The Gun Industry’s 16.5 Percent August Comeback Is Being Graded on a Very Generous Curve
The FBI logged 2,111,146 background checks in August, up 16.5 percent over last year and the biggest annual jump since 2021. The fine print: last August set a decade low.
August 2026 NICS background checks came in at 2,111,146, up 16.5 percent from the same month last year. The FBI posted the updated monthly tables Thursday morning.
That 16.5 percent jump is the largest year-over-year gain for any month since April 2021. It’s also the third straight month of annual growth: June ran 4.2 percent ahead of 2025, July stretched the lead to 9.4 percent, and August blew the doors off.
Before anyone pops champagne over the industry rebound, a word about the curve this comeback is being graded on. August 2025, the month being beaten here, was the weakest August in the NICS system since 2015.
Clearing the lowest bar in a decade by 16.5 percent is real progress. It’s also the statistical equivalent of setting a personal record the week after you skipped leg day. Still, up is up.
The scoreboard: this August’s 2.11 million checks still trail August 2023 (2.14 million) and August 2024 (2.25 million), and they’re nowhere near the 3.1 million the panic-buying summer of 2020 put up. The trend finally points the right way. The altitude is still low.
The year so far: 17,430,065 checks through August, against 17,457,892 through the same eight months of 2025. That’s a gap of 0.16 percent, which a statistician calls flat and a gun counter calls a staring contest.
One caveat the FBI staples to its own tables: a NICS check is not a gun sale. The raw number includes permit checks, permit rechecks, and transactions where one check covers multiple firearms.
That’s why NSSF publishes an adjusted figure that strips out the permit noise, and that adjusted number hadn’t posted as of this writing. Expect it to tell the same directional story at a lower altitude.
The wild card: August was the first month lived almost entirely under the federal injunction that ended NFA registration for suppressors and short-barreled rifles, in effect since August 12. A suppressor still crosses the counter with a background check; it just skips the registration wait that used to keep buyers on the sidelines for months.
Nobody can cleanly say how much of the August bump traces to that, and we won’t pretend to. It’s the variable to watch as the fall numbers roll in.
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September’s tables land in early October and will show whether this is a bounce or a turn. The grading stays generous for one more month, because last September was nearly as weak as last August. October is when the comparison gets honest. (We’re keeping score.)
Do the August numbers match what you’re seeing at your local gun counter? Let us know in the comments.
Sources: FBI NICS month-by-year tables and day-by-month tables, retrieved September 3, 2026.
Justin Trump is the managing editor and owner of CAT Outdoors. The son of a Vietnam veteran, he’s a Certified Glock Armorer, an avid gun enthusiast and 2A advocate. He holds two firearm patents for the CAT M4 and Talon tools. When not managing CAT Outdoors, he enjoys spending time with his family and friends, rooting for Michigan sports teams, and serving his church.