Serial Number Lookup

Enter a firearm's serial number to estimate the year it was made. Every result cites the published manufacturer chart it came from — we show the threshold serial the factory documented, so you can check the reasoning yourself.

Enter the number exactly as stamped, including any prefix.
Confidence

No specific imprecision is documented for this maker’s published table. That is not a claim that the table is exact — a threshold list can only ever give a range — but it does mean nothing adverse is on the record. Every result above still shows the threshold it rests on, so you can see the precision for yourself. The reasons two sources disagree →

How this works. We transcribe the serial-number-to-year charts that manufacturers publish themselves, keep the documented threshold serial for each year, and find the latest threshold at or below your number. Nothing is inferred or interpolated — if a serial falls outside the published ranges, we say so instead of producing a number.

Look up by make

Prefer to read the table itself? Browning serial chart — the published years· High Standard serial chart — the published years· Ithaca serial chart — the published years· Purdey serial chart — the published years· Remington serial chart — the published years· Ruger serial chart — the published years· Savage serial chart — the published years· Winchester serial chart — the published years

Frequently asked

Is there a free database of gun serial numbers?
Not one that reveals history. Stolen-gun records live in the FBI's NCIC database, which only law enforcement can query, and ATF traces run through eTrace, also law-enforcement only. What is public is the manufacturer's own production chart — which is what this tool uses, and it dates the gun, not identifies an owner.
Why do you show the threshold serial?
So you can verify the answer. Manufacturers publish "first serial shipped that year", so a result is only as precise as the gap between two published thresholds. Showing the threshold makes that precision visible instead of hiding it behind a confident-looking year.
Which makers are covered?
Browning, High Standard, Ithaca, Purdey, Remington, Ruger, Savage, Winchester — with more being transcribed. Requests are welcome: tell us which maker you need and we'll prioritise the published chart we can cite.

When the lookup can't answer

A serial lookup fails for a handful of distinct reasons, and they need different fixes. Each one below is a page that explains what happened and what to check — written from the manufacturer's published chart, with the reasoning shown.

About to photograph the number and ask on a forum? Mark the serial out first — in your browser, with nothing uploaded, and with the exported file stripped of its GPS metadata.

Marks Purdey guns may carry

The serial gives you the year where a chart was published. The proof and inspection marks are the other half: what the gun was tested for, where, and under whose law. These are the ones that turn up on this maker's guns — each with its source class, and each stating what it does not tell you.