New Hampshire Gun Laws: Complete Guide

Private Sales and Transfers

• A private seller must not transfer to a felon, must personally know the buyer or obtain clear identity evidence, and must comply with the pistol-transfer-to-minor rules. Interstate transfers ordinarily pass through an FFL. [3][15]
• Selling, bartering, hiring, lending, or giving a pistol or revolver to a minor is a misdemeanor, with exceptions for a parent, grandparent, guardian, or estate representative transferring to their own child, ward, or heir, and for supervised firearms training, licensed-hunter accompaniment, and lawful shooting events. Selling or otherwise delivering a firearm to a person known to be a felon is a class B felony, and RSA 159:8 bars delivery unless the seller personally knows the buyer or obtains satisfactory identity evidence first. [8][3]

• Confirm identity, New Hampshire residency, age, and eligibility. [3]
• Use an FFL whenever residency or eligibility is uncertain. [15]
• Do not sell, lend, or give a pistol or revolver to a minor outside the family, training, hunting, and shooting-event exceptions. [8]

Important notice: Personal familiarity or identification does not excuse a transfer to a prohibited person. [3]

Buying a Firearm

• New Hampshire requires no general purchase permit, waiting period, owner license, or registration. Dealers conduct the federal NICS process, and state minor-transfer and federal dealer age rules apply. [3][17][16]
• A federally licensed dealer generally requires a buyer to be at least eighteen for a rifle or shotgun and at least twenty-one for a handgun, other firearm, or frame or receiver. New Hampshire's own age rule for pistols and revolvers runs through the sale-to-minors statute rather than a separate purchase-age law, so a private transfer to someone under eighteen must fit a family, training, hunting, or shooting-event exception. [16][8]

Ownership and Prohibited Persons

• New Hampshire and federal law prohibit possession by specified felons and other disqualified persons. New Hampshire has no general owner license or extreme risk protection order statute. [1][17]
• RSA 159:3 makes it a class B felony for a person convicted of a felony against the person or property of another, or of a felony drug offense, to possess a pistol, revolver, or other firearm; a conviction under this section requires the state to confiscate the weapon. An affirmative defense applies if the out-of-state offense would not have been a felony under New Hampshire law. [7]
• New Hampshire has no standalone firearm-rights-restoration statute, but annulling the underlying conviction under RSA 651:5 restores eligibility because an annulled record is treated as though the arrest, conviction, and sentence never happened. Waiting periods after full completion of sentence run five years for a class B felony and ten years for a class A felony, and annulment is unavailable for a violent crime, felony obstruction of justice, or an offense carrying an extended term of imprisonment. Federal firearm prohibitions can still apply independently even after a state annulment. [9][7]

Concealed and Open Carry

• An eligible person may carry openly or concealed, loaded or unloaded, without a license. Optional resident and nonresident licenses remain available and can be useful for reciprocity outside New Hampshire. [2][14]
• A resident applies through their town selectmen, city mayor, police chief, or another officer the licensing body designates; a nonresident applies to the state police director or a designee. The issuing authority must act within fourteen days, must give a written reason for any denial, and may not require a photograph or fingerprint unless the applicant asks for one. A license runs for at least five years and renews within the month of the fifth-anniversary birth date; the resident fee is ten dollars, kept by the issuing town or city, and the nonresident fee is one hundred dollars, kept by the state. [2][14]

• Self-defense, hunting, and target shooting all qualify as a proper purpose on a license application. [2]
• A New Hampshire license does not by itself guarantee recognition in another state; check that state's law before traveling. [14]

Self-Defense and the Castle Doctrine in New Hampshire

• The New Hampshire Constitution, Part First, Article 2-a, adopted in 1982, protects the right of all persons to keep and bear arms in defense of themselves, their families, their property, and the state. [10]
• RSA 627:4 justifies using non-deadly force when a person reasonably believes it necessary to defend against another's imminent unlawful use of non-deadly force, and justifies deadly force when a person reasonably believes another is about to use unlawful deadly force against them or a third person, or is committing or attempting burglary, kidnapping, or a forcible sex offense against them within their own dwelling. Since a 2011 amendment, the statute imposes no duty to retreat when the person is in their dwelling or its curtilage, or anywhere else they have a right to be, provided they were not the initial aggressor. [11]
• RSA 627:7 and 627:8 separately govern force used to defend premises or property. Non-deadly force may be used to prevent or stop a criminal trespass, an unlawful taking of property, or criminal mischief, but deadly force in defense of premises or property is justified only under the same conditions as defense of a person under RSA 627:4, or, for premises specifically, when reasonably necessary to prevent an attempted arson. [12]

Important notice: RSA 627:1-a goes further than many states' justification statutes: a person who uses force justified under RSA 627:4 through 627:8 is statutorily immune from civil liability for the perpetrator's injuries, and a court must award the defendant reasonable attorney's fees and costs in a civil suit the perpetrator brings anyway. That immunity, however, depends on the underlying use of force actually being legally justified — a genuinely disputed self-defense claim can still mean a civil case, arrest, and prosecution before that question is resolved. Get individualized legal advice before relying on any of this content in an actual confrontation. [13][11]

Transportation and Vehicles

• New Hampshire expressly allows eligible residents and nonresidents to carry or transport firearms in vehicles without a license, whether open or concealed and loaded or unloaded. Destination-state rules and federal safe passage still matter on interstate trips. [2][19]
• New Hampshire's permissive vehicle rule does not export itself once a trip crosses into a stricter state. For a state where local carry law would otherwise be violated, keeping the firearm unloaded, cased or otherwise not readily accessible, and separated from readily accessible ammunition can invoke the federal interstate transportation protection while passing through. [19]

Restricted Firearms and Magazines

• New Hampshire has no general magazine limit or assault-weapon ban. NFA firearms are generally permitted when all federal registration, tax, and transfer requirements are satisfied. [1][6][18]
• Because RSA 159:26 keeps firearm regulation with the state and New Hampshire has enacted no separate suppressor, short-barreled-firearm, or machine-gun ban, an owner who completes the federal making or transfer process on an ATF Form 1 or Form 4 and pays the applicable tax may lawfully possess the item in New Hampshire once approved. The federal registration and transfer timeline, not a state permit, controls when possession may lawfully begin. [18][6]

Safe Storage and Reporting

• New Hampshire's negligent-storage law applies conditionally when a child under sixteen gains access to a loaded firearm and misuses it, with defenses and exceptions for secure storage, close control, training, self-defense, illegal entry, and other circumstances. No general lost-or-stolen reporting deadline applies. [5][1]
• The offense requires that the owner know or reasonably should know a child is likely to gain access without permission, and that the child then use the firearm recklessly or threateningly, use it while committing a misdemeanor or felony, or discharge it negligently or recklessly; a violation is fined up to one thousand dollars. [5]

• The law does not apply if the firearm was kept in a locked box, gun safe, or other secured space, or fitted with a trigger lock. [5]
• The law does not apply if the firearm was on the owner's person or within their immediate reach, if the child completed a firearm-safety or hunter-safety course, or if the child obtained it through illegal entry or theft by someone else. [5]

Restricted Locations and Private Property

• Firearms are prohibited in courtrooms and court-controlled areas, subject to statutory notice and exceptions. Federal facilities, federal school-zone law, private-property directions, and conduct-based offenses also remain relevant. [4][1]
• RSA 159:19 bars knowingly carrying a loaded or unloaded pistol, revolver, firearm, or other deadly weapon into a courthouse, covering an entire building used exclusively for court purposes and, in a mixed-use building, the courtrooms, jury rooms, chambers, court staff areas, holding areas, and connecting corridors and elevators. Violating it is a class B felony. Law enforcement officers, bailiffs, and court security personnel are exempt, court-authorized evidence may be brought in, and it is an affirmative defense that the courthouse failed to post the required notice at each public entrance. [4]

• A private property owner may exclude firearms by posting or a direct request; refusing to leave can support a criminal trespass charge. [1]
• Federal law separately bars firearms in federal facilities and within a school zone absent a qualifying exception, regardless of New Hampshire's permitless-carry rule. [1]

State Preemption and Local Rules

• RSA 159:26 broadly reserves firearm regulation to the state and voids inconsistent local ordinances, while preserving ordinary business zoning and specified discharge-related authority. [6]
• The statute gives the state exclusive authority over the sale, purchase, ownership, use, possession, transportation, licensing, permitting, and taxation of firearms, firearm components, ammunition, firearm supplies, and knives, and it declares any conflicting local ordinance null and void. A city or town keeps only the authority to zone firearm- or knife-related businesses the same way it zones other businesses and to act under the separate hunting-discharge statute, RSA 207:59. The statute provides no private right of action or damages remedy for a person harmed by a noncompliant local ordinance. [6]

Before Completing a Private Firearm Sale in New Hampshire

• Confirm identity, residency, age, and eligibility before a private transfer. [3][15]
• Use an FFL for interstate transfers or whenever eligibility is uncertain. [15]
• Keep firearms out of court-controlled areas and follow private-property directions. [4]
• Consider an optional New Hampshire license for reciprocity during travel. [2][14]
• Complete all federal requirements before possessing an NFA firearm. [18]
• Secure loaded firearms against unauthorized child access and keep serial-number records separately. [5]
• Do not assume a past felony conviction is automatically cleared; confirm eligibility restoration through an RSA 651:5 annulment before possessing a firearm. [9][7]

Official New Hampshire Firearm Law Resources

New Hampshire Gun Law FAQ

Sources

1. 1. New Hampshire RSA Chapter 159, Pistols and RevolversNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 7, 2026.
2. 2. RSA 159:6, License to CarryNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 7, 2026.
3. 3. RSA 159:7 through 159:14, Firearm TransfersNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 7, 2026.
4. 4. RSA 159:19, Courthouse SecurityNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 7, 2026.
5. 5. RSA 650-C:1, Negligent Storage of FirearmsNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 7, 2026.
6. 6. RSA 159:26, State Firearm JurisdictionNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 7, 2026.
7. 7. RSA 159:3, Felonious Use of FirearmsNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 8, 2026.
8. 8. RSA 159:12, Sales to MinorsNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 8, 2026.
9. 9. RSA 651:5, Annulment of Criminal RecordsNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 8, 2026.
10. 10. New Hampshire Constitution, Part First, Article 2-aState of New Hampshire. State agency. Accessed August 14, 2026.
11. 11. RSA 627:4, Physical Force in Defense of a PersonNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 14, 2026.
12. 12. RSA 627:7 and 627:8, Use of Force in Defense of Premises and PropertyNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 14, 2026.
13. 13. RSA 627:1-a, Civil ImmunityNew Hampshire General Court. State statute. Accessed August 14, 2026.
14. 14. Pistol and Revolver LicensingNew Hampshire State Police. State agency. Accessed August 7, 2026.
15. 15. Firearms Questions and Answers: Unlicensed PersonsBureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Federal agency. Accessed August 7, 2026.
16. 16. Minimum Age for Gun Sales and TransfersBureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Federal agency. Accessed August 7, 2026.
17. 17. National Instant Criminal Background Check SystemFederal Bureau of Investigation. Federal agency. Accessed August 7, 2026.
18. 18. National Firearms ActBureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Federal agency. Accessed August 7, 2026.
19. 19. 18 U.S.C. 926A, Interstate Transportation of FirearmsOffice of the Law Revision Counsel. Federal statute. Accessed August 7, 2026.
20. 20. 18 U.S.C. 922(b)(3), Interstate Sale of Rifles and ShotgunsOffice of the Law Revision Counsel. Federal statute. Accessed August 14, 2026.