Team SOFREP Tackles SHOT Show 2026

Miles of Concrete and Guns

To say that SHOT Show can be overwhelming is a massive understatement. It is thousands of booths, miles of concrete, and an industry trying to talk all at once. The moment you step onto the show floor, you realize the same hard truth every year. No matter how long you stay or how fast you walk, you will never see it all, and that forces you to start paying attention to what actually matters. And to someone like me, a lot matters.

Let me take a step back for a second. Sometimes I forget that the uninitiated may not know what SHOT Show is.

When people say “SHOT Show,” they are literally talking about the Shooting, Hunting, and Outdoor Trade Show, the annual industry event put on by the National Shooting Sports Foundation.

It is not a public gun show. It is a closed, industry-only trade show, which is why the tone, access, and conversations there are very different from anything open to the public.

Here are the obligatory facts and figures: Attendance at SHOT Show 2026 topped 53,000 industry professionals, including more than 2,000 credentialed media, all sharing the same badge and the same floor. Industry professionals came from all 50 states and more than 126 countries. Total exhibit space was more than 830,000 net square feet. That’s equivalent to more than 19 acres, or enough space to park 2,586 M1 Abrams tanks. The aisles between all those displays comprise a distance of 13.9 miles, the length of more than half a marathon. Yeah, it’s big.

Industry Day at the Range is where SHOT Show stops being theoretical and starts getting honest. Before the lights come on inside the convention center, the industry loads up buses and heads out to the desert, to the Boulder Rifle and Pistol Club, where the gear actually gets used. No glass cases. No carefully angled booth lighting. Just rifles, pistols, optics, ammo, and a long firing line stretching into the Nevada dirt. If something runs, you know it. If it does not, you find out fast, with witnesses.

It is invite-only and badge-restricted, mostly media, manufacturers, and serious buyers, which gives the whole thing a different tone. Conversations are looser. Claims get tested immediately. You can hear marketing die in real time when a trigger disappoints, or an optic washes out under desert sun. For a lot of companies, this is where products live or quietly get buried before the show floor ever opens. By the time SHOT Show officially kicks off, much of the real story has already been written out there on the range, measured in spent brass and honest first impressions.

This year, there were two ranges operating on the Monday before the show: the one I’m mentioning above and SIG Sauer Defense Demo Day, featuring their latest and greatest offerings. You can catch fantastic video coverage of that event here.

The Sounds of Suppressors

Suppressors were impossible to miss at SHOT Show 2026. Every aisle had them, from boutique outfits to the big names, and the excitement was real because this year, the $200 tax stamp is history. That barrier’s gone, and suddenly suppressors aren’t toys or optional kit—they’re part of the baseline gear for rifles and pistols alike. Threaded barrels, suppressor-height sights, designs built for recoil control and heat management—all of it is moving into what used to be standard issue. Walk the floor, talk to the reps, watch people on the range, and it’s obvious: the industry finally recognizes that suppression is no longer niche. It’s essential.

The demos at Industry Day were telling. Established companies like Banish brought out full-power 5.56 and .30-cal cans engineered for reliability and real shooting conditions. Smaller brands were leaning into practical innovation instead of hype, showing what’s possible for first-time buyers and experienced operators alike. Across the board, the message was the same: quieter is now mainstream, and the market has the depth to back it up. By the time the show floor opened, the story of 2026 was already written in brass, carbon, and the low thump of suppressed rounds ringing downrange.

It is important to understand that the suppressor itself is still an NFA item requiring the full Form‑4 process (or Form‑1 for self‑manufacture), but the specific $200 federal tax component is no longer charged for those categories of NFA items starting in 2026. Machine guns and destructive devices still carry the tax requirement, and state or local laws may still impose additional restrictions or fees.

In short, the tax stamp cost is gone, but the regulatory and paperwork process remains.

A Mature Industry

Beyond individual product trends, SHOT Show 2026 felt like an industry that had finally grown out of its loudest phase. There were fewer gimmicks chasing attention and more conversations about durability, sustainment, and long-term use. The booths that stayed busy were not always the flashiest ones. They were the ones staffed by people who could explain why a product existed, who it was built for, and how it would hold up after thousands of rounds and years of hard use. That shift matters because it suggests the market is no longer rewarding noise for noise’s sake.

You could feel that maturity in the way companies talked about their gear. The language was more restrained. Claims were tighter. Instead of promising revolutions, manufacturers focused on refinement, reliability, and solving specific problems. That is not as exciting as unveiling the next big thing, but it is far more telling. It signals an industry that understands the easy wins are gone, and the future belongs to those willing to build products that last, support them long-term, and earn trust the hard way.

The Fun Stuff: SOFREP Meet and Greet

It wasn’t all walking and talking shop. We were in Vegas after all. I must admit a bit of whiskey and beer were consumed at SOFREP’s meet and greet held at the wonderful Nine Fine Irishmen Pub located in New York, New York. A number of Outriders who happened to be in the area were invited to join the festivities and partake. As a matter of fact, we had such a good time that we plan on doing more of these events in the coming year.

Keep checking back with SOFREP for the next time and location.

The Big Guns

When you walk the show floor at SHOT Show 2026, certain names naturally draw your eye and your respect because they are not just big in size, they are big in influence. Barrett Firearms is one of those names. For more than four decades, Barrett has been synonymous with large-caliber precision rifles, starting with Ronnie Barrett’s original shoulder-fired .50 BMG design that changed long-range warfare and special operations forever. Today Barrett leads the world in big-bore design and manufacturing, supplying not just civilian long-range shooters but U.S. military units and law enforcement around the globe. At this year’s show, the Barrett booth doubled as a home base for serious discussions about long-range lethality and next-gen fire support systems, including precision grenade systems that push the envelope on what infantry-class weapons can do.

Walking past the Barrett space, you could feel a different kind of gravitas at SIG Sauer’s presence. SIG is not just a ubiquitous name in pistols and rifles; it is one of the few companies that spans the full spectrum of modern small arms and related systems, from duty pistols to battle-ready carbines to suppressors, optics, ammunition, and even training platforms. Headquartered in New Hampshire with global manufacturing depth and a reputation for reliability and precision, SIG has positioned itself as a system-wide provider for military, law enforcement, and civilian markets alike. Their booth was packed with seasoned shooters and buyers looking at how SIG’s integrated approach to weapons and support equipment can serve real missions and real shooters, not just look good on the wall.

Then there was Heckler & Koch, the storied German maker whose engineering pedigree goes back to the post-war era and iconic designs like the G3 battle rifle and MP5 family. H&K has always carried a bit of mystique on the floor because they represent a blend of precision engineering, practical durability, and real-world pedigree that professionals trust. At SHOT 2026, their presence reminded everyone that the classics still matter: systems that have been adopted by elite units worldwide continue to evolve, and the company’s commitment to innovation in small arms and modular weapon systems shows up in every rifle, submachine gun, and pistol they bring. In a year where trends felt incremental, the big three of Barrett, SIG, and H&K were anchors, not attractions, proving that heritage plus performance still wins respect on the range and on the floor.

Leaving Las Vegas

As they say, “all good things must come to an end.” This was particularly true of our time at SHOT Show 2026. A monster storm bearing down on the majority of the United States forced us to bug out immediately after the show was over.

SHOT Show 2026 was never about the glitz, the banners, or the mile‑long aisles of concrete. It was about the gear that actually matters: the rifles, the suppressors, the optics, and the precision systems that are shaping the future of shooting, from Barrett’s backpackable MRAD to SIG’s full-spectrum platforms and HK’s battle-proven engineering. From Navy Arms reminding us of the heritage behind every firearm, to Schmidt + Bender scopes that bring clarity to every shot, the story on the floor was one of substance over spectacle.

If you walked away thinking you saw it all, you didn’t. But if you paid attention to what works, what’s real, and what’s coming, you saw enough to understand why the industry isn’t just surviving—it’s maturing.