Muzzle climb

Muzzle climb refers to the elevation of muzzle of the firearm, caused by combined recoil from multiple shots being fired in quick succession. It has an adverse effect on accuracy of automatic and rapid-fire semi-automatic firearms, causing a target to be overshot.

Muzzle climb can be reduced by reducing the recoil itself (with devices such as muzzle brakes), by compensating for recoil using a ported barrel, or by supplanting the fully-automatic mode of fire with burst mode.