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The meplat (from the French language word " méplat" meaning "flat surface of a cylinder") is the technical term for the flat or open tip on the nose of a bullet. The shape of the meplat is important in determining how the bullet moves through the air. In particular the size and shape of the meplat has a significant effect on the ballistic coefficient of a bullet. Haag, Lucien C., "The Sound of Bullets", AFTE Journal #34, Summer 2002, p. 255
Pointing the meplat (reducing its area) involves pressing the bullets into a special die. This decreases the size of the meplat which increases the ballistic coefficient, which reduces drag, time of flight, and wind drift of the bullet. Some target shooters sort their bullets by weight, point their bullets, and then trim them to the same meplat width to ensure the greatest possible consistency.
Meplats are often used to increase the bullet's Wound ballistics.
The shape of the nose of an axisymmetric projectile that gives it the least possible aerodynamic drag at always has a meplat, the diameter of which depends on the length of the nose.A.J. Eggers, Jr., Meyer M. Resnikoff, and David H. Dennis, "Bodies of Revolution Having Minimum Drag at High Supersonic Speeds", NACA Report 1306, 1955.
Rounds of the same caliber, but with different-shaped meplats sometimes cannot be loaded into the same firearm. The meplat plays an important role in the loading of weapons whose ammunition is guided into the chamber by a mechanism (e.g., semi-automatic, pump-action, lever-action, or bolt-action firearms), though this usually is not as important in weapons whose rounds are chambered individually by hand (e.g., , multiple-barrel firearms, , or .)
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