.22 mag pistols are prettty impressive to shoot. Loud and lots of muzzle flash. At least my .22 auto mag with a six inch barrel was. I bought one of these years ago and a buddy of mine bought a .44 mag revolver at the same time. We went out and shot his .44 first. It was impressive and didn't recoil nearly as bad as I thought it would. We went to shoot my my .22 mag as it was starting to get dusk out. I fired the first round and we looked at each other and both said "Holy ----- (fill in the blank)! This thing was loud and blew flames like 3 inches out of the barrel. If you didn't know what it was it would be very intimidating. Wish I would have kept it since you can't get them any more.

I have never noticed much of a difference in centerfire rifles to be honest. .223, .243, 7.62x39, or 30-06, they were all pretty loud, and it depended more on the gun then the round used. Shorter barrels tend to be louder, and if you have a muzzle break forget it, they are like twice as loud! My shotgun is ported and if I shoot more than twice without good hearing protection my ears are ringing for the rest of the day.

I own a 17hmr and have shot .223's before (AR's and M16's, never a bolt action) and I would say the .223 is considerably louder than the .17 hmr rifle. All pistols are loud though in my opinion because of the short barrels.

Depending on what gun shop you go to they may let you fire one of each or do it for you so you can hear the difference.

Paul