Texas Hunting License Cost: $25 and Up
Texas prints the tags on the licence rather than selling them separately
What a season in Texas actually costs to start
A resident hunting licence in Texas is $25, sold as the Resident Hunting License. Texas is one of eleven in this reading where the tags come with the licence rather than on top of it, which makes the price on the fee page the price of the hunt. 39 of the 50 states are built the other way, and in those the licence is the smaller half. Texas is one of the states where the licence covers the deer: a resident pays $25 and a nonresident $315 for a licence valid for any legal bird or animal, with $7 endorsements added for archery, turkey and migratory birds, and it expires on 31 August whatever day it was bought.
- Resident licence $25, the Resident Hunting License
- Nonresident licence $315
- The licence runs runs a licence year with its own start and end dates, set by the state rather than by the calendar
- Hunter education required of anyone born on or after 1971
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department sells it through its own licensing system, which is where a fee change appears first.
Every Texas hunting licence, at the price Texas Parks and Wildlife Department prints
Everything a Texas licence holder needs for the species it names is in the licence itself. That is unusual: 39 of the 50 states read here sell the animal separately from the right to hunt it, and Alabama, Arkansas, Maine, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, Vermont and West Virginia do not.
- Resident Hunting License$25
any legal bird or animal in Texas, deer included, with endorsements added for archery, upland birds and migratory birds
valid from date of purchase until August 31
Resident Hunting License | Texas resident | 101 | $25 | Buy online or Find a retailer
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source - Non-resident General Hunting License$315
any legal bird or animal including deer, and the only nonresident licence valid for white-tailed deer, mule deer, pronghorn or bighorn sheep
valid from date of purchase until August 31
Non-resident General Hunting License | Non-resident | 105 | $315 | Buy online or Find a retailer
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source - Non-resident Special Small Game/Exotic Hunting$48
five consecutive days of small game, exotics, javelina and game birds other than turkey, and no deer
any period of five consecutive days
Non-resident Special Small Game/Exotic Hunting | Non-resident | 157 | $48 | Buy online or Find a retailer
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source - Youth Hunting License$7
hunting for anyone under 17, resident or nonresident, with state endorsements other than reptile and amphibian included
valid from date of purchase until August 31
Youth Hunting License | Texas resident or non-resident under 17 years at date of purchase | 169 | $7 | Buy online or Find a retailer
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source - Senior Resident Hunting License$7
the same hunting privileges as the resident licence for a resident aged 65 or over
valid from date of purchase until August 31
Senior Resident Hunting License | Texas resident 65 years and older | 102 | $7 | Buy online or Find a retailer
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source - Combo Hunting & Freshwater Fishing Package$50
resident hunting plus freshwater fishing, without the hunting endorsements
valid from date of purchase until August 31
Combo Hunting & Freshwater Fishing Package | Texas resident | 503 | $50 | Buy online or Find a retailer
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source - Super Combo$68
resident hunting and fishing plus the archery, upland game bird, migratory game bird, freshwater and saltwater endorsements in one package
valid from date of purchase until August 31
Super Combo | Texas resident | 111 | $68 | Buy online or Find a retailer
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source
When a Texas hunting license expires Licence year
Texas runs a licence year with its own start and end dates, set by the state rather than by the calendar. The year turns on a date the state picked, usually in the spring or early autumn, so what a licence is worth depends on where in that year it was bought. The sentence the state uses is quoted below and links to the page it came from.
A Texas hunting licence runs from the day it is bought to 31 August whenever in the year it was bought, so one bought in spring expires that summer.
All hunting licenses are valid from date of purchase until August 31 unless otherwise noted. Licenses go on sale August 15.Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source
Texas hunter education: born on or after 1971
Texas hangs hunter education on a birth date rather than on an age: the requirement reaches anybody born after 1971. Every state that publishes a cutoff publishes a different one, and across this reading they run from 1949 to 1986, which is why a national answer to this question is always wrong somewhere.
Texas requires hunter education of every hunter born on or after 2 September 1971, and a hunter of 17 or over who has not taken it may buy a one time Hunter Education Deferral and hunt accompanied for up to a year.
Every hunter in Texas (including out-of-state hunters) born on or after Sept. 2, 1971, must successfully complete hunter education. Minimum age for certification is 9 years and cost is $15.Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source
Who counts as a Texas resident
Texas draws the resident line at 183 days, and the difference between the two sides of it is $25 against $315. The statutory definition is quoted below.
A person who has lived continuously in Texas for more than six months immediately before buying their license, officially documented members of the Kickapoo Traditional Tribe of Texas, or members of the U.S. Armed Forces (and their dependents) on “active duty” anywhere.Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, read 23 September 2026. Read it at the source
39 of 50 states sell the animal separately from the right to hunt it
Texas is one of 11 states in this reading that print the tags on the licence, which is why its fee page price is the price of the hunt. In the other 39, the licence is the first of two purchases and the number a search result shows is the smaller half.
Resident licences across these states run from $10 to $64.54, and nonresident licences from $50 to $410, which is the widest spread on any licence this site has read. 25 states run a licence year of their own, 9 give a full year from the day of sale, and 9 end it on 31 December whatever month it was bought.
The national table puts Texas beside every other state on licence price, first tag, and the two added together.
Texas hunting license questions
More for Texas
Hunting licenses in every state
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department read 23 September 2026, with every licence price, tag price, expiry rule and hunter education cutoff above linked to the page it came from. Fees are set by statute or by a commission and change between seasons, so the agency page beside each figure is what governs on the day. Tags included