Trigger control strategy is of vital importance for the multistage synchronous induction coilgun (MSSICG). According to the operating principle of MSSICG, we can theoretically obtain a sustained and steady acceleration which is sufficient to push the projectile to high speed by means of continuously increasing the series of driving coils and matching with the appropriate trigger strategy. However, the transition time between the adjacent coils decreases with the increase of the projectile velocity, which leads to the weakness of the traditional position or time trigger control. In this paper, a self-consistent control strategy of MSSICG was proposed. Its accuracy and flexibility are verified through an illustrative example of a 25 stages synchronous coilgun. The results coincide well with that by finite-element method (FEM), and the error of muzzle velocity is only 3.4%. Based on this method, the influence of slip speed and rise length on the adaptive control effect is calculated and analyzed, and accordingly proposed to use variable slip speed. As far as the capacitive pulsed power supply (CPPS)-based MSSICG is concerned, the research methods and results in this paper have both theoretical and pragmatic value in simplifying the design process and improving energy conversion efficiency (ECE). (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.