July Gun Sales Up, NICS tops 1 Million Each of Last 60 Months in a Row

All signs point to Americans continuing to reach for their wallets when it comes to practicing the right to keep and bear arms

Last month was the fifth highest July on record in terms of federal background checks for likely over-the-counter gun transfers since the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System was established over 20 years ago.

The unadjusted figure of 2,021,235 checks conducted through NICS last month is 1.7 percent higher than the unadjusted FBI NICS figure of 1,987,650 in July 2023.

Crunching the numbers for last month by the National Shooting Sports Foundation to remove gun permit checks and rechecks, the adjusted figure stands at 1,064,790, which is a 4-percent bump compared to the July 2023 NSSF-adjusted NICS figure of 1,023,903.

But perhaps the biggest piece of news when looking at last month’s NICS figures is that July 2024 marks the 60th consecutive month – five solid years – that has exceeded 1 million adjusted background checks in a single month.

And with America headed into a contentious election cycle where one side is on record advocating strict gun control and the other is kind of dialing it in when it comes to gun rights, you can likely expect those figures to keep on climbing.