Updated August 17, 2026. Quick answer: In Maryland, 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, a dealer is not required — the state does regulate transfers here, and this is not one it routes through a dealer; and on inheritance itself, the code names inheritance in so many words and carves it out. Whether anything has to be filed depends on which firearm it is. Every answer below is quoted from Maryland’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 Maryland law settles, in four lines
| Question | What the code says | Section |
|---|---|---|
| Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card? | Depends | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) |
| Does the acquisition have to be reported? | Depends | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) |
| Does it have to go through a licensed dealer? | No | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) |
| Does the statute name inheritance at all? | Named expressly | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) |
What this covers. An ordinary estate transfer in Maryland: 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 Maryland that answer reads depends. The section that settles it is quoted here rather than paraphrased:
This subtitle does not apply to: … (8) the receipt of a regulated firearm by inheritance, if the heir forwards to the Secretary a completed application to purchase or transfer that regulated firearm
Does anyone have to be told, and by when
Sometimes. Something has to be filed, but only in the circumstance the statute attaches it to, and no day count is stated anywhere for doing it. What triggers it is set out below rather than reduced to a yes or a no.
The sentence that answers this is the one already quoted above, under Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card?. Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) settles both questions in the same breath, which is itself part of the answer — there is no separate inheritance provision to read.
Does it have to go through a licensed dealer
A dealer is not required — the state does regulate transfers here, and this is not one it routes through a dealer. 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 Maryland the section that settles it reads:
The sentence that answers this is the one already quoted above, under Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card?. Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) settles both questions in the same breath, which is itself part of the answer — there is no separate inheritance provision to read.
What the code says about inheritance itself
The code names inheritance in so many words and carves it out. An express carve-out is worth more than the convenience it buys today: it is a decision somebody made about heirs, and it survives the next amendment to the rule it sits in.
The sentence that answers this is the one already quoted above, under Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card?. Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) settles both questions in the same breath, which is itself part of the answer — there is no separate inheritance provision to read.
What is specific to Maryland
- Everything in Maryland turns on one defined term. A regulated firearm means a handgun or a listed assault weapon; an ordinary rifle or shotgun is outside the whole subtitle, inherited or not. Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8)
- The exemption is real and it is conditional in one specific way: it holds if the heir forwards a completed application to the Secretary. The application is the price of the exemption. Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8)
- That filing has no deadline. The condition is stated; a number of days to satisfy it by is not, anywhere in the subtitle. Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8)
- There is a second, quieter inheritance provision inside the under-21 rule: title may pass to a minor heir when possession does not. Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8)
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? | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does the acquisition have to be reported? | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does it have to go through a licensed dealer? | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does the statute name inheritance at all? | Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety § 5-102(8) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
The other states with their own page: California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Hawaii, Connecticut, 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.