How fast are blaster bolts in Canon?

In Legends, while the speed of bolts is pretty inconsistent, we know that they are (at least) as fast as some of the fastest shooting real world weapons. Making Jedi/Sith very casual bullet timers. But, in Canon, we have no clear cut reference to their speed. Unless I am missing something.

No Canon hasn't really been specifying or hinting at what speeds, at least as far as I remember. So...still a question mark and when that ever does happen, things will be for better or worse. Also they weren't really inconsistent in prior Canon, they were pretty consistent in noting that they were ridiculously fast.

Zenwolf wrote:No Canon hasn't really been specifying or hinting at what speeds, at least as far as I remember. So...still a question mark and when that ever does happen, things will be for better or worse. Also they weren't really inconsistent in prior Canon, they were pretty consistent in noting that they were ridiculously fast.

By inconsistent I mean that some sources said they were hypersonic, some sources said they were relativistic, and some said they were straight up lightspeed.

The Slick Obi wrote:

Zenwolf wrote:No Canon hasn't really been specifying or hinting at what speeds, at least as far as I remember. So...still a question mark and when that ever does happen, things will be for better or worse. Also they weren't really inconsistent in prior Canon, they were pretty consistent in noting that they were ridiculously fast.

By inconsistent I mean that some sources said they were hypersonic, some sources said they were relativistic, and some said they were straight up lightspeed.

Well the hypersonic was only slugthrower rounds, not bolts from what I recall, the other sources are right though. But at any case, it's not to be taken literally....at least I'm pretty sure, but to hammer the notion that they are crazy fast.

But I honestly don't think Canon will get around to specifying blaster bolt speed, it's been years and you'd think at some point a comparison would be made or something...but I guess not. So we're kinda stuck, when it does or IF it does, things are going to change.

Zenwolf wrote:

The Slick Obi wrote:

Zenwolf wrote:No Canon hasn't really been specifying or hinting at what speeds, at least as far as I remember. So...still a question mark and when that ever does happen, things will be for better or worse. Also they weren't really inconsistent in prior Canon, they were pretty consistent in noting that they were ridiculously fast.

By inconsistent I mean that some sources said they were hypersonic, some sources said they were relativistic, and some said they were straight up lightspeed.

Well the hypersonic was only slugthrower rounds, not bolts from what I recall, the other sources are right though. But at any case, it's not to be taken literally....at least I'm pretty sure, but to hammer the notion that they are crazy fast.

But I honestly don't think Canon will get around to specifying blaster bolt speed, it's been years and you'd think at some point a comparison would be made or something...but I guess not. So we're kinda stuck, when it does or IF it does, things are going to change.

Good point

Well, we do know that they're light based weapons, so Lightspeed seems plausible

BLASTER PISTOL

The standard ranged weapon of both military personnel and civilians in the galaxy, the blaster pistol fires cohesive bursts of light-based energy called bolts. Appearing in a variety of shapes and sizes and sometimes augmented for other functions, including acension guns that fire grappling hooks, blaster pistols deliver a wide range of damage capability. Many blaster pistols have stun settings that incapacitate a target, rather than inflicting physical damage. While blasters do deliver a searing concussive blast, they can be foiled by magnetic seals and deflector shields.

--Databank

King Glo wrote:Well, we do know that they're light based weapons, so Lightspeed seems plausible

BLASTER PISTOL

The standard ranged weapon of both military personnel and civilians in the galaxy, the blaster pistol fires cohesive bursts of light-based energy called bolts. Appearing in a variety of shapes and sizes and sometimes augmented for other functions, including acension guns that fire grappling hooks, blaster pistols deliver a wide range of damage capability. Many blaster pistols have stun settings that incapacitate a target, rather than inflicting physical damage. While blasters do deliver a searing concussive blast, they can be foiled by magnetic seals and deflector shields.

--Databank

But they aren't exactly light, it's particle energy from an energy rich gas. Even in the databank stats, it's listed as a particle weapon.

Even if they're listed as particle weapons (which I couldn't find) I don't see why them using gas to fire means it can't be Lightspeed, hyperdrives seem to use gas too and we know how fast those can go

King Glo wrote:Even if they're listed as particle weapons (which I couldn't find) I don't see why them using gas to fire means it can't be Lightspeed, hyperdrives seem to use gas too and we know how fast those can go

Yeah because hyperdrives have been explained and noted to be lightspeed. The databank on blasters only give the one quote, which even then it doesn't state exactly that they are lightspeed. All it says is that they give off a light-based energy which are called bolts.

Ye? I was just saying them using gas doesn't mean they can't be light speed. Why wouldn't light based projectiles travel at light speed?

King Glo wrote:Ye? I was just saying them using gas doesn't mean they can't be light speed. Why wouldn't light based projectiles travel at light speed?

Blaster bolts aren't light based projectiles. Why would you think they are? Much like lightsabers, blaster bolts are super-heated plasma particles from some sort of gas (usually Tibanna or some equivalent). If something has mass, it cannot move the speed of light. That's true even in the Sci-Fi setting of Star Wars. Hyperdrives explicitly get around this by allowing ships to access Hyperspace, which is basically a pocket dimension that doesn't obey real-world physics. Blaster bolts don't use Hyperspace (otherwise they wouldn't be able to interact with anything in the real-world), therefore they cannot move at the speed of light.


Also, I want to address the premise of this thread. It's woefully inaccurate to state that Jedi are "casual bullet timers." Force users foresee where the blaster bolts are going to hit before they are even fired, and move their lightsabers to intercept before the blaster bolt reaches its destination. The characters in Star Wars are sometimes superhumanly fast (though not always), but they don't move at the same speed as bullets. It's the same principle idea as Batman being depicted dodging bullets or lasers in comics, shows, and movies. He's not actually moving faster than the things fired at him, he just sees where they're aimed and moves out of the way before they're fired.

Because they're light based weaponry? And why does it apply to Star Wars?  When was this stated? We know in Legends it doesn't. Because we literally have statements of Jedi being supposed to be able to react to Lightspeed, and then them not being able to react to certain bounty hunters. We also know people like Solo, clones etc...can all react to blasters without precog

Here's the link to the databank, which says light based
https://www.starwars.com/databank/blaster-pistol

King Glo wrote:Because they're light based weaponry? And why does it apply to Star Wars?  When was this stated? We know in Legends it doesn't. Because we literally have statements of Jedi being supposed to be able to react to Lightspeed, and then them not being able to react to certain bounty hunters. We also know people like Solo, clones etc...can all react to blasters without precog

Here's the link to the databank, which says light based
https://www.starwars.com/databank/blaster-pistol

I'm not going to waste my time digging through all of my books for every instance where blaster bolts are referred to as plasma (all my books are packed away in boxes right now anyway), but I distinctly remember it being offhandedly mentioned in at least a few novels.

Jedi don't react to lightspeed. Jedi "react" to things before they happen. As explicitly stated by Qui-Gon in The Phantom Menace. It's why they appear to have superhuman reflexes. It doesn't matter how fast something is if a Jedi knows it's coming two seconds before it happens, which is explicitly how Jedi precognition is stated to work (best stated in the Coruscant Nights trilogy, iirc).

You bringing up Solo and Clones reacting to blaster bolts without precog just further hurts your own argument. You're correct, there are countless examples in Star Wars of non-Force sensitive characters reacting to blaster fire. This just further disproves the idea that blaster fire happens at lightspeed.

If you want to be a dweeb like me, it's actually possible to get a rough estimate for how fast blaster shots are portrayed in the films. While it varies from scene to scene (the general rule seems to be blaster bolts move as fast as they need to in order to look good on screen), the rough average speed of blaster fire in the Original Trilogy is about 60 meters per second (they often move roughly 2 to 3 meters per frame, at 24 frames per second). Given enough distance from the source of the blaster shot, humans can definitely react to something moving at those speeds, though it wouldn't be easy.

Idc about all your novels, retconns exist. The databank is official, so blasters are now light based.

Right, but characters can still hit them, and be relative to them. people like Jango could even fire too fast for them to block, Boba could also pull a gun on Ventress before she could react. So their precog allows them to dodge hypersonic / light speed blasters, but some people are too fast for that precog. That means they're at least above Hypersonic, or Lightspeed. Whatever it is

??? No it doesn't, that just means they also have hypersonic/Lightspeed reactions


Cinematic timing, the speed on screen doesn't reflect the actual speed. Because normal people obviously can't perceive Lightspeed. Superman or Goku are also supposed to move at FTL, but we can still see them. Doesn't mean they're below supersonic

Still probably varies from source to source like it did in Legends though. I agree In some Legend/EU sources Force-Users move far faster than bullets. Some examples include Anakin cutting missiles out of the air, easily, and Sidious moving faster than Anakin can track whilst Anakin was still capable of flying a starfighter at a respectable fraction of the speed of light in the ROTS novel.

Nothing so far states a speed but we do know Blaster bolts and laser bolts are always portrayed faster than speeding vehicles in the verse.