Texas firearm law has several topics that don't fit neatly into the canonical sections. This catalog covers magazine capacity (no limit), body armor...
Reviewed by Will Luker, Founder of CCW Hub. USCCA Training Counselor, USCCA Certified Instructor, NRA Certified Instructor, Law Enforcement.
Texas firearm law has several topics that don't fit neatly into the canonical sections. This catalog covers magazine capacity (no limit), body armor restrictions, knives, the Texas Suppressor Freedom Act, antique firearms, hog hunting from aircraft, lost-and-stolen reporting (no mandate), and estate inheritance. Each topic gives the bottom-line answer first, then the statute, then the nuance.
Texas does not impose any magazine capacity limit. Standard-capacity and high-capacity magazines are lawful to own, possess, transport, and use anywhere in the state. Chapter 46 of the Penal Code contains no capacity-based restriction, and the term "magazine" appears in Chapter 46 only in incidental, definitional contexts. Tex. Penal Code § 46.05 (Prohibited Weapons) lists machine guns, short-barrel firearms, explosive weapons, armor-piercing ammunition, chemical dispensing devices, zip guns, tire deflation devices, and improvised explosive devices, but contains no magazine-capacity item. (Suppressors are NOT listed in § 46.05; they are governed solely by federal NFA registration in Texas - see NFA_ITEMS.)
This matters operationally because several states impose hard capacity caps (California, New York, New Jersey, Colorado, Washington, and others). A Texas LTC holder who travels with a standard-capacity pistol magazine or a standard rifle magazine is lawful in Texas without qualification. Cross a state line into a capacity-limit jurisdiction and the federal Firearm Owners Protection Act safe-harbor at 18 U.S.C. § 926A may protect transport (unloaded, locked, separate from ammunition, in a vehicle making an otherwise-lawful trip), but it does not protect possession at the destination. Texas's preemption statute (Tex. Local Gov't Code § 229.001) further blocks any city, county, or special-purpose district from adopting a magazine-capacity ordinance, so there is no Texas jurisdiction in which a different rule applies. Tex. Gov't Code § 411.209 is a separate provision, barring a state agency or political subdivision from giving notice that states or implies a license holder carrying a handgun is prohibited from entering or remaining on a premises the governmental entity owns or leases.
For instructors: when a student asks "how big a magazine can I carry in Texas," the answer is whatever fits and whatever the firearm will accept. There is no ceiling.
Body armor is generally lawful for civilian purchase, possession, and use in Texas. There is no Texas LTC or registration requirement to own body armor, and no general state-law prohibition on wearing it in public.
The narrow exception is at Tex. Penal Code § 46.041, which makes it a third-degree felony for a person convicted of a felony to possess metal or body armor after the conviction. Subsection (b) defines the prohibited item as "any body armor, made of metal or other material, that is designed to prevent or to lessen the chance of penetration by a bullet, knife, or other similar piercing instrument." A "felony" for purposes of § 46.041 includes a conviction in any state or federal court for which Texas would also classify the offense as a felony, and an order of deferred adjudication that has not been set aside.
The federal layer is parallel. Under 18 U.S.C. § 931, a person convicted of a federal or state "crime of violence" felony is barred from purchasing, owning, or possessing body armor, with a narrow employment-related affirmative defense. The Texas § 46.041 prohibition is broader on the prior-conviction side (any felony, not only crimes of violence), so a felon in Texas can be charged under state law in circumstances where the federal § 931 charge would not apply.
For non-prohibited civilians, soft Level IIIA carriers and Level III/IV rifle plates are lawful to buy, own, wear, and store. Use of body armor in the commission of an offense is a sentencing-enhancement issue, not a separate possession offense, and falls under generally applicable Texas sentencing rules.
Texas knife law was substantially deregulated in two recent sessions. Before September 1, 2017, switchblade and gravity-knife possession was a separate Penal Code offense. HB 1935 (85th Legislature, Regular Session, 2017) repealed those provisions and rewrote Tex. Penal Code § 46.01 to introduce the term "location-restricted knife": a knife with a blade more than five and one-half inches.
Under current § 46.02(a-4) and § 46.03(a), a person may carry a knife of any kind on their own premises. Carrying a "location-restricted knife" is prohibited at the places § 46.03(a) lists: schools and postsecondary educational institutions, polling places on election day or while early voting is in progress, government courts and offices used by the court, racetracks, secured areas of an airport, within 1,000 feet of a designated place of execution on a day a death sentence is set to be imposed there after the required notice, premises that derive 51 percent or more of their income from on-premises alcohol sales, premises where a high school, collegiate, professional, or interscholastic sporting event is taking place, correctional facilities, civil commitment facilities, hospitals and nursing facilities, mental hospitals, amusement parks, and the room where an open meeting of a governmental entity is held after the required notice. Places of religious worship are not on that list, so § 46.03(a) does not restrict a location-restricted knife at a church, synagogue, or mosque. Under § 46.03(g-1) a location-restricted knife offense is a Class C misdemeanor, except that it is a felony of the third degree when committed under § 46.03(a)(1).
HB 446 (86th Legislature, Regular Session, 2019) repealed Texas's longstanding knuckles ban. Brass knuckles and similar self-defense knuckle devices became legal to manufacture, sell, possess, and carry on September 1, 2019. The "knuckles" item was struck from Tex. Penal Code § 46.05.
Practical takeaways for a Texas LTC class: a pocket knife with a blade of five and one-half inches or less is lawful to carry virtually anywhere a person can lawfully be. A bowie, machete, or fixed-blade hunting knife with a blade longer than five and one-half inches is lawful in most settings but triggers the location-restricted carve-outs above. Switchblades, automatics, OTF knives, and traditional knuckles are no longer separate Penal Code violations.
Texas authorizes the use of helicopters and other aircraft for the management of feral hogs and other depredating animals through a state permit framework that has no parallel in most other states.
The statutory base is Tex. Parks & Wild. Code § 43.109 (the "Aerial Wildlife Management Permit," or AWM permit), which authorizes Texas Parks and Wildlife to issue permits for the management of wildlife or exotic species by means of aircraft to control depredating animals (including feral hogs and coyotes), to count and survey populations, and to capture animals. Section 43.108 supports the AWM-related Landowner Authorization (LOA) framework. The permit is held by the operator (the pilot/aviation company); a participating gunner ("hunter") signs an LOA, completes Texas-mandated training, and pays the operator for the experience. AWM operators may charge gunners.
The hunt is not "hog hunting" in the recreational sense. It is depredation control conducted under a state-issued permit, on private land with a written LOA from the landowner, with mandatory hunter training, with no general bag limits on feral hogs, and frequently with semi-automatic rifles fed from standard- or extended-capacity magazines. Federal aviation, ITAR, and machine-gun rules continue to apply to the aircraft and to any NFA items used in the operation. State law sits on top of those federal requirements; the AWM permit does not waive any federal aviation rule, NFA registration requirement, or 26 U.S.C. § 5841 obligation.
For an instructor: this is one of a handful of state-specific frameworks that students hear about in advertising and ask about in class. The accurate answer is that AWM is a real Texas permit, that the experience runs through a TPWD-licensed operator, and that the federal NFA, FAA, and 18 U.S.C. § 922(g) rules continue to apply throughout.
Texas has no state-law rule on pistol braces. The state Penal Code's "short-barrel firearm" definition at § 46.01(10) tracks the federal NFA definition by cross-reference to 26 U.S.C. § 5845, which means whatever the federal rule says about braced pistols controls in Texas.
The federal status is currently disputed. ATF Final Rule 2021R-08F, "Factoring Criteria for Firearms with Attached 'Stabilizing Braces,'" 88 Fed. Reg. 6478 (Jan. 31, 2023), declared that most braced pistols meet the NFA definition of a short-barreled rifle, requiring registration and a $200 making tax. The Fifth Circuit vacated the rule's application to plaintiffs in Mock v. Garland, 75 F.4th 563 (5th Cir. 2023), and the Northern District of Texas vacated the rule on Administrative Procedure Act grounds in Britto v. ATF, No. 2:23-cv-00019-Z (N.D. Tex. 2024). The legal posture continues to evolve through appeals.
For Texas residents, the practical guidance is conservative: Texas has no state-level pistol-brace rule, but the federal rule and the federal litigation control. An owner of a braced pistol should track the current status of the rule, the scope of any nationwide injunction, and the ATF amnesty registration window before relying on a particular configuration. A Texas LTC class is not the place to give definitive federal-rule advice; it is the place to flag that the rule is federal, that it is disputed, and that the student needs current counsel before building or modifying.
In 2021, Texas enacted HB 957 (87th Legislature, Regular Session), the "Texas Suppressor Freedom Act," now codified in part at Tex. Gov't Code § 2.052. The Act declares that a firearm suppressor manufactured in Texas and that remains in Texas is not subject to federal law or federal regulation under the Commerce Clause, and provides that Texas state agencies and local law enforcement may not enforce a federal regulation, statute, or rule that does not exist under Texas law concerning a firearm suppressor manufactured and remaining in Texas.
The federal position is contrary. The National Firearms Act (26 U.S.C. ch. 53) and ATF regulations (27 C.F.R. § 479.11) continue to define a "firearm" to include a silencer/suppressor without any in-state-manufacture exception, and ATF has consistently taken the position that NFA registration, the $200 making tax (Form 1) or transfer tax (Form 4), and federal background checks apply to all suppressors manufactured or transferred in the United States, including those built and kept entirely within Texas. The federal courts have not adopted the in-state-manufacture exemption theory in any binding decision protecting Texas residents from NFA prosecution.
The legal exposure is real. A Texas resident who builds an unregistered suppressor in reliance on HB 957 can face federal prosecution under 26 U.S.C. § 5861 (possession of an unregistered NFA firearm) carrying up to ten years and $250,000, with a parallel forfeiture under 26 U.S.C. § 5872. State sovereignty and Tenth Amendment defenses raised in similar Kansas (Kettler) and Missouri prosecutions have not succeeded. For instructors, the only safe answer is to advise students that the federal NFA process (Form 1 or Form 4, fingerprints, photographs, $200 tax, ATF approval, tax stamp) is the route to lawful suppressor possession in Texas, regardless of HB 957's text.
Tex. Penal Code § 46.03(a)(1) makes it an offense to intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly possess or go with a firearm "on the premises of a school or postsecondary educational institution, on any grounds or building owned by and under the control of a school or postsecondary educational institution and on which an activity sponsored by the school or institution is being conducted, or in a passenger transportation vehicle of a school or postsecondary educational institution, whether the school or postsecondary educational institution is public or private," unless the person acts "pursuant to written regulations or written authorization of the school or institution" or comes within the postsecondary concealed-handgun exception printed at § 46.03(a)(1)(B). The subsection names three places: the premises, the grounds or building owned by and under the control of the school on which a sponsored activity is being conducted, and the passenger transportation vehicle. The "premises" definition at § 46.03(c)(4) reads: "a building or a portion of a building. The term does not include any public or private driveway, street, sidewalk or walkway, parking lot, parking garage, or other parking area." That definition answers the premises element only; the grounds clause and the transportation-vehicle clause stand on their own words. Under § 46.03(g), "[e]xcept as provided by Subsections (g-1) and (g-2), an offense under this section is a felony of the third degree," and the Class A misdemeanor list in § 46.03(g-2) does not include (a)(1).
The practical effect reaches the premises element and stops there. A parking lot is not "a building or a portion of a building," so a handgun that stays in a vehicle in a school parking lot is outside the § 46.03(c)(4) "premises" element. That does not answer § 46.03(a)(1), because the same subsection separately reaches "any grounds or building owned by and under the control of a school or postsecondary educational institution and on which an activity sponsored by the school or institution is being conducted," and a school parking lot can be grounds the school owns and controls. Where a school-sponsored activity is being conducted on grounds the school owns and controls, the grounds clause reaches the lot on its own words, and the parking-area exclusion written into the "premises" definition does not remove it. The parking-area exclusion does run through the § 46.03 prohibitions that are written in terms of "premises," including polling places under (a)(2), government courts and offices utilized by the court under (a)(3), and racetracks under (a)(4).
The carve-out is narrow. Walking the firearm into the building, into a school-sponsored activity, or onto a school passenger transportation vehicle is the conduct § 46.03(a)(1) describes, and § 46.03(g) grades an offense under the section as a felony of the third degree except as provided by (g-1) and (g-2). Keeping the handgun in the vehicle answers the "premises" element under § 46.03(c)(4). It does not answer the (a)(1) grounds clause where the lot is grounds owned by and under the control of the school and a school-sponsored activity is being conducted there.
Antique firearms occupy a separate space under federal law that flows through into Texas practice. Under 18 U.S.C. § 921(a)(16), an "antique firearm" is any firearm manufactured in or before 1898, or any replica of such a firearm not designed to use rimfire or conventional centerfire fixed ammunition, or a muzzleloading rifle, shotgun, or pistol designed to use black powder or a black-powder substitute and not capable of using fixed ammunition. Antique firearms are excluded from the federal definition of "firearm" at 27 C.F.R. § 478.11, which means they are not subject to FFL transfer requirements, Form 4473, or NICS background checks at retail.
Texas law follows the federal carve-out closely. Tex. Penal Code § 46.01(3) defines "firearm" to exclude an antique or curio firearm manufactured before 1899 and any replica of such a firearm if the replica does not use rim fire or center fire ammunition, or that uses ammunition no longer manufactured in the United States and not readily available in commercial trade. The result: a pre-1899 cap-and-ball revolver, a flintlock long rifle, or a similar antique is generally outside Texas's Chapter 46 apparatus. UCW does not run on a black-powder revolver; the felon-in-possession rule at § 46.04 may still reach an antique under federal law (which has its own treatment), so a Texas resident with a felony conviction should not assume the antique carve-out resolves their disability.
For estate, gift, and private-sale purposes, antiques can be transferred without an FFL or background check. Common-sense limits apply: do not assume an antique reproduction with modern centerfire chambering is in the carve-out.
Texas does not impose a statutory duty to report a lost or stolen firearm to law enforcement. There is no Penal Code or Government Code provision that makes failure to report a missing firearm a separate offense. Local police departments uniformly accept lost-and-stolen reports and recommend filing them, but the recommendation is operational, not statutory.
The practical reasons to file anyway are substantial. A timely lost-and-stolen report (with serial number, make, model, and date) creates the record that protects the original owner if the firearm is later recovered at a crime scene or used in an offense. NCIC entry by the receiving agency creates a national hit at any future law-enforcement contact. The report is also evidence of due diligence in any later civil claim or insurance recovery.
The 2022 federal Bipartisan Safer Communities Act expanded the federal straw-purchase statute (now 18 U.S.C. § 932) but did not create a federal lost-or-stolen reporting mandate for private owners. The FFL-side reporting obligation under 18 U.S.C. § 923(g)(6) (dealers must report theft within 48 hours) is unchanged and applies only to FFLs, not private owners.
Instructor takeaway: there is no Texas state mandate to report. There are good reasons to do it anyway, and a student's choice to file or not is not a state-law violation either way.
Inheriting a non-NFA firearm in Texas involves no special state-law process. The personal representative of the estate distributes the firearm to the named beneficiary or to the heir under intestate succession (Tex. Estates Code), and the receiving heir must be eligible to possess under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g) and Tex. Penal Code § 46.04. There is no Texas-specific transfer paperwork, no FFL requirement, and no background check between estate and beneficiary.
NFA items (suppressors, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, machine guns, AOWs, destructive devices) are governed by federal law. The transfer mechanism on death is ATF Form 5, "Application for Tax-Exempt Transfer and Registration of Firearm" (per 27 C.F.R. § 479.90 and ATF guidance). Form 5 transfers an NFA item from the estate of a deceased registered owner to a lawful heir tax-free, but the heir must still be a person not prohibited under federal law and must complete the ATF approval process before taking possession. The executor's lawful possession during probate is recognized under federal law, but actual transfer to the heir requires Form 5 approval.
NFA trusts simplify this. If the deceased's NFA items were registered to a properly drafted gun trust with successor trustees and beneficiaries identified in the trust instrument, the items remain in the trust on death without a Form 5 transfer; control passes through trust succession instead. For Texas residents with multiple NFA items or a planned estate, the trust route generally produces a smoother transition than the personal-registration route.
For instructors: a student inheriting a non-NFA Texas-resident firearm needs no special procedure beyond ensuring the heir can lawfully possess. A student inheriting a registered suppressor or SBR needs a Form 5 process and should be referred to an NFA-experienced attorney before any movement of the item.
This page covers one part of our Texas concealed carry guide.
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