The AK-74 is an assault rifle developed in the early 1970s in the Soviet Union as the replacement for the earlier AKM. It uses a smaller intermediate cartridge, the 5.45_39mm, replacing the 7.62_39mm chambering of earlier Kalashnikov-pattern weapons.

The rifle received a new barrel with a chrome-lined bore and 4 right-hand grooves at a 200 mm (1:8 in) rifling twist rate. The front sight base and gas block were redesigned. The gas block contains a gas channel that is installed at a 90