January started out strong in the firearms world and ended with a bang at SHOT Show 2023 in Las Vegas. There’s a lot of new guns to look forward to this year, that’s for sure. Not everything was bright shining lights with the ATF working hard to take away pistol braces from millions of ordinary gun owners…again.

But Americans spoke with their wallets. We’ve tossed together a nice list of the best-selling guns here at Guns.com for the month of January. They include some classic American gems as well as a somewhat surprising new top pick for the rifle category. Shotguns also got a new king of the hill, which finally broke the streak of budget-friendly champions that dominated most of 2022.

So, without wasting any more time, here were American gun buyers’ top picks last month.

Top 5 Handguns

Americans love their 1911s, but it’s not actually that often we see them dominating at the top of the list. Rolling into the best-selling handgun position for January was the affordable but reliable Tisas 1911A1 Tanker. Tisas 1911s have made the top five before, and the fan base of these affordable guns is clearly growing. Coming in second and third were the Taurus G2c and Glock 43X, which was about par for the course back in 2022.

The trusty M&P 9 Shield pulled into fourth place. That left SIG Sauer to grab fifth with its P365XL Spectre Comp, partly thanks to a killer deal that we had on them last month. Over the past several months, budget-friendly guns have dominated the handgun arena. But that didn’t pan out in the rifle and shotgun selections below.

Top 5 Rifles & Carbines

In a somewhat surprising development, the heavy-hitting but easy-shooting Ruger SFAR easily clinched first place. While it’s not too pricey for an AR-10, there’s no denying the huge cost difference between our second place gun – the polymer Plum Crazy AR with a 60-round magazine. We’re pretty sure a sweet review of the SFAR helped it along the way.

The affordable Hi-Point 995TS carbine came in third but still well behind our number one and two spots. Tied for fourth at the bottom of our list were the Marlin 1895 Trapper and the Century Arms WASR-M AK.

Top 5 Shotguns

Mossberg shook up the shotgun list by easily – and we do mean easily – grabbing first with its rather new 940 Pro Tactical semi-auto shotgun. We saw a ton of interest in this tactical scattergun when we announced its launch early last year. But supplies quickly dried up faster than we could put new ones on the shelves. Clearly, the interest never went away. Perhaps more curious was the similar love for Mossberg's 590A1 Retrograde, earning it a second-place finish. 

Tactical-style shotguns were clearly the movers and shakers for January, because they owned the rest of the list as well. From third to fifth, we had the ever-popular Mossberg Maverick 88 Security, Mossberg’s 500 Tactical, and KelTec’s KS7. It would have been interesting to see a clean sweep by Mossberg, but we think they’ll be happy with those numbers.