Draw Range Rings and Weapon Range Fans on a Map

A common operational-planning task is drawing range rings — circles of a fixed radius around a point, used to show weapon ranges, SAM threat zones, communications coverage, or any radius-based area of effect.

Hint: Need a sector of fire, a direction of fire or ricochet areas? Use a Safety Distance Zone instead of a range ring. It is the map.army builder for a full surface danger zone (SDZ) or range fan, attached to any single-point symbol — see SDZ builder.

Choose the right graphic

MSS Symbol Search for 'range fan' in map.army, listing Weapons / Radar Range Fans, Circular and Sector

map.army offers range rings as tactical graphics. Find them with the Symbol Search: the circular fan is not listed in any gallery group, so searching is the only way to reach it. The two to use:

  • Weapons / Radar Range Fans, Circular — a single circle of configurable radius around one point. This is the one most people mean by “range ring”. Its MIL-STD-2525C designation is Weapon/Sensor Range Fan, Circular; the app shows the label above.
  • Weapons / Radar Range Fans, Sector — the same hazard limited to an arc, for a weapon or sensor that does not cover the full circle.
Hint: The two are not drawn the same way. The circular fan is a one-point symbol — place it, then set the radius, and the procedure below applies. The sector fan is a three-point symbol, so you place its points rather than dragging a radius. The sector variant also accepts fewer text modifiers, so some labelling fields available on the circular one are simply not offered on it.

Graphics often reached for here that are not range rings, all of them separate entries in the gallery: Position Area For Artillery (PAA), Circular and …, Rectangular describe the area a battery occupies, not a distance from it; Short-Range Air Defense Engagement Zone (Shoradez) and Missile Engagement Zone (MEZ) are bounded areas in which a commander intends to engage. Draw those when an area is what you mean.

Symbol names follow the interface language, but not completely: German shows Waffen / Radar Reichweite, Kreisförmig, while French and Italian translate only the last word (…, Circulaire, …, Circolare). Search with the name as your language shows it — in English, range fan finds both.

Drawing a single range ring

A circular range-ring tactical graphic placed on the map.army map

  1. Search for the range fan in the Symbol Search and pick it.

  2. Click on the map at the centre of the ring. The ring is placed at once with a small default radius and stays in edit mode, with a red centre point and a purple radius handle on its right edge.

  3. Drag the purple handle outward until the ring has the radius you need (dragging the centre point moves the whole ring instead), then confirm with the check mark at the bottom.

  4. To set the radius numerically, open the Point List on the placed graphic (see The Point List). It shows two groups: Radius, an editable field where you enter the exact radius in the units configured under Options → Unit Settings → Distance Unit, and Points, the coordinate of the centre.

    The Point List of a circular range fan in map.army with the Radius field marked, showing 3 005 m

A circular range fan has no Safety Distance (Zone) controls: its Point List shows only Radius and the centre Points. The Safety Distance (Zone) group appears only for ordinary one-point symbols such as units.

Stacking concentric rings

Three concentric range rings of increasing radius centred on one point on the map.army map

For multiple concentric rings around the same point (for example “max effective”, “max effective at 80 %”, “max engagement”):

  1. Place the first ring as above.

  2. Click the first ring once so it is selected, then press Ctrl + C or right-click it and choose Copy (Ctrl + C). Right-click the map and choose Paste (Ctrl + V) to duplicate it in the active layer.

    Range ring selected in map.army with the right-click menu open and 'Copy (Ctrl + C)' marked

  3. Open the point list (View and edit graphic’s coordinates) on the duplicate and change only the radius.

  4. Repeat for each additional ring; place them all on the same layer for easy show / hide.

Hint: The displayed radius respects the Distance Unit setting in Options → Unit Settings — it offers metric, imperial and nautical, and the same setting governs areas and elevations too.

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