 21 paper targets set between 5 and 40 m (5.5 and 44 yd) [23].

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The FFTA says so itself: its only animals are made of foam or paper, and bowhunting falls under a different framework than its own [6]. It isn’t the subject of this guide. Finally, a course shares the woods with other users, hikers and mountain bikers first among them: the FFTA calls for separate trail markers for archers and for visitors [24].

The safety rules of the shooting line

The rules look alike from one country to the next, because they address the same risk: an arrow travels fast and far. Archery’s track record is good all the same: in the United States, according to 2017 hospital data compiled by the Archery Trade Association, an industry group, it saw 0.57 injuries per 1,000 participants, compared with 1.38 for golf [26].

The FFTA gives its clubs a list of basic rules to write into their house rules [7]:

• Never nock an arrow or draw the bow, even without an arrow, anywhere other than on the shooting line and toward the target.
• Never release the string without an arrow on it.
• An arrow dropped in front of the line gets picked up once the end is over, not during it.
• Nothing goes between the shooting line and the target.
• Keep a good distance from an archer who is shooting.
• At the target, make sure nobody is standing right behind you before pulling your arrows.
• No running indoors or on the range, and never with arrows in your quiver.
• No damaged or unsuitable gear: arrows that are too short, a worn string, a faulty arrow rest.

In competition, World Archery adds that you draw your bow only while standing on the shooting line, always pointed at your own target, and bans any technique that could send an arrow beyond the safety zone [18]. Shooting is paced by sound signals, and one matters more than all the others: at least 5 blasts, and everyone stops shooting [18].

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On a course, a few more rules

In the woods, the target no longer sits at the end of a closed range. The FFTA reminds its organizers that an arrow that misses the target can fly 100 m (330 ft), and up to 250 m (820 ft) from a target set on a hilltop. It recommends a safety corridor 100 m long and 11 m wide (330 by 36 ft), where nobody walks or stands, and shorter shots in 3D, where arrows bounce off more often [24]. The rules of the UK’s NFAS spell out what this means for the group [14]:

• Before shooting, make sure the target and the visible overshoot area behind it are clear.
• Shout “Stop” at the first sign of danger: the whole group stops shooting at once.
• Never move between targets with an arrow nocked on the string.
• Never start drawing a bow above a line parallel to the target.
• Nobody stands in front of the archer on the shooting stake.
• While scoring, pulling, or looking for arrows, one adult in the group stays standing in front of the target.
• Stay on the marked path between targets, including once the round is over.
• Keep a dog on a leash of no more than 3 m (10 ft) whenever there’s shooting nearby, a rule to add to those of hiking with a dog.

The emergency signal itself changes from one set of rules to another. In target archery, World Archery uses at least 5 blasts; on NFAS courses, every adult carries a whistle, and the alarm is three blasts followed by a pause [18, 14]. On a permanent course, the FFTA also recommends a sign at the entrance with contact details for an on-call medical service [24]: find it, and know how to call for help with no cell signal.

What it costs to take up archery

The first season costs mostly membership and club dues, since the gear is on loan [1]. Personal accessories come next: the tab or glove that protects your fingers with a recurve, the armguard, and the quiver, “a very personal accessory, which is not lent,” as the FFTA puts it [28]. In the United States, part of what you pay for archery gear comes back to the sport: manufacturer taxes on archery equipment feed the Pittman-Robertson wildlife program, which states also use to build and run target ranges [29].

Your own bow usually arrives before the end of the first year. For a competition recurve, the FFTA gives a rough guide, in France, of €200 to €700 for the riser and €100 to €700 for a pair of limbs, so about €300 to €1,500, not counting the sight or stabilizers. It points out that complete kits exist, that they suit adults too, and that limb length and draw weight are the two key settings; it advises talking with your coach before you buy [1].

Worth watching

The basic rules to know before you shoot at a range, explained in under three minutes by Archery 360 and filmed on a real outdoor shooting line.

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Arnaud Couderc

Fact-checking, regulations, and safety

Arnaud Couderc reviews our contributors’ articles and writes for Outfarer about regulations, safety, fishing, the ocean, and outdoor activities. He traces every rule back to its official text and every number to its source, so you head out with solid benchmarks.

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