NFA Form 4 Applications for Suppressors up 394 Percent

All signs point to a bumper year for suppressor sales as last month saw roughly the same number of ATF Form 4s submitted as in a full third of 2025.

The ATF published its official NFA Processing Times & Statistics on Thursday, disclosing it had received 464,746 Form 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 making and transfer applications since Jan. 1, 2026. Of those, 325,075 have been processed with an average turnaround time of about 10 days. Silencer Central confirmed the average wait time.

When it comes to just Form 4 transfer applications for suppressors, they received 240,270. As explained to Guns.com by the American Suppressor Association, "This represents a 394 percent increase over the 2025 monthly average and 33 percent of the entire year's 2025 application volume." Of note, there were only 731,623 tax-paid Form 4s submitted for suppressor transfers in all of calendar year 2025.

That's a lot of cans, no matter how you do the math.

The graph above is "based on official numbers published by ATF beginning in June 2025. No data was published for September due to the government shutdown in October, and no data was published for December due to the significant increase in ATF form submissions in January." (Graph: ASA)

As of Jan. 5, 2026, the government's NFRTR had a total of 5,776,685 suppressors registered, with the highest number on file (1,973,702) attributed to legal trusts or corporate entities. Another 1,891,352 were listed on file to individuals, while FFLs/SOTs had 1,461,118 in their inventory. Meanwhile, government, military, and LE users had 443,872 cans on file, pointing to the "citizenry at large," not counting FFLs and manufacturers, having an almost 9-to-1 advantage in terms of quiet power when compared to the G.

Still, rookie numbers, folks. Pump it up!

Banner image: FN QD suppressors, new for 2026 in both 5.56 and 7.62. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

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