What is California's magazine capacity limit?

The definition turns on capacity, not on the firearm. Any ammunition feeding device "with the capacity to accept more than 10 rounds" qualifies (Penal Code 16740). The same section removes three things from the definition: a device permanently altered so that it cannot accommodate more than 10 rounds, a .22 caliber tube ammunition feeding device, and a tubular magazine contained in a lever-action firearm.

A magazine that accepts 10 rounds or fewer is outside the definition.

Section 32310 has four parts:

• Subdivision (a) covers any person in California who manufactures, imports into the state, keeps for sale, offers for sale, gives, lends, buys or receives a large-capacity magazine.
• Subdivision (b) says "manufacturing" includes both fabricating a magazine and assembling one from a combination of parts into a fully functioning large-capacity magazine.
• Subdivision (c) covers possession, "regardless of the date the magazine was acquired," starting July 1, 2017.
• Subdivision (d) told people who could not lawfully keep a magazine to remove it from the state, sell it to a licensed firearms dealer, or surrender it to law enforcement for destruction before that date.

Separately, Section 32390 declares a large-capacity magazine a nuisance, and Section 32311 sets a fine of up to $1,000, up to six months in county jail, or both for a person who knowingly manufactures, imports, sells, gives, lends, buys or receives a large-capacity magazine conversion kit.

The possession rule came in 2016. The Ninth Circuit's summary explains that the Legislature first passed Senate Bill 1446, which barred possession as of July 1, 2017 with a fine. Voters then approved Proposition 63, which absorbed that bill and added a possible criminal penalty for possession (en banc opinion). The current text of Section 32310 is the Proposition 63 version.

The exceptions are in Penal Code 32400 to 32455. They include:

• Law enforcement agencies, and sworn peace officers and federal officers authorized to carry a firearm on duty (32400, 32405).
• Honorably retired sworn peace officers, for possession (32406).
• Licensed firearms dealers (32410).
• A loan of a lawfully possessed magazine between two people when the lender stays in the accessible vicinity and the borrower is not a prohibited person (32415).
• Lending or giving a magazine to a licensed dealer or gunsmith for maintenance, repair or modification, and its return to the owner (32425).
• Armored vehicle businesses and their employees (32435).
• A loan of a magazine for use solely as a prop for a motion picture, television or video production (32445).

Section 32406 appears twice in the code, because Proposition 63 and SB 1446 each added a version. The SB 1446 version also lists museums, forensic laboratories, estate trustees and executors, and a person who lawfully has a firearm obtained before January 1, 2000, when no magazine holding 10 or fewer rounds is compatible with it and the magazine is kept solely for use with that firearm.

"Freedom Week" is an informal name for one week in 2019. On March 29, 2019, a federal district court in San Diego declared Section 32310 unconstitutional and enjoined its enforcement (order). On April 4, 2019, the same court stayed its judgment as to subdivisions (a) and (b), effective 5:00 p.m. on Friday, April 5, 2019 (stay order).

The stay order kept the injunction in effect "for those persons and business entities who have manufactured, imported, sold, or bought magazines able to hold more than 10 rounds" between the March 29 injunction and 5:00 p.m. on April 5, 2019. It also left in place the court's June 29, 2017 preliminary injunction against enforcing subdivisions (c) and (d), the possession provisions (2017 order).

• September 22, 2023: after the Supreme Court vacated an earlier Ninth Circuit ruling for reconsideration under its Bruen decision, the district court again declared Section 32310 unconstitutional and enjoined its enforcement (stay order, describing the ruling; en banc opinion, procedural history).
• October 10, 2023: the Ninth Circuit, sitting en banc, granted the Attorney General's request to stay "all portions of the order except those regarding Sections 32310(c) and (d)" (stay order).
• March 20, 2025: the en banc court held that the law "comport[s] with the principles underlying the Second Amendment," reversed, and told the district court to enter judgment for the Attorney General (opinion).
• April 10, June 9 and July 16, 2025: the Ninth Circuit granted the plaintiffs' unopposed motions, which the docket describes as motions to partially stay the mandate, and ordered that if a certiorari petition were filed the mandate would be further stayed "until final disposition of the matter by the Supreme Court" (Ninth Circuit docket).
• August 15, 2025: the plaintiffs filed a petition for certiorari, No. 25-198. The docket shows it distributed for conference many times, most recently for June 29, 2026, with a supplemental brief on August 3, 2026, a letter from the Attorney General on August 11, 2026, and no ruling on the petition as of 2026-11-11 (Supreme Court docket).