The National Instant Background Check System (NICS) numbers, adjusted by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) have dropped 3.4% below December of 2024 and 4.1% below the adjusted sales for 2024 for the entire year of 2025.

The pattern of adjusted NICS checks is remarkably similar to that of 2024, with slight variations. A minor variation is that in 2024, August numbers were higher than in September. In 2025, the numbers climb from a low in July to a maximum in December. From NSSF:

The December 2025 NSSF-adjusted National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) figure of 1,587,049 is a decrease of 3.4 percent compared to the December 2024 NSSF-adjusted NICS figure of 1,642,270. For comparison, the unadjusted December 2025 FBI NICS figure of 2,220,852 reflects a 16.1 percent decrease from the unadjusted FBI NICS figure of 2,647,933 in December 2024.

The annual 2025 NSSF-adjusted National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) figure of 14,612,314 reflects a decrease of 4.1 percent compared to the 15,239,011 figure for annual 2024.

The chart of annual adjusted NICS numbers show a gradual decline in annual firearm sales from the peak during the tumultuous and hotly contested election of 2020 through most of the first year of President Trump’s second term. President Trump has recorded success after success during the past year. Most people in the gun culture are seeing both greater domestic stability and a lower level of international chaos and crises. A form of shaky peace has been imposed on the Middle East. Iran has been rendered nearly impotent, as have its proxies, the Houthis, Hezbollah, and Hamas.  President Trump has had success in damping down hot spots between Cambodia and Thailand, Kosovo and Serbia, DRC and Rwanda, Pakistan and India, Egypt and Ethiopia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. While peace has yet to break out between Ukraine and Russia, serious talks are occurring.

On the domestic front, inflation is down, the stock market is up, GDP is increasing, and energy prices are down. As the United States enters the new year, prosperity appears to be on the rise, and violent crime has been declining. The numbers for 2025 are not yet complete. The trend has been toward 2025, setting the record for the lowest homicide rate ever recorded in the United States. We will not know if a record has been set for another month or two.

An upturn in international and domestic affairs may have reduced motivations to purchase firearms. It is possible that greater prosperity could incentivize people to spend more disposable income. Such potential is not currently reflected in the NICS figures.

When the NICS adjusted figures are compared to the more accurate ATF figures from Firearms Commerce in the United States, the averages have been converging. ATF figures are reported a year and a half later than NICS, to respect manufacturers’ property rights. The numbers from 2000 – 2023 show the number of firearms added to  private stock to be 90% of the numbers shown in the NICS adjusted figures. When the last decade of available numbers are used, 2014-2023, the ATF numbers are 98% of the NICS adjusted numbers.  It seems likely the last two years have added 30 million more firearms to the private stock in the United States. This equates to a total of 540 million firearms in the USA at the end of 2025.

How close is the United States to market saturation? Considerable growth is possible. If growth continues in the USA, a miracle may happen. The debt and budget deficit may be brought under control. Such would seem impossible for any president other than President Trump. It would be impossible if we were not on the brink of incredible technological breakthroughs such as fusion power, autonomous vehicles, breakthrough reductions in cost to orbit, and… even… increasingly powerful artificial intelligence. Any one of these technologies, if widely implemented, has the potential of enormous increases in productivity.

The elimination of the $200 tax on silencers, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, and any other weapons (AOW) in the National Firearms Act (NFA) has the potential to unleash significant demand. Such demand would be multiplied if those items are completely removed from the NFA, as seems possible, but not probable, in the next year. Unconfirmed reports show applications for Form 1 and Form 4 from the ATF have reached over 250,000 in the first week of 2026. The table has been set for a more prosperous year in 2026.

About Dean Weingarten:

Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of Constitutional Carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.