Best Deer Feeders: Tripod, Gravity, and What Your State Allows

The practical division: spinners are for hunting and inventory, because a fixed feed time trains deer to arrive predictably and gives your trail camera a reliable window. Gravity feeders are for nutrition, because they waste almost nothing and handle protein pellets that a spinner cannot broadcast well.

Many properties run both: a gravity protein feeder for the spring and summer program, and a spinner near a stand for the season.

Prices are approximate mid-2026 brackets; verify before buying.

Moultrie is the volume leader in this category and the Pro Hunter III is the current expression of why: a complete 250-pound tripod feeder with Bluetooth app control at roughly $170 (verify current pricing), which is a genuinely good price for a finished unit rather than a kit plus a barrel plus legs.

App control is the feature that changes how you use a feeder. Adjusting spin duration and feed times from your phone, standing next to it, means you actually tune the program instead of leaving it on whatever it shipped with — and you are not opening a housing in the rain in November trying to read a tiny LCD.

Honest cons: 250 pounds of corn is not a lot in high deer density, and the tripod class is inherently more vulnerable to hogs and raccoons than a purpose-built varmint-proof unit. Spinner feeders remain the design with the most failure modes — motor, battery, timer and wet corn jamming the plate — so plan on inspecting it, not just filling it.

The smartest money in this whole category is usually a kit. Moultrie’s Pro Hunter III feeder kit — the spinner unit, timer and hardware without the barrel or legs — runs about $64 (verify current pricing) and bolts onto a barrel you already own or a 55-gallon drum from a farm supply store.

If you have an old feeder whose motor died, or a barrel sitting behind the shop, a kit gets you modern app-controlled feeding for a quarter of the price of a new unit. The same logic applies to the Moultrie gravity feeder kit at around $60, which converts a barrel into a gravity feeder with a quick-lock adapter.

Honest cons: you are responsible for the barrel, the legs, the mounting and the weatherproofing, and a poorly sealed home-built hopper is exactly how corn gets wet and jams a spinner. Budget the time as well as the money.

When the feeder is far from a road, capacity beats everything. American Hunter’s 350-pound tripod wildlife feeder at around $260(verify current pricing) is the answer to the "I can only get out there once a month" problem, and American Hunter’s heavy-duty leg kits are among the sturdiest in the class.

The extra hundred pounds over the Moultrie is roughly 40 percent more run time between fills, which on a lease two hours away is the difference between a working feeder and an empty one.

Honest cons: 350 pounds of corn is heavy to get into a tall hopper — plan on a ladder and a second person. The timer is more basic than Moultrie’s app-controlled units, and the taller, heavier build is a real job to relocate once it is set.

Boss Buck is the name serious land managers use, and the 200-pound gravity tripod at around $240 (verify current pricing) is the entry point. Gravity feeding is the efficient way to run a protein program: nothing broadcasts onto the ground to rot, deer eat from ports as they want it, and there is no motor, battery or timer to fail.

Boss Buck’s reputation rests on build quality and varmint resistance — the specific places cheap feeders fail. If you are running a year-round nutrition program rather than a hunting setup, this is the design and this is the brand.

Honest cons: gravity feeding gives you no control over consumption, so a high deer density (or one determined group of hogs) empties it fast and expensively. Ports can clog with wet or finely ground feed, and 200 pounds is modest capacity for the price — you are paying for construction, not volume.

Banks Outdoors builds the Feed Bank for people who do not want to think about the feeder again for a long time: 300 pounds at around $394, with a 600-pound version available for larger programs (verify current pricing).

The Banks design is a heavy poly hopper on a low frame, which solves two problems at once: no rust, and a fill height you can actually reach without a ladder. For a genuine year-round protein program on a managed property, this is the most set-and-forget option here.

Honest cons: it is the most expensive feeder on this page, it is bulky and awkward to move once sited, and like all gravity feeders it gives you no control over how fast the feed goes. Hogs, if you have them, will find it.

The Quick-Set’s pitch is in the name — a 270-pound spinner feeder designed to assemble quickly in the field, at around $160 (verify current pricing), which is strong capacity per dollar.

If you are putting several feeders out across a property, assembly time is a real cost, and this is the one that gets you from truck to filled in the least time.

Honest cons: build quality and varmint resistance are a step below Boss Buck and American Hunter, the timer is basic, and Wildgame Innovations’ long-term durability reputation is mixed. Treat it as a good-value working feeder rather than a decade-long investment.

1. Do not hunt directly over the feeder. Where it is legal to hunt over bait, deer still arrive on the feeder alert and looking. Set your stand on the trail approaching the feeder, downwind, 60-100 yards off.
2. Site it near cover, not in the middle of a field. Mature bucks use feeders in daylight far more readily when they can arrive without crossing open ground.
3. Two spins a day beats one. A short morning and evening throw trains deer to a window without dumping so much feed that they linger all night.
4. Set the evening spin about an hour before last light in the season, so deer arrive while you can still shoot, and shift it earlier as the days shorten.
5. Put a camera on it and actually read the data.A feeder’s highest value is often inventory rather than hunting — see cellular trail cameras and when deer move.
6. Keep it full or turn it off. A feeder that runs empty in the middle of the season teaches deer to stop checking, which is worse than never having it.
7. Re-check the regulations each year. CWD rules change annually, and a feeder that was legal last season may not be this one.

Check the Moultrie 250 lb Pro Hunter III price on Amazon.