A pistol silencer or suppressor is designed to fit on your gun's muzzle and reduce the noise coming out of the firearm when it is discharged. They are legal in most US states, and as long as you adhere to the regulations surrounding them, you should not have any issues owning one or several.
Legal Requirements
In most states, if you can legally purchase a handgun, you can more than likely legally buy a silencer that you can install on the firearm to help reduce the noise coming from the gun's muzzle. There may be an age restriction that you must meet, and you will need to be able to pass a federal background check like you would for a gun.
There are different requirements in each state, so check with the state you live in to see if you are required to register the pistol silencer in your area. The silencer is issued a serial number by the manufacturer when it is made, and often that is the number used to register the silencer to the owner.
It is also essential to check if there are restrictions on use. For most shooters, the silencer is only going to be used on a firing range, but if you want to keep it on your pistol to protect your ears if you have to use the gun, you need to know that it is legal and not going to raise some flags after the situation is resolved.
Caliber Specific Or Not
Pistol silencers are designed in two specific ways. One is made specifically to fit one caliber firearm, so you could only use a 9mm silencer on a 9mm pistol. However, there are other silencers that are made with a bigger bore so that you can fire many different calibers through them. The downside is that the oversized silencer tends to let more gas escape from the firearm, so they do not reduce the sound of the shot as well.
If you are looking for one silencer you can use on several guns at the range, these can be good options, but each firearm will need to be modified to allow the pistol silencer to mount on the barrel. Another good option is to buy several caliber-specific pistol silencers for the calibers you have.
If you have several 9mm handguns, you could buy one 9mm silencer and use it on all your 9mm guns. You can do this for the firearms you have that you want the sound protection on, but check with the manufacturer to ensure the same silencer will fit on each make and model of gun you own. They can also help you with mounting kits or adapters needed for each firearm in your collection.
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