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Georgia Concealed Carry Permit

Georgia allows permitless carry for non-prohibited adults 21+. A WCL is still available and is what other states recognize.

Permitless carry is legal in Georgia

A non-prohibited adult aged 21 or older may carry a concealed handgun without a permit (since 2022). Georgia is a permitless-carry ('constitutional carry') state. SB 319 took effect on the Governor's approval, April 12, 2022. It added the definition of 'lawful weapons carrier' to O.C.G.A. § 16-11-125.1 — verbatim: 'any person who is licensed or eligible for a license pursuant to Code Section 16-11-129 and who is not otherwise prohibited by law from possessing a weapon or long gun, any resident of any other state who would otherwise be eligible to obtain a license pursuant to such Code section but for the residency requirement, and any person licensed to carry a weapon in any other state' — and rewrote § 16-11-126 to read 'Except as otherwise provided in subsections (a) through (f) of this Code section, no person shall carry a weapon unless he or she is a lawful weapons carrier.' Practical effect: a person 21+ (or 18+ with qualifying U.S. armed forces basic training) who is not otherwise prohibited may carry a handgun openly or concealed with NO permit. Because the trigger is ELIGIBILITY for a WCL, anyone who could not lawfully be issued a WCL also may not carry permitlessly. Georgia.gov states plainly: 'You do not need a WCL to purchase or carry a firearm in Georgia.' Carrying while not a lawful weapons carrier is a misdemeanor for a first offense and a FELONY punishable by 2–5 years for a second offense within five years. Location restrictions (O.C.G.A. §§ 16-11-127, 16-11-127.1, 16-11-135, plus federal facilities) still apply, and a WCL is still worth holding for out-of-state reciprocity and certain in-state exemptions. AMENDMENT AUDIT (re-verified 2026-09-15 against the Office of Legislative Counsel's official 'Table of Code Sections Amended, Repealed, and Enacted' for every session since 2022, rather than by keyword-sweeping bill titles): section 16-11-125.1 was amended in 2022 by SB 319 only and has NOT been touched in the 2023, 2024, 2025 or 2026 sessions. Section 16-11-126 was amended in 2022 by BOTH SB 319 (Act 596, effective April 12, 2022) and HB 218 (Act 597, effective July 1, 2022) and has NOT been amended in 2023, 2024, 2025 or 2026. The permitless-carry rule therefore stands exactly as enacted in 2022. Current subsection letters after SB 319's renumbering: (d) recognition of out-of-state licenses, (g) the 'no person shall carry a weapon unless he or she is a lawful weapons carrier' prohibition, (h) the penalty ladder (first offense a misdemeanour; a second within five years and any subsequent offense a felony punishable by 2-5 years). SB 319 took effect 'upon its approval by the Governor', which Legislative Counsel records as April 12, 2022.

Getting the permit anyway is still worth it for most people: other states recognize the permit, not your residency, so without one you generally cannot carry across state lines.

O.C.G.A. § 16-11-125.1(2.1) ('lawful weapons carrier') and O.C.G.A. § 16-11-126, as amended by 2022 Ga. Laws Act 596 (SB 319, whose own Section 1 gives the short title 'Chairman John Meadows Act'; the Governor's office and the press called it the Georgia Constitutional Carry Act), effective April 12, 2022. Section 16-11-126 was further amended the same year by 2022 Ga. Laws Act 597 (HB 218), effective July 1, 2022.

There are 7 details on this page we could not confirm from a primary source. Read what they are before relying on this.

Requirements at a glance

Permit name Georgia Weapons Carry License
Issuing authority Judge of the Probate Court of the applicant's county of residence (Georgia has no single statewide issuing agency; the Council of Probate Court Judges of Georgia coordinates the 159 county courts)
System shall-issue
Minimum age 21 — 21 for the standard license and for permitless carry. 18-20 year olds may obtain a WCL (and therefore carry) only with proof that they completed basic training in the U.S. armed forces and are on active duty or were honorably discharged. On May 28, 2025 the Supreme Court of Georgia, in Stephens v. State of Georgia, unanimously upheld the under-21 public-carry restriction against a challenge brought under Article I, Section I, Paragraph VIII of the Georgia Constitution; the court relied on that clause's 'manner' language and declined to import federal Second Amendment tests. A separate federal Second Amendment challenge (Baughcum v. Jackson / Georgia Second Amendment, Inc. v. Governor of Georgia) was vacated and remanded by the Eleventh Circuit in July 2026 and is pending again in the Northern District of Georgia; the 21 threshold remains in force today. Note also that 2024 Ga. Laws Act 389 (HB 299) amended section 16-11-129 to add the United States Space Force to the military branches the statute lists, so Space Force basic training now counts for the 18-20 exception.
Training required No
State fee $75 initial / $30 renewal — the state's own charge, not the total
Valid for 5 years
Processing time Roughly 30-45 days in practice. By statute (O.C.G.A. section 16-11-129(d)) the probate judge must, within five business days of receiving the application, direct the law enforcement agency to request a fingerprint-based criminal history check from GCIC and the FBI, and must issue the license not later than ten days after receiving the agency's report. Georgia.gov describes the background check as taking about 30 days, which is a descriptive estimate and not a legal deadline. The applicant must be fingerprinted within five business days of filing; Gwinnett's probate court warns that missing that window means the application is administratively dismissed and must be refiled at the full fee.
Fingerprints Required
Non-resident permit Not available

What it actually costs

The state fee is rarely the whole bill. Fingerprinting is usually charged by a private vendor, training is bought from an instructor, and several states add photographs, notarisation or other requirements on top.

State fee $75
Fingerprinting $5
County probate court fee varies — set locally, not by statute: Gwinnett $72, Fulton $77, Chatham $77, Coffee $81.50
Realistic total $72–$87

O.C.G.A. section 16-11-129(a) fixes the license fee itself at $30.00 and section 16-11-129(c) gives the law enforcement agency $5.00 for fingerprinting; the variable piece is the GBI/FBI records search, for which the GBI 'may charge such fee as is necessary to cover the cost'. The $75 Georgia publishes is an average of what counties collect all-in, not a fee anyone is entitled to pay. No training is required, so the county's charge is essentially the whole bill, and renewal drops back to about the $30 statutory fee because prints are not retaken.

O.C.G.A. section 16-11-129(a) sets a statutory license fee of $30.00, and section 16-11-129(c) entitles the law enforcement agency to a $5.00 fee for fingerprinting; on top of that the GBI 'may charge such fee as is necessary to cover the cost of the records search'. That records-search charge, not county discretion over the license fee, is why a new license costs far more than $30. The 75 figure here is Georgia.gov's stated statewide AVERAGE of what counties collect all-in ('The average fee is $75, but it varies by county'), not a statutory amount. County amounts re-verified 2026-09-15 and all unchanged: Gwinnett $72 new / $30 renewal / $6 duplicate / $1 temporary renewal, plus 2.5% on card payments; Fulton $77 new / $35 renewal / $6 for retired law enforcement; Chatham $77 new (includes fingerprinting and the background search) / $30 renewal / $6 replacement / $1 temporary, and $0 for retired law enforcement, plus 5% on card payments; Coffee $81.50 new / $30 renewal. Renewals sit at or near the bare $30 statutory fee because fingerprints are not retaken. No refunds if the application is denied or the prints come back illegible. Confirm the exact amount with your own county's probate court.

How to apply

  1. FIRST, check whether you need this license at all. Georgia has permitless carry: under O.C.G.A. sections 16-11-125.1(2.1) and 16-11-126(g), a 'lawful weapons carrier' -- a person 21 or older, or 18 or older with qualifying U.S. armed forces basic training, who is eligible for a WCL and not otherwise prohibited by law -- may carry a handgun openly or concealed with NO permit. Georgia.gov states plainly: 'You do not need a WCL to purchase or carry a firearm in Georgia.' People still apply because the license buys recognition in the states on the Attorney General's list and certain in-state exemptions.
  2. Confirm eligibility: 21 or older (or 18 or older with proof of basic training in the U.S. armed forces -- including the Space Force, added to section 16-11-129 by 2024 Ga. Laws Act 389 -- plus active duty or an honorable discharge), a resident of the Georgia county where you apply, a U.S. citizen or lawfully present non-citizen, and not disqualified by criminal, drug, or mental-health history.
  3. Locate your county's Probate Court. There are 159 of them and there is no statewide online application: applications are filed in person in your county of residence. Use the Council of Probate Court Judges' directory at georgiaprobatecourt.com, or call 1-800-GEORGIA / 1-800-436-7442.
  4. Bring valid photo ID -- a Georgia driver's license or state ID showing a current physical street address in that county, as P.O. boxes and business or mail-service addresses are refused -- plus proof of citizenship or lawful presence (naturalization certificate, USCIS number, or a certified birth certificate or passport if foreign-born), and, if you are 18-20, your DD-214 or active-duty orders showing completed basic training.
  5. Complete and swear to the application at the probate court and pay the county's fee. O.C.G.A. section 16-11-129(a) sets the license fee at $30.00, but counties add the $5.00 statutory fingerprint fee and the GBI/FBI records-search cost, so a new license runs roughly $72-$82 (Gwinnett $72, Fulton $77, Chatham $77, Coffee $81.50). Fees are non-refundable even if you are denied.
  6. Get fingerprinted within five business days of filing -- at the probate court, at the designated county law enforcement agency, or at a GBI-approved fingerprint vendor. The court may issue a Law Enforcement Affidavit for you to take with you. Missing the five-business-day window gets the application administratively dismissed, and you pay the full fee again.
  7. Wait for the GCIC/FBI fingerprint-based background check, about 30 days. Under section 16-11-129(d) the probate judge must issue within ten days after receiving the law enforcement report unless disqualifying facts are found.
  8. Receive your license, valid five years. Apply for renewal within the 90 days before expiration, or up to 30 days after, to get the reduced renewal fee of about $30-$35; fingerprints are not retaken on renewal, only a name-and-identifier check. More than 30 days past expiry and you must apply as a new applicant at the full fee.

Apply on the official Georgia site

What disqualifies you

Where to get the required training

Georgia does not publish a central list of certified instructors. Confirm directly with Judge of the Probate Court of the applicant's county of residence (Georgia has no single statewide issuing agency; the Council of Probate Court Judges of Georgia coordinates the 159 county courts) that a course will be accepted before you pay for it.

Training providers in Georgia

Businesses in our directory that offer firearms training. These are not state-verified as certified permit instructors — check against the official list above, or ask the provider directly.

All firearms training in Georgia →

Reciprocity

Carrying into Georgia

Georgia recognizes permits from 32 other jurisdictions.

Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, North Dakota, New Hampshire, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin, West Virginia, Wyoming

31 jurisdictions honor a Georgia permit

Derived from what each of those states officially publishes.

Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin, West Virginia, Wyoming

Official Georgia reciprocity page Full reciprocity matrix →

Building your own in Georgia

Build for personal use
Allowed
Serial number required
No

Georgia law permits an individual who may lawfully possess a firearm to build one for personal use. There is no Georgia firearm registry: O.C.G.A. § 16-11-173 declares firearm regulation a matter of state-wide concern and bars counties, municipalities, and every state agency other than the General Assembly from regulating 'the possession, ownership, transport, carrying, transfer, sale, purchase, licensing, or registration of firearms or other weapons or components of firearms or other weapons.' Georgia has enacted no serialization mandate for privately made firearms, no 'ghost gun' statute, and no unfinished frame/receiver law as of the close of the 2026 session. What Georgia DOES criminalize is O.C.G.A. § 16-9-70: buying, selling, receiving, disposing of, concealing, or possessing a firearm knowing that the manufacturer's name plate, serial number, or other distinguishing identification mark has been removed or altered for the purpose of concealing or destroying the article's identity. That forbids defacing an existing serial number; it does not require adding one to a firearm that never had one. Federal law applies independently: unlicensed making for personal use is permitted under the Gun Control Act, but the National Firearms Act governs NFA items, 18 U.S.C. § 922(p) bans undetectable firearms, prohibited-person rules apply, making with intent to sell requires an FFL, and ATF Final Rule 2021R-05F requires serialization once a licensee takes a frame/receiver into inventory. The claim that Georgia requires serialization of firearms manufactured after July 1, 2024, asserted by one secondary write-up seen in the August pass, is now affirmatively refuted from a primary source: the Office of Legislative Counsel's official tables of code sections amended, repealed, and enacted for the 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026 sessions contain no serialization provision at all, and a July 1, 2024 effective date would necessarily appear in the 2024 table. Those same tables show sections 16-11-173 and 16-9-70 untouched across all five sessions, the one attempt on section 16-11-173 -- 2026 SB 204 -- having been vetoed (Veto No. 10). Both statutes therefore stand as quoted above.

No Georgia statute prohibits or regulates making a firearm for personal use. See O.C.G.A. § 16-11-173 (state preemption of firearm regulation, expressly including 'registration' and 'components of firearms'), O.C.G.A. § 16-9-70 (criminal use of an article with an altered identification mark), and O.C.G.A. § 16-11-125.1 et seq.

Federal law, gunsmithing schools, and tools →

Statutes

What we could not confirm

  • Fee figures: the 75 in fees.initial is Georgia.gov's stated statewide AVERAGE of what counties collect all-in, not a legal amount. The statutory pieces are fixed -- a $30.00 license fee under O.C.G.A. section 16-11-129(a) and $5.00 for fingerprinting under (c) -- but the GBI records-search charge is set at cost and is what makes the total vary. Verified county totals on 2026-09-15 ran $72 (Gwinnett) to $81.50 (Coffee) for a new license and $30 to $35 on renewal. Ask your own probate court for the exact number before you go.
  • No official current-code database could be read on 2026-09-15. The free LexisNexis O.C.G.A. portal is a JavaScript application that will not render; law.justia.com returned HTTP 403 and ga.elaws.us returned HTTP 503 to every request, both via WebFetch and via curl with a browser user-agent. The substance of sections 16-11-125.1, 16-11-126 and 16-11-129 in this record is therefore taken verbatim from the enrolled SB 319 and HB 218 PDFs plus the Office of Legislative Counsel's official session summaries, and the compiled current subsection letters -- (d) out-of-state recognition, (g) the lawful-weapons-carrier requirement, (h) penalties -- are corroborated by a commercial reproduction that states it is current as of March 28, 2024. The internal paragraph structure WITHIN section 16-11-126(d) is the one thing still unpinned: SB 319 and HB 218 both edited that subsection in 2022 under different letterings and I could not read the code compiler's reconciliation, so treat '(d)(1)(A)' and '(d)(1)(B)' as a careful reconstruction rather than as quotable pin cites.
  • The Attorney General's reciprocity page still carries NO published last-updated date, and the DPS page mirrors it. Both were re-read on 2026-09-15 and both still name exactly the same 32 states as in August 2026, so nothing has visibly moved -- but this list can go stale relative to other states' changes without any signal appearing on the page. Re-verify before relying on it for interstate travel.
  • Federal litigation over Georgia's 21-and-over carry age is live. The Eleventh Circuit vacated and remanded Georgia Second Amendment, Inc. v. Governor of Georgia (Baughcum v. Jackson) in July 2026 for the district court to apply recent Supreme Court precedent, and the case is pending again in the Northern District of Georgia. I confirmed the vacate-and-remand and its month but could not read the order itself on a court website, so the precise date the baseline gave (July 24, 2026) is not independently verified here. The 21 threshold is in force today and minAge and permitlessCarry.minAge reflect that, but this is the field most likely to move next.
  • The processing figures mix two kinds of number. The five-business-day and ten-day deadlines are statutory (section 16-11-129(d)) but are quoted here from the enrolled bill and a commercial reproduction rather than from an official current-code page. The '30 days' is Georgia.gov's descriptive estimate and is not a legal deadline at all.
  • 'nonResidentPermitAvailable' is false because every probate court requires county residency; the narrow exception is active-duty military stationed in Georgia, who may apply in their duty-station county (Chatham expressly accommodates personnel at Fort Stewart and Hunter Army Airfield). Note separately that non-residents aged 21 and over generally do not NEED a Georgia permit, because section 16-11-125.1(2.1) makes any out-of-state licensee -- and any out-of-state resident who would be eligible but for residency -- a 'lawful weapons carrier'.
  • Because Georgia has 159 independently administered probate courts, everything procedural in this record (the exact document list, accepted payment methods, whether prints are taken on site, card surcharges) is generalised from four courts -- Gwinnett, Fulton, Chatham and Coffee -- which happen to agree with one another. A smaller county may differ in these details without being out of compliance with section 16-11-129.

Sources