Submachine guns (or SMGs), are lightweight guns oftentimes used in close-quarters situations in a gunfight. These are ideal for people who want to have a less campy playstyle when it comes to shooters, like last year’s Call of Duty: Vanguard. The game has seen a fair share of new content and weapons since its release. Now in 2022, we’ll rank the top 5 best submachine guns (SMGs) so far into Season One of Call of Duty: Vanguard.
Top 5 best SMGs in Call of Duty: Vanguard
5. PPSH-41
The last SMG you’ll unlock if you haven’t gotten to prestige levels; the PPSH-41 is a solid gun with strengths that just barely outweigh its drawbacks. It’s a very fast-firing SMG that makes recoil a bit of an issue, so you’ll have to make use of attachments that help with recoil control to get it going.
The gun without any attachments is just serviceable, but like many other guns in Vanguard, it needs attachments to truly shine. It can also be used to specialize in hip firing at point-blank ranges. Since the PPSH-41 has such a fast firing rate, its time to kill (TTK) is one of the highest in the SMG category.
4. Owen Gun
The Owen Gun is a solid gun overall. It’s almost an assault rifle because of its range capability. Because of that, it should be given attachments that make it more suitable for medium-range combat. It has decent firepower, good mag size, and shoots on the slower side, making recoil a bit easier to anticipate.
Its only drawback is the odd placement of its magazine on the top of the gun. It can obstruct your view when aiming down the sights (ADS). The unfortunate part is that different magazines won’t make a visual difference.
3. M1928
This gun sure does pack a punch. The M1928 is a solid gun overall with a good TTK, but it’s a bit on the slower side. Because of its large magazine, it makes the time to fire after sprinting a bit more delayed than other SMGs and it has a longer reload speed.
The point of SMGs is to give yourself as little downtime as possible after sprinting so you can easily pepper down your enemies. This gun has to be played a bit more methodically than to just run headfirst into engagements. Call of Duty: Vanguard is a fast-paced game, so a quick mistake within a second can easily get you killed in battle.
2. Type 100
The Type 100 is a very beginner-friendly SMG, having very little recoil, good accuracy, and decent range. However, while all of those stats are favorable, it comes at the cost of firepower, making this SMG the slowest in terms of TTK.
Even if this gun has the slowest time to kill, it still ranks higher among the other SMGs because of Vanguard’s extensive use of attachments for the weapons. If you slap on a .30 Russian Short Rounds magazine attachment to it, the Type 100 will become such a monster of a weapon.
1. MP-40
To no one’s surprise, the MP-40 still reigns supreme in the CoD Vanguard SMG meta. This gun is laser-accurate, sporting a recoil that can easily be offset by certain attachments. It’s a lightweight weapon that’s perfect in close-quarter engagements. If you jump into the 24/7 Ship Haus playlists or anything alike, you’ll most likely get gunned down by a handful of these.
Luckily, this gun is unlocked right as you are able to customize your own loadout. This removes the need of having to grind levels before you can start blasting at the tryhards in multiplayer.
Call of Duty Vanguard is out now for PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Series S/X, and PC via Battle.net.
