When background checks for gun sales dipped below 1 million last July, anti-gun advocates sighed with relief. The nearly six-year-long streak had come to an end, and gun-banners were hopeful it would usher in a new era of lower gun sales.
Judging by the latest March numbers, those hopes were false.
The March National Shooting Sports Foundation-adjusted National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) figure of 1,412,917 is a 1.9% increase from the 1,386,724 in March 2025. It is also a 13% increase over the February total. For comparison, the unadjusted March 2026 FBI NICS figure of 2,212,094 reflects a 10.5% decrease from the unadjusted March 2025 figure of 2,470,705.
The latest monthly total of over 1 million monthly gun sales in March marked the eighth consecutive month with more than 1 million background checks, after the single month in July 2025 with fewer than 1 million.
“March’s Adjusted NICS figure of over 1.4 million checks for the sale of a firearm represents a healthy and steady growth in the interest of Americans to freely exercise their Second Amendment rights,” Oliva said.
Oliva said that the interest in practicing Second Amendment rights is most evident in Virginia, where legislation sits on Democrat Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s desk to unconstitutionally ban an entire class of firearms, along with many other infringements.
“Virginians are quite literally voting with their wallets on how they view this pending ban,” he said. “Virginia’s background checks for all firearms sold increased by 70% over the same month last year, to 79,383 background checks, which was up from 46,659 this time last year. That follows a 55 percent increase reported in February’s background check figures.”
And, according to Oliva, his organization doesn’t expect that trend to end anytime soon.
“We expect this figure to continue to rise, as it is expected Gov. Spanberger will ignore the will of the citizens of the Commonwealth to violate her own state constitution and the U.S. Constitution to bar the sale of the most-popular selling centerfire rifle in America today—the Modern Sporting Rifle,” he said.
According to the NSSF, the top five states for overall Adjusted NICS checks in March were Texas, Florida, California, Pennsylvania, and Colorado. The top five for handgun NICS checks were Texas, Florida, California, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Leading the nation in long gun checks were Texas, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Florida, and California.
Although not directly correlated to firearms sales, the NSSF-adjusted NICS data offer an additional view of current market conditions. Besides other uses, NICS is used to verify transactions for the sale or transfer of new or used firearms.
Notably, 28 states have at least one qualified alternative permit, which, under the Brady Act, allows the permit holder, who has undergone a background check, to purchase a firearm from a licensed dealer without a separate background check for that transfer. The number of NICS checks in these states does not include legal transfers made with qualifying permits, so the actual number of gun sales is likely much higher.
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