Updated August 17, 2026. Quick answer: In New York, whether an heir needs a state credential depends on a line the statute itself draws, and the line is the answer; on the dealer question, it depends, and in practice it depends on who the heir is rather than on what the firearm is; and on inheritance itself, the code names inheritance and then bounds what naming it buys you. Nothing has to be filed with anyone. Every answer below is quoted from New York’s own code with the section named and linked, because this is a subject where being roughly right is not a category that exists.
What New York law settles, in four lines
| Question | What the code says | Section |
|---|---|---|
| Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card? | Depends | N.Y. Penal Law §§ 400.00(1), 265.20(a)(3), 265.00(3), 265.01-b |
| Does the acquisition have to be reported? | No | N.Y. Penal Law § 400.00(9) |
| Does it have to go through a licensed dealer? | Depends | N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 898(1) |
| Does the statute name inheritance at all? | Named, but limited | N.Y. Penal Law § 265.20(a)(1)(f) |
What this covers. An ordinary estate transfer in New York: the person who died and the person inheriting are in the same state, and the firearm is an ordinary rifle, shotgun, pistol or revolver. Machine guns, suppressors, short-barrelled rifles and anything else registered under the National Firearms Act run on a separate federal track that is not this page, and neither is moving a firearm across a state line. The federal layer is set out separately.
Does the heir need a permit, licence or card
Whether an heir needs a state credential depends on a line the statute itself draws, and the line is the answer. In New York that answer reads depends. The section that settles it is quoted here rather than paraphrased:
Possession of a pistol or revolver by a person to whom a license therefor has been issued as provided under section 400.00 or 400.01 of this chapter
— N.Y. Penal Law §§ 400.00(1), 265.20(a)(3), 265.00(3), 265.01-b
Does anyone have to be told, and by when
No. New York has no report, registration or notification duty for an heir who acquires a firearm this way. That is an absence established by reading the chapters through, not an unanswered question — the sections searched are named in the sources below, and what is quoted here is the nearest provision they contain.
Elsewhere than in the city of New York, a person licensed to carry or possess a pistol or revolver or to purchase or take possession of a semiautomatic rifle may apply at any time to his or her licensing officer for amendment of his or her license to include one or more such weapons or to cancel weapons held under license.
Does it have to go through a licensed dealer
It depends, and in practice it depends on who the heir is rather than on what the firearm is. The claim that an inherited firearm always has to be transferred through a licensed dealer is not true as a flat statement in any state in this table, and in New York the section that settles it reads:
all sales, exchanges or disposals of firearms, rifles or shotguns shall be conducted in accordance with this section unless such sale, exchange or disposal is conducted by a licensed importer, licensed manufacturer or licensed dealer, as those terms are defined in 18 USC § 922, when such sale, exchange or disposal is conducted pursuant to that person’s federal firearms license or such sale, exchange or disposal is between members of an immediate family.
What the code says about inheritance itself
The code names inheritance and then bounds what naming it buys you. Being named and being released are different things. What follows the naming is the bound — a window that closes, a route that only works one way, or an exemption from the paperwork but not from the licence.
A person who possesses any such weapon, instrument, appliance or substance as an executor or administrator or any other lawful possessor of such property of a decedent may continue to possess such property for a period not over fifteen days. If such property is not lawfully disposed of within such period the possessor shall deliver it to an appropriate official described in this paragraph or such property may be delivered to the superintendent of state police.
What is specific to New York
- New York’s licensing word does not mean what it means everywhere else. The defined term covers pistols and revolvers and short-barrelled long guns; an ordinary rifle or shotgun is outside it, so the licence question never reaches most of what is in a gun cabinet. N.Y. Penal Law §§ 400.00(1), 265.20(a)(3), 265.00(3), 265.01-b
- The fifteen days read like a grace period and are the opposite of one. They are the window before an unlicensed possessor has to hand the firearm to police. N.Y. Penal Law § 265.20(a)(1)(f)
- What happens after that is the part almost nobody publishes: property left unclaimed with police for a year is disposed of under the nuisance section. N.Y. Penal Law § 265.20(a)(1)(f)
- The background-check statute’s family exemption is four categories long — spouses, domestic partners, children and step-children. A sibling, a parent or a grandchild is not in it. N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 898(1)
- This answer is a non-New-York-City answer. The section that governs says so on its own face, and the city runs its own licensing rules that this page does not state. N.Y. Penal Law § 400.00(9)
What this page does not tell you
- The permit answer is a genuine “it depends”. It is recorded that way because the statute draws a line rather than giving one answer, and flattening it to yes or no would be wrong in half the cases.
- This is what the statute says, not what a court or a police department has done with it. No case law and no agency guidance was read. Where a code is silent, this page reports silence rather than filling it in.
- City and county rules sit on top and are not here. Several of these states let a city license or register firearms separately, and a local rule can add a step the state code does not mention.
- Who may possess is a separate question from how it transfers. A federal or state bar on possession — a felony conviction, a protective order, an involuntary commitment — attaches to the person and reaches an inherited firearm exactly as it reaches a bought one.
- A gun trust is a different mechanism and is covered separately. What a gun trust does and does not do is its own question, and it is mostly a federal one.
- This is general information, not legal advice. On this subject a wrong step is not a paperwork problem, so the sections are linked for you to read and a probate lawyer in the state is the right next call if anything here is close.
Sources
Every answer on this page comes out of a 51-jurisdiction table built from statute text: 204 cells, 201 of them read from a state’s own code and 3 from an official state publication, with 0 resting on a secondary source of any kind. 175 quotations were machine-checked against the bytes of the page each came from, with 0 failures. 22 of the 204 cells are flagged because the text is verbatim but the date of the copy it came from could not be confirmed at the state’s own site.
| What it supports | Section | Tier | Read on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card? | N.Y. Penal Law §§ 400.00(1), 265.20(a)(3), 265.00(3), 265.01-b | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does the acquisition have to be reported? | N.Y. Penal Law § 400.00(9) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does it have to go through a licensed dealer? | N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law § 898(1) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does the statute name inheritance at all? | N.Y. Penal Law § 265.20(a)(1)(f) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
The other states with their own page: California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Hawaii, Connecticut, Maryland, Washington, Michigan, Texas. All 51 jurisdictions are in the by-state table.
General consumer information, not legal advice. State codes are as published by the cited source on 2026-08-17 and change without notice; the statute and a lawyer in the state govern.