Standard of Measurement for Range of Missiles?

The data provided on missile range should be taken with a bucket of salt. Just too many variables.

I recall at least 2 cases where a SAM killed its target beyond its advertised range.

– A SeaDart missile during the Falklands war: the target was an Argentine aircraft (AFAIR a Canberra).

– An S-200 (SA-5) missile tragically downing a Siberian Airlines Tu-154 airliner over the Black Sea a few years ago.

The issue is, at least in my experience, that range measurements aren’t even given. Pretty much ALL the data that is publicly available on the internet/in various books etc. is a ballpark figure conjured up by third parties, not any kind of official data from the missile makers or missile users. Official data for modern weapons is more often given in the ‘more than XX km’ form, with ‘more’ sometimes being 50% over the given figure. I’m sure some of those third parties are serious analyists that try their best to come up with a realistic figure, but they, just like us, are guesstimating. What they (and we) get are snippets here or there about some test fireing here or there, where very few variables are mentioned.

How exactly is range of missiles measured? Are they measured according to a certain standard in all countries (some certain alt, speed, etc)? If there is a standard measurement, what is it? Or do all countries measure the ranges of their missiles according to different standards?

I see figures out there all over the place, and none of them seem to say anything about:
a) from what altitude the missile is fired at
b) what altitude the target is at
c) from what speed the missile is fired at
d) if the missile is fired at a closing, receding, or stationary target, and at what speed
e) if the target is maneuvering or not

I see figures out there for the R-77 (AA-12) from 50km all the way up to 120km, and none of them list all (or mostly any) of the points a) through e). I have seen the same thing with the AIM-120 as well. I would imagine that an AIM-120 fired at 1.7 mach at 60,000 ft by a F-22 would have a much farther range than launched by, lets say a F/A-18 at 0.7 mach at 20,000 ft.

Sorry if this has been posted before, but I have no idea what the answer is to my questions, and I have tried searching.

Problem is as you pointed out that there are a lot of variables. Even if you knew to the pound how much fuel an AIM-120 has, it’s ISP, and burn profile you would still end up with a huge range of possiblities depending on launch altitude and speed, shot geometry, hell even weather. One of the ways they increased the range of AIM-120 was just to fly a more efficient flight path. Take the last version of Terrier before it was retired (SM-2ER). It’s normal flight path as a SAM was given as 100nm or so. But use it for a ballistic target and it’s 300nm+. Conceivably they could have modified it for midcourse update with terminal homing and had a 300nm range SAM that dove on targets from above.