Last night I was at the gun store and was handling the A400 Xcel and A400 Xtreme side by side.

The Xcel shouldered great for me and was perfect. The Xtreme felt very different and didn't fit me nearly as well.

Do these two guns use drastically different stocks? LOP and drop looked similar-ish, but man did they feel different! I would have assumed they'd feel very similar since they are both in the A400 family.

I bought the Xcel for a game gun, but I still want something for the field. Is the Xplor more similar to the Xcel?

Any help from the Beretta experts would be much appreciated. Thanks.

Synthetic butt versus wood.
The synthetics are basically hollow and lighter.
That is enough to make one feel more muzzle heavy or sluggish versus the other feeling more balanced.

I hate the way Beretta has labeled the A400 variants, it's confusing and hard to remember which is which. Since your looking for a field gun, you might want to look at the A300 synthetic. It's adjustable for lop, pitch and cast.

I have an A400 Xtreme Unico Synthetic. The main difference with the A400 Xcel is the version of the "Kick-off" recoil reduction that each one uses.

The Synthetic has essentially a hinge just aft of the grip but in front of your cheek weld. It flexes and compresses a bit at that point to absorb the recoil.

The Xcel and other A400 wood stock models have the Kick-off recoil absorber located at the shoulder pad interface of the stock. During recoil the entire stock slides backwards as that absorber compresses, including some sliding along your cheek weld. Some don't notice it but I found it to be distracting.

I prefer the version in the Synthetic model as the rear portion of the stock isn't moving, all movement occurs in front of your cheek weld.

So the stocks are different designs, which could have resulted in a different feel/fitment when you shouldered them.

Pretty sure the Xtreme versions have a 3.5'' chamber.

haha... I read "side by side" and was wondering how they got two barrels onto an A400...

carry on.

For what it's worth, the xtreme comes with a 1/2" spacer in right before the buttpad.

I took that out and all is right with the world now! It mounts like the Xcel does and I'm quite happy with it.

That made a huge difference for me.