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Connecticut Concealed Carry Permit

Connecticut requires a State Permit to Carry Pistols and Revolvers to carry. It is shall-issue, the minimum age is 21, and training is required.

Requirements at a glance

Permit name State Permit to Carry Pistols and Revolvers
Issuing authority Two-step: the local chief of police (or chief executive officer / resident state trooper) issues a 60-day Temporary State Permit; the Commissioner of Emergency Services and Public Protection, through the Connecticut State Police Special Licensing and Firearms Unit (SLFU), issues the 5-year State Permit. Non-residents apply directly to DESPP/SLFU.
System shall-issue
Minimum age 21 — C.G.S. § 29-28(b)(10) bars issuance to any applicant who \"is less than twenty-one years of age.\" No military or other under-21 exception exists for the carry permit. (By contrast, an Eligibility Certificate to purchase long guns is available at 18 — that is not a carry permit.)
Training required Yes, live fire required
State fee $140 initial / $70 renewal — the state's own charge, not the total
Valid for 5 years
Processing time Roughly 8 weeks for the local/temporary stage. C.G.S. § 29-29(c) requires the issuing authority to notify the applicant in writing if national criminal history results have not come back within 8 weeks of a sufficient application, and to decide within one week of receiving the results. DESPP states \"the issuing authority has 8 weeks to review your application and approve or deny.\" After the 60-day Temporary State Permit issues, the applicant has 60 days to appear at an SLFU location for the 5-year State Permit.
Fingerprints Required
Non-resident permit 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 $140
Training course $75–$250 (private instructor)
FBI national check varies — § 29-30(a) asks for 'sufficient funds' to cover it and fixes no amount
Fingerprint processing varies — not stated on the DESPP permit pages

The $140 is collected in two $70 halves — one to the local authority with the temporary-permit application, one to the State Treasurer when the state permit issues — and renewal is $70, so Connecticut's permit gets cheaper to hold than to get. The statute then adds the FBI check as an open-ended pass-through, the same drafting choice that makes Washington impossible to total. No hour count is set, but the course must have been completed within two years of applying, so an old certificate does not carry here the way it does in Maine or Montana.

C.G.S. § 29-30(a): the fee for a state permit originally issued under § 29-28(b) is $140 "plus sufficient funds as required to be transmitted to the Federal Bureau of Investigation to cover the cost of a national criminal history records check." In practice this is paid in two $70 installments — $70 to the local authority with the DPS-799-C temporary-permit application (retained locally) and $70 to the Treasurer, State of Connecticut when the full state permit is issued — as stated on form DPS-799-C (Rev. 07/16/2024) and in the DESPP FAQ. Renewal is $70. Duplicate/replacement permit $5. Fingerprint-processing and FBI national-check fees are additional and are paid separately (amount not stated on the DESPP permit pages). Training-course tuition is a separate private cost.

How to apply

  1. Complete a DESPP-approved firearms safety and use course (live fire required) within the two years before you apply; keep the instructor-signed certificate.
  2. Complete and notarize form DPS-799-C (Rev. 07/16/2024), checking "60 Day Temporary State Pistol Permit" (residents) or "Non-Resident State Pistol Permit" (non-residents).
  3. Residents: submit DPS-799-C to your local authority — local chief of police, resident state trooper, or first selectperson — with the course certificate, a $70 fee payable to the local authority, and proof you are lawfully in the United States (certified birth certificate, U.S. passport, or ICE documentation).
  4. Be fingerprinted for state and national criminal history records checks (C.G.S. §§ 29-29, 29-17a); contact your local law enforcement agency for the fingerprinting process.
  5. The local authority investigates suitability and, if approved, issues a 60-day Temporary State Permit to Carry Pistols and Revolvers (DPS-11-C).
  6. Within those 60 days, go to a DESPP/State Police pistol permit location (HQ Middletown or Troop G Bridgeport; Troop E Montville closed as of 08/01/2025) with the DPS-11-C, a completed DPS-46-C application, a $70 check payable to Treasurer, State of Connecticut, proof of lawful U.S. presence, and valid state photo ID.
  7. DESPP photographs you and issues the laminated 5-year State Permit to Carry Pistols and Revolvers.
  8. Non-residents: you must already hold a valid permit or license to carry a pistol or revolver issued by another U.S. jurisdiction; email [email protected] with your full name and mailing address to request the out-of-state packet and apply directly to DESPP under C.G.S. § 29-28(f).
  9. Renewal: DESPP mails or emails a renewal notice at least 90 days before expiration; renew by mail with the $70 fee, proof of citizenship/legal residency, and a full-face photograph. The permit stays valid for 90 days past its expiration date (unless revoked or revocation is pending).
  10. Denials and revocations may be appealed to the Board of Firearms Permit Examiners (C.G.S. § 29-32b).

Apply on the official Connecticut site

What disqualifies you

Where to get the required training

Connecticut publishes an official list of certified instructors. That list is authoritative — a certificate from an instructor who is not on it may not be accepted. View the official instructor list

Training providers in Connecticut

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 Connecticut →

Reciprocity

Carrying into Connecticut

Connecticut recognizes no out-of-state carry permits. A permit from another state does not authorize you to carry here.

26 jurisdictions honor a Connecticut permit

Derived from what each of those states officially publishes.

Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin

Official Connecticut reciprocity page Full reciprocity matrix →

Building your own in Connecticut

Build for personal use
Allowed
Serial number required
Yes

Building a firearm for personal use is legal in Connecticut only under a strict serialization-and-registration regime. C.G.S. § 29-36a(a): no person may complete the manufacture of a firearm without (1) obtaining a unique serial number or other mark of identification from DESPP and (2) engraving or permanently affixing it in the manner federal law requires of licensed manufacturers under 18 U.S.C. § 923(i). § 29-36a(b): within 30 days of completing manufacture the maker must notify DESPP and provide identifying information about the firearm and its owner; DESPP checks whether the person is prohibited and, if not, issues the number within 3 business days. "Manufacture" is defined broadly as "to fabricate or construct a firearm including the initial assembly" (§ 29-36a(j)). Since January 1, 2024, § 29-36a(c) makes it unlawful to possess any firearm lacking a serial number unless possession was timely declared to DESPP or a serial number application is pending; pre-Oct 1, 2019 unserialized firearms had to be declared by January 1, 2024, and people moving into Connecticut with an unserialized firearm have 90 days to serialize it, render it permanently inoperable, sell it to an FFL, or remove it from the state. Transfer of a firearm manufactured in violation of the section is prohibited (§ 29-36a(e)), as is distributing, importing, keeping for sale, offering for sale or purchasing an unserialized firearm (§ 29-36a(c)(6)). Exemptions: federally licensed manufacturers, antique firearms as defined in 18 U.S.C. § 921, firearms made before December 16, 1968 if otherwise lawfully possessed, and delivery to a law enforcement agency (§ 29-36a(f)). Penalty: class C misdemeanor for a person otherwise eligible to possess firearms; class C felony (2-year non-suspendable minimum, $5,000 non-remittable fine) for a person ineligible to possess a firearm (§ 29-36a(i)). Separately, C.G.S. § 53-206j governs unfinished frames and lower receivers: they may be transferred only through the same channels and procedures as pistols/revolvers under § 29-33, only if already serialized (via ATF's program or a DESPP-issued number), and since October 1, 2019 no one may possess an unfinished frame or lower receiver unless eligible to purchase a firearm. Violation of § 53-206j is a class C felony with a 2-year non-suspendable minimum. In practice, buying an unserialized "80%" lower in Connecticut is a felony; a self-built firearm must carry a DESPP-issued serial number and be reported to DESPP within 30 days.

Conn. Gen. Stat. §§ 29-36a, 29-36b; § 53-206j

Federal law, gunsmithing schools, and tools →

Statutes

What we could not confirm

  • permitSystem classification is a judgment call. C.G.S. § 29-28(b) says the issuing authority "may issue" a permit "provided such authority shall find that ... such person is a suitable person to receive such permit." There is no good-cause/proper-cause requirement (Connecticut never had one, so Bruen did not force a change), and denials get de novo review by the Board of Firearms Permit Examiners under § 29-32b — so it functions as shall-issue. But the discretionary "suitable person" standard is real and some classifications still call Connecticut may-issue. Treat as shall-issue-with-suitability-review.
  • Training hours: no hour figure appears in statute or in DESPP's published guidance. DESPP says the course must be "no less than the NRA's Basic Pistol Course" (typically about 8 hours), but I could not confirm any officially mandated minimum number of hours, so training.hours is left blank rather than guessed.
  • Live-fire requirement: stated plainly on the DESPP pistol permit page and FAQ ("Live fire is also required" / students must fire a semi-automatic pistol or revolver). It is not spelled out in the post-July-1-2024 statutory text of § 29-28(b)(1)(B), which describes course content generically. Sourced to the agency, not the statute.
  • Exact fingerprint-processing and FBI national criminal history check fees are not published on the DESPP permit pages; § 29-30(a) only says the FBI cost is added to the $140. The dollar amount of that add-on is unconfirmed.
  • Whether a non-resident applying directly to DESPP under § 29-28(f) pays the same $140 (which for residents is split $70 local / $70 state) or a different amount is not stated on the DESPP out-of-state page; the fee schedule in § 29-30(a) is written around the local-authority split.
  • DESPP publishes no reciprocity page at all. The "honors nothing" conclusion is drawn from the absence of any recognition provision in Chapter 529 (zero hits for "reciproc" in the full current chapter text) plus the plain text of § 29-35(a)(1), rather than from an affirmative official statement. I could not find a DESPP page that says in so many words "Connecticut does not recognize out-of-state permits."
  • The published DESPP approved-instructor/approved-course PDFs are dated 2024-2025 (e.g. online-instructor-spreadsheet-1-10-2025.pdf); the general Connecticut Firearms Instructors PDF resolves 200 OK but I could not confirm its revision date, and portal.ct.gov/despp/slfu/instructors currently returns 404.
  • I checked for post-2023 changes and found P.A. 24-24 (technical/permit amendments), P.A. 25-157 (purchase eligibility and armed security officer permits, eff. Oct 1, 2025), and a June 2026 act on pistols convertible to machine guns — none of which alter permit-required carry, the age-21 floor, the 5-year term, or the fee structure. A line-by-line review of every 2025-2026 public act was not performed.

Sources