What are the best automotive paint guns for beginners?
Don't worry, we've found them!
In this ProPaintCorner.com guide, you will learn:
- What is an automotive paint gun
- How an automotive paint gun works
- How to choose the best automotive paint gun for your budget
And more!
Before you get started on your next automotive paint job, you should consider grabbing your own personal automotive paint gun.
However, if you don’t know where to start when buying your own, take a look at our guide for the best automotive paint gun for beginners.
Take a look at our top 10 rated automotive paint gun products below!
| Image | Product | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Our Top Pick
| Our Top Pick | Devilbiss Finishline Solvent Based Gravity Feed HVLP Gun
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| View on Amazon |
| Best Budget
| Best Budget | TCP Global Professional Gravity Feed HVLP Spray Gun with a 1.4mm Fluid Tip
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| View on Amazon |
| Best High End
| Best High End | Master Pro Series 44 High Performance HVLP Spray Gun
|
| View on Amazon |
|
| PNTGreen Professional Gravity Feed Air Spray Gun
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| View on Amazon | |
|
| REXBETI HIgh Power Electric Spray Gun
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| View on Amazon | |
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| SPRAYIT Gravity Feed Spray Gun
|
| View on Amazon | |
|
| Neiko HVLP Gravity Feed Sprayer
|
| View on Amazon | |
|
| Campbell Spray Gun Kit
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| View on Amazon | |
|
| PNTGREEN HVLP Spray Gun for Base Coats
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| View on Amazon | |
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| Astro Pneumatic Spray Gun
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| View on Amazon |
Our Overall #1 Rated Pick
Updated On February 17, 2023
There are so many factors to review when discussing these paint guns, it can be hard to come to a decision.
However, we have found that the Devilbiss Finishline is the hardest product to beat. Certainly, it has a steeper price tag than the other options, but that is a small sacrifice for what the product offers.
With the best transfer rate, the best longevity, and being the easiest to clean, this product was designed for long-term, professional grade use.
Top 10 Best Automotive Paint Guns for Beginners
In a hurry? Check out our Top 10 picks below! Keep reading to learn more about these automotive paint guns for beginners!
- Devilbiss Finishline Solvent Based Gravity Feed HVLP Gun
- TCP Global Professional Gravity Feed HVLP Spray Gun with a 1.4mm Fluid Tip
- Master Pro Series 44 High Performance HVLP Spray Gun
- PNTGreen Professional Gravity Feed Air Spray Gun
- REXBETI HIgh Power Electric Spray Gun
- SPRAYIT Gravity Feed Spray Gun
- Neiko HVLP Gravity Feed Sprayer
- Campbell Spray Gun Kit
- PNTGREEN HVLP Spray Gun for Base Coats
- Astro Pneumatic Spray Gun
What Are Automotive Paint Guns?
An automotive paint gun is sometimes referred to as an HVLP gun, which stands for High Volume Low Pressure.
These tools are used to administer high volumes of automotive paint to quickly and uniformly cover a car.
The automotive paint guns are designed to provide maximum coverage with a variable spray while also being efficient and easy to use.
These paint sprayers allow you to quickly paint the entire body or a single panel of a car without fuss.
Professional car painters use these spray guns almost exclusively, but car hobbyists also enjoy using them because they can speed up their work and give them more control and coverage in their painting.
For a large project, such as painting a car that has been stripped down or altering the color of a replacement door to match the body, it makes the process of applying multiple coats extremely efficient, which is very handy for painters and car detailers.
A high quality automotive paint gun will speed up your process significantly and make your car finishing job go much more quickly. These paint guns give your car a more polished, cohesive finish that is difficult to replicate with manual methods.
Some automotive paint guns offer a much narrower spray for fine detail work such as writing words or drawing imagery, as well as painting in narrow crevices.
Professional body shops exclusively use automotive paint guns, and some of them even have industrial paint machines that can spray the car all at one time.
Since that’s not feasible for the DIY auto painter or hobbyist, a personal automotive paint gun is a great option. These paint guns will give you professional grade work in a short period of time.
What Are the Different Types of Automotive Paint Guns?
Automotive Paint Guns come in all different shapes and sizes for your needs, but they all provide basically the same function.
Each of these different types of paint guns is an HVLP gun, meaning it delivers a high volume of paint at a low spraying pressure, preventing damage or concentration of paint in any one area.
The main differences in types paint sprayers used for automotive painting are related to how they are powered and how they are fed.
There are both electric automotive paint guns and pneumatic paint guns, which relates to the power behind their spray - pneumatic obviously being from compressed air.
Additionally, there are gravity fed and pressure fed automotive paint guns. The gravity fed paint guns utilize a hopper above the paint gun to draw paint down into the air stream, while the pressure fed ones create suction from the air stream and draw paint into the flow.
How Do Automotive Paint Guns Work?
As we mentioned in the last section, an auto paint gun functions in one primary way: by delivering a high volume of paint at a relatively low pressure. Doing this allows for a consistent spray that applies paint all over the body of the vehicle, without creating heavily concentrated areas.
Using either a pneumatic pressure or motorized pump, the paint gun will create a pressurized stream of air that draws paint into and through it, sending it out the tip of the nozzle.
These systems are designed with adjustable spray nozzles to change the shape of the paint spray, which helps to adjust how the spray lands on the vehicle, making a perfectly applied coat of paint.
Different fluid tips can be interchanged to create a variety of spray patterns for different projects and finishes.
Read More >> What Are the Best Professional Airless Paint Sprayers?
What To Look For in an Automotive Paint Gun
Depending on your project and the scope with which you’ll use your automotive paint gun in the future, there are several things you’ll want to examine when you’re shopping for an automotive paint gun.
- Weight - The weight of this product is very important, because you will always be using it for long periods of time and needing to hold it up. Make sure you find one that you can support.
- Air Pressure Rating - There is a comfort zone/range for the air pressure. You want a device that is capable of delivering a good spray without achieving a high pressure.
- Electric vs. Pneumatic - You’ll also want to investigate whether you want an electric or a pneumatic sprayer. Pneumatic ones are typically higher performing, but electric ones are cheaper and easier to use, so they may be a good option if you’re going to be using it infrequently.
- Ease of Cleaning - A final factor is the ease of cleaning. Because these automotive paint sprayers are used to spray paint, they will typically get covered with paint internally, creating a high risk for gumming up. Make sure the paint gun is easy to disassemble and clean, especially inside the internal passages.
Our Reviews of Paint Guns for Automotive Detailing
Our #1 rated automotive spray guns for beginners is the Devilbliss Finishline.
The Devilbiss Finishline HVLP gun is the highest priced product, but it has the best showing of any on the list.
The quality of the paint spray is unparalleled, and it is the easiest to adjust and clean, while also being compatible with all different types of paints.
It is best used with a solvent to ensure the thickness of the paint is appropriate, but because of that it can easily tackle latex paints, urethanes, and any different type of paint you can imagine.
This product will deliver a professional finish and has dynamic air control to ensure an even coat for all of your painting jobs.
The aluminum cup and stainless steel components make the Devilbiss a heavy-duty product that will stand the test of time for all of your auto paint projects.
You can check the latest price on Amazon to see if it's worth the investment for your projects because this product is hard to beat.
Pros
Cons
The ease of use and portability of this product are great, but it is difficult to clean properly, and adjusting the spray patterns either manually or by changing fluid tips can be complicated and time consuming.
Pros
Cons
This product can deliver a very high cfm without too much overspray and is a great high quality paint sprayer for the price.
However, customers have complained that the seals wear out relatively quickly, leading to leakage and a loss of pressure.
Pros
Cons
PNTGreen has released a gravity feed HVLP sprayer in the starter price range for people to get started with gravity spray gun painting.
This product is another good beginner option, particularly because it has a very high transfer efficiency, meaning you won’t lose a lot of paint during your job and it can provide a very smooth finish.
However, this spray gun is known to wear out pretty quickly, and it’s not suitable for heavier paints such as latex paints or urethanes without a solvent.
Pros
Cons
REXBETI has the only electric paint spray gun on the list, because it is a great value with a lot of punch for its weight.
This product can mimic the spray of most similarly priced pneumatic guns, making it a great airless alternative.
It is electric and lightweight, so you can't overstate its portability, and it is not tethered by tubing and an air compressor.
However, the battery life can be a limiting factor to the performance of this airless paint sprayer.
Pros
Cons
Pick #6: SPRAYIT Gravity Feed Spray Gun
You’ll need to build a working spray kit from scratch with this spray paint gun, but that gives you some added flexibility in terms of developing the perfect setup for your work.
Perhaps you want something a bit lower pressure, like an LVLP paint sprayer, or you want to have shorter hoses to reduce the potential for kinks and knots.
Regardless, this aluminum spray gun is well designed for smaller projects and is a great starter option for many new spray painters.
Though it is low in price, this spray paint gun is still relatively sturdy and can handle being tossed about a bit.
The small size comes with a couple of drawbacks - namely having more limited spray patterns and smaller volume. These can be detrimental to your work, but may be acceptable for many starters, and is useful for base coats or touch-up work.
Pros
Cons
Pick #7: Neiko HVLP Gravity Feed Sprayer
The Neiko HVLP Gravity Feed Sprayer has an impressive array of different options available. Regardless of what nozzle size or inlet hose size you want, you can find it for a low price. The variability makes this a great option for someone who knows a bit about what they’re doing.
You can customize and design your spray a bit more clearly when you have control over the individual aspects like the Neiko brand offers you.
This aluminum spray paint gun is heavy-duty and resilient, promising long life and impressive spray quality.
It is only the gun and nozzle combo, though, so you may be left purchasing some additional pieces. Fortunately, because of the various options from Neiko, you can design the perfect set up for your work.
Pros
Cons
Pick #8: Campbell Spray Gun Kit
If you’re looking for a full kit to start from scratch with, the Campbell Spray Gun Kit has all the essentials.
It is not a perfect kit, and it does not include many of the potential upgrades and add-ons you may want in the future, but to start with, this product is a great option.
The Campbell Spray Gun Kit comes with two spray guns, different sized paint hoppers, thread tape, and a myriad of cleaning supplies.
This product is ready to go when you receive it, so you can load it up and hook up your air compressor to start spraying.
Fortunately, it comes with a lot of different sizes and options so you have choices when you’re working to start with. The added benefit of having the included cleaning equipment, such as a cleaning brush, cannot be overstated.
Cleaning is one of the most vital parts of using a paint sprayer, because there is so much risk of the gun gumming up.
The pieces of this kit are a bit less sturdy than some of the other options, which is part of the reason it is affordable as a whole kit.
Unfortunately, you'll still have to find an air regulator to go along with the paint cup and other amenities that come along with the gravity spray gun in this kit.
Pros
Cons
It’s possible that not everyone who reads this article wants a spray gun solely for automotive use.
Some of you may be asking yourselves if there is an option that is suitable for both automotive use and other uses, like small spraying projects, art pieces, and hobbies. Fortunately, there is.
PNTGREEN’s HVLP Spray Gun for Base Coats is a great, smaller option for people who have a variety of interests.
This spray gun is smaller, lighter weight, and lower pressure for a variety of reasons.
It is designed to apply base coats on automotive projects or to apply clear coats to finish off the automotive painting job, which means it doesn’t have to be as perfect or as detailed as a finished coat spray paint gun.
To make it cheaper, PNTGREEN reduced the size and pressure so that it could be used for a base coat, and so that it would also be useful for smaller scale projects as well.
If you’re interested in spraying some stencils to sell on Etsy or something similar in addition to finishing an old car spray painting project, this may be an excellent choice for you.
This product may not handle the thickest of lacquers, but it will be able to tackle some light base coats and touch-up work.
Pros
Cons
Pick #10: Astro Pneumatic Spray Gun
Finally, Astro’s Pneumatic Spray Gun is a professional grade product that uses pneumatic pressure instead of a gravity feed system to deliver the paint.
This siphon feed system offers a few benefits. Pneumatic systems tend to have a bit less internal mess and clogging because the paint is not pooling near transition points.
This means a pneumatic spray gun will be a little bit less intensive on the cleanup process.
This spray gun is made from a very sturdy aluminum and has a large degree of flexibility in the spray angle, allowing you to customize the width of your spray for each of your projects.
Pros
Cons
Devilbliss Finishline Solvent Based Gravity Feed HVLP Gun is our absolute top pick!
This spray gun is tough to top, as this product can handle any different type of paint and will apply it smoothly and quickly without any issue.
Add in the heavy-duty components and easily-disassembled air cap and fluid tips to clean it, and you’ve got a product that will stand the test of time and will give you the best paint job you’ve done in a while.
Devilbliss is known for having high quality spray painting products, and this one checks off all the boxes.
If you’re interested in spray guns with different transfer rates or a high degree of flexibility, the Finishline is perfect, and Devilbliss has numerous other products to offer as well.
Plus, it’s an excellent value for the money! Check the low price on Amazon now!
Final Thoughts on Automotive Paint Guns for Beginners
Not everyone is going to use an automotive spray gun, and those who do may not use them very often.
However, if you want a product that will last you a long time and will give you the best finishing touch on your car paint project, these spray guns are all great options.
Whatever you need, remember to consider the weight and ease of cleaning, because that will impact how long you can use it and how long the device will last.
Read More >> Top 5 Gravity Feed Spray Guns
