You’ve seen it. That guy in the Lazer or the Oppressor Mk II is terrorizing the lobby, and you’re stuck firing standard 9mm rounds that barely scratch his paint. Then, suddenly, a high-rank player snaps onto him with a Heavy Sniper and—boom—one shot, and the jet is a fireball. That’s the power of knowing how to get explosive ammo gta 5 players swear by. It’s a total game-changer. Honestly, it’s basically the "endgame" of GTA Online’s combat meta. Without it, you’re bringing a knife to a nuclear standoff.
But here is the catch. You can't just walk into Ammu-Nation and buy it. If you could, Los Santos would be a crater within twenty minutes. Getting your hands on these rounds is a grind. A long one. It’s tied to the Gunrunning update, which means you need to be a businessman, a researcher, and a bit of a masochist.
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The Bunker: Your Multi-Million Dollar Entry Fee
You need a Bunker. No way around it. If you’re looking at your Maze Bank account and see less than a couple million, you’ve got work to do first. You can buy these through the Maze Bank Foreclosures website. Don't buy the Paleto Bay Bunker. Just don’t. It’s cheap for a reason. You’ll spend half your life driving up and down the Great Ocean Highway just to check on your progress. Grab the Farmhouse or Chumash locations instead.
Once you own the Bunker, you’re basically a weapons manufacturer. But your staff? They’re lazy. Or maybe just uninspired. Initially, they only know how to make standard stock to sell for cash. To unlock the good stuff, you have to redirect them.
Managing Your Staff for Research
Open the laptop in your Bunker—you have to be a CEO, VIP, or MC President to do this—and look at the "Staff Management" section. You have three choices. You can have them focus on Manufacturing, Research, or both.
If you want the how to get explosive ammo gta 5 journey to end quickly, set them to Research only. Splitting the staff between both tasks makes everything take twice as long. It’s frustrating because you aren’t making money while they research, but that’s the trade-off for having the most powerful bullets in the game.
The RNG Nightmare: Why Research is a Pain
Here is the part that makes most players want to throw their controller through a window. There are 51 different research projects in the Bunker. These range from liveries for your Mobile Operations Center (completely useless) to heavy armor for the Weaponized Tampa.
The order is completely random.
You might get lucky and unlock the Explosive Rounds as your second project. Or, you might be like me and find it's the very last thing on the list. You cannot pick what your team researches next. It is a pure dice roll. Each project takes about 3.5 to 6 hours of real-time play to finish, depending on your Bunker upgrades.
Speeding Up the Process with Fast Tracking
If you have cash to burn, you can "Fast Track" research. Basically, you pay a bribe to finish the current project instantly. It costs $225,000 per project. If you were to fast track all 51 items, you’d be looking at over $11 million. Is it worth it? Maybe. If you’re tired of waiting weeks for the RNG gods to smile on you, and you have Cayo Perico heist money sitting around, just pay the fee.
Wait for the research bar to move just a tiny bit—literally one pixel—and then the option to fast track becomes available.
The Gear You Need to Actually Use the Ammo
Unlocking the research is only half the battle. You can’t put explosive rounds in a standard pistol or a basic sniper rifle. You need Mk II weapons.
To upgrade your guns, you need a Weapon Workshop. You can find these in several places:
- A Mobile Operations Center (MOC) with the Weapon & Vehicle Workshop module.
- An Avenger.
- A Terrorbyte.
- The Kosatka (if you bought the weapon station).
- An Agency or Freakshop.
The Heavy Sniper Mk II
This is the holy grail. Once you’ve researched the ammo and upgraded your Heavy Sniper to the Mk II version at a workshop, you can equip the Explosive Slugs.
It changes everything.
A standard Heavy Sniper is good. An Explosive Heavy Sniper is a god-tier anti-air weapon. It can knock a Hydra out of the sky in two shots. It stops a griefing hovering bike in one. However, there’s a massive downside: ammo capacity. You can only carry about 40 rounds of explosive sniper ammo. You can’t just spray and pray. You have to make every shot count, and you can only refill it at a weapon workshop—not through the Interaction Menu.
Other Weapons That Support Explosive Rounds
While the sniper gets all the glory, don't sleep on the Pump Shotgun Mk II.
If you unlock the explosive shells for the shotgun, it becomes a devastating close-quarters tool. It’s essentially a handheld grenade launcher that fires faster. If a car is chasing you, one shell to the engine block usually ends the pursuit. It’s chaotic. It’s loud. It’s incredibly satisfying.
Common Mistakes and Misconceptions
People think once they unlock the ammo, they have it forever for free. Nope. Every time you run out, you’re paying a premium to refill it at your MOC or Agency. It’s expensive. It’s a rich man’s game.
Also, some players think the "Explosive" ammo for the MK II Assault Rifle is a thing. It isn't. The rifles get specialized rounds like Incendiary or Armor Piercing, but not the boom-boom bullets. Only the Sniper and the Shotgun get the true explosive treatment.
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Another weird quirk? If you have explosive ammo equipped, you lose your extended clips. You’re trading volume for power. In a heated firefight against NPCs, you might actually find the standard ammo better because you won't have to reload every four seconds. But for PvP? Explosive is king.
The Path to Dominance
To wrap this up, your roadmap is pretty clear, even if it's expensive. Buy the Bunker (Chumash). Upgrade the staff and equipment to make research faster. Steal or buy supplies constantly. Either wait out the 51 random projects or dump $11 million into fast-tracking. Upgrade your Heavy Sniper to Mk II. Equip the rounds.
It’s a grind that defines the GTA Online experience. It represents the shift from being a street-level thug to a high-tech mercenary.
Once you have it, the game feels different. You stop being the prey. You start being the reason people leave the lobby. Just remember to keep an eye on your ammo count; there is nothing more embarrassing than lining up the perfect shot on a griefer only to hear a "click" because you forgot to stop by your Terrorbyte to restock.
Actionable Next Steps
- Check your Bunker location. If you’re still in Paleto Bay, trade it in for Chumash today. The time saved on supply runs is worth the lost upgrades.
- Start the Research loop. Even if you don't have the cash to fast-track, keep that research bar moving while you do other heists.
- Prioritize the Heavy Sniper Mk II upgrade. Buy the MOC or use the Kosatka workshop to get the gun ready so the moment the research pops, you can equip it.
- Save $225,000. Keep this amount as a "float" so you can instantly skip a useless livery project the second it starts.