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Well as I remember it match quality air rifles are often made with very short barrels inside a barrel jacket that carries the sights. The shorter the barrel liner the shorter the barrel time and the lesser the effect of any vibration or lack of follow through on the part of the shooter.

Spring Piston guns suffer some of the draw backs of the open bolt operation that limits the single shot accuracy of first and second generation submachineguns. The piston moving forwards can upset the shot.
Its a atter of excessive locktime.

CO2 and precharged pneumatics offer the best potential accuracy all other elements being equal.

Pellet design is critical. My 78g .22 for example was designed around a specific pellet, the Fiochi made under contract to S&W. Accuracy with those pelets was near matc quality but in American Rifleman tests no other pellet preformed nearly as well.
The Copperhead does fairly well in my pistol. At the aprox. 400 FPS velocity of the pistol its a decent one shot rat killer. Wadcutter pellets performed poorly on rats at the same velocities.

In .177 the Beeman coated Wadcutter gives best accuracy in every gun I've tried it in. Daisy and Gamo, which appear to be the same pellet, give mediocre results. They may do better in other guns.

It would seem that air rifle target accuracy, in .22 at any rate, is best at around 600 fps, but for humane hunting of small game 800 fps is about the minimum.

In .177 (Beeman wadcutter) accuracy is great in my daisy 880 at around 700+ fps, dime sized groups at 25 yards. I'm not sure if I'd want to use it on rabbits or squirrels though.

A balance must be struck according to the intended uses.

On the lower end of the scale my Umarex Walther PPKS pushes a .177 steel BB at around 300 fps, not good for any sort of hunting or pest control, but due to its realistic blowback action its a good introduction to the modern pocket pistols. Its felt recoil is more noticable than a .22LR pistol of the same size and weight. Accuracy is far from match quality but consistent with the pocket pistol types at 30 feet or so, MOSC (Minute of Soda Can).


If a pellet rifle gives only fair accuracy with the first brand of pellets you try, then try another brand.
Skirt thickness and alloy hardness effect how well a pellet takes the rifling.
Pellets that are too soft can be deformed by the pressures of a gun more powerful than it was designed for.