This is Alaska's published 2026-27 season, the whole state at once. A pin reads its game management subunit off the map and cuts this to the seasons, arms and limits that apply there.
Alaska deer seasons
2026-27
6 antlered deer per licence year. Six is the most any Alaska unit allows, and it is one unit: the remainder of Unit 4, for a resident, of which the first may be taken from 1 August and does only from 15 September. Everywhere else it is lower — five in Unit 6, four in Units 1A, 1C's islands and 2, three in Unit 8's remainder and north-east Chichagof, two in Units 1B, 1C's remainder, 3's remainder and Unit 4 for a non-resident, and one in Units 3's Mitkof and Lindenberg hunts, 5A and the Kodiak road system. The number on your unit is on its season blocks. Residents hunt on a free harvest ticket; a non-resident needs a $300 locking-tag for each deer.
General Deer
Any legal weaponPrinted in 8 columns — check which covers your game management subunit.1 August to 31 December in most of the deer country, on a free harvest ticket for a resident.
1 August to 31 December
Aug 1 – Dec 31Antlered onlyFour bucks.
1 August to 31 December
Aug 1 – Dec 31Antlered onlyTwo bucks.
1 August to 14 September, then 15 September to 31 December
Aug 1 – Sep 14Antlered onlySep 15 – Dec 31Either sexAug 1 – Dec 31Antlered onlyFour deer on Douglas, Lincoln, Shelter and Sullivan islands; two bucks in the rest of Unit 1C.
1 August to 30 November, and 1 October to 7 November
Aug 1 – Nov 30Antlered onlyOct 1 – Nov 7Antlered onlyOct 15–31Antlered onlyTwo bucks in the remainder; one buck on the named islands and the Lindenberg Peninsula.
1 August to 14 September, then 15 September to 31 December
Aug 1 – Sep 14Antlered onlySep 15 – Dec 31Either sexAug 1 – Dec 31Antlered onlySix deer for a resident in the remainder of Unit 4, three on north-east Chichagof Island, two bucks for a non-resident anywhere.
1 November to 30 November
Nov 1–30Antlered onlyOne buck.
1 August to 30 September, then 1 October to 31 December
Aug 1 – Sep 30Antlered onlyOct 1 – Dec 31Either sexFive deer for a resident, four for a non-resident.
1 August to 31 October, and 1 August to 30 September then 1 October to 31 December
Aug 1 – Oct 31Antlered onlyAug 1 – Sep 30Antlered onlyOct 1 – Dec 31Either sexOne buck on the Kodiak road system; three deer for a resident in the remainder, one buck for a non-resident.
- A resident hunts deer on a harvest ticket, which is free and available from July. "Harvest tickets must be validated in sequential order, and unused tickets must be carried when you hunt."
- A non-resident needs a $300 locking-tag for each deer, on top of the $160 non-resident hunting licence.
- "In all hunts limited to one sex, evidence of sex must remain naturally attached to the meat or antlers must remain naturally attached to the entire carcass, with or without viscera."
- Same-day airborne hunting of deer is allowed, which it is not for most Alaskan big game.
- Alaska sets no legal shooting hours for big game. What is prohibited is artificial light, except to track and dispatch a wounded animal — and then not from a motorised vehicle.
- The bag limit is on each block below, because in Alaska it is what changes from one unit to the next rather than the dates.
Bow and Primitive Weapon Deer
Bow and arrow, and on Kodiak a crossbow or muzzleloader tooPrinted in 2 columns — check which covers your game management subunit.Two hunts: the Petersburg Management Area all autumn, and a fortnight on the Kodiak road system in November.
1 August to 15 December
Aug 1 – Dec 15Antlered onlyTwo bucks.
1 November to 14 November
Nov 1–14Either sexOne deer.
- The Petersburg Management Area hunt is bow and arrow only. The Kodiak road system hunt in November allows a bow, a crossbow or a muzzleloader.
- The Kodiak November hunt is the only either-sex deer hunting on the Kodiak road system, and it is the fortnight between the general season closing on 31 October and the youth hunt opening on 16 November.
- Alaska sets no legal shooting hours for big game.
Youth Deer
Any legal weapon, and on Kodiak a bow, crossbow or muzzleloaderPrinted in 2 columns — check which covers your game management subunit.Two youth hunts: a fortnight in Yakutat before the adult season, and six weeks on the Kodiak road system after it.
15 October to 31 October
Oct 15–31Antlered onlyOne buck.
16 November to 31 December
Nov 16 – Dec 31Either sexOne deer.
- A hunter aged 17 or under needs no Alaska hunting licence, but does need their own harvest ticket or permit.
- The Unit 5A youth hunt runs 15 to 31 October, ahead of the adult season that opens on 1 November — the only place in the state where the youth hunt comes first.
- The Kodiak road system youth hunt uses a bow, crossbow or muzzleloader, like the November hunt before it.
- Alaska sets no legal shooting hours for big game.
New This Season
What changed since last year, and is therefore easiest to get wrong.
- The 2026-2027 regulations run from 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027; new harvest tickets are available from July.
- Online drawing and subsistence permit applications are due by 5 p.m. Alaska time on 15 December 2026.
Legal Arms
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations weapon specifications, as the digest prints them.
Bow and arrow
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations, Unit 3 and Unit 8 deer tables, printed pp. 48 and 62
- A bow, in the Petersburg Management Area of Unit 3, which is bow-only.
- A bow, crossbow or muzzleloader on the Kodiak road system between 1 and 14 November and in the youth hunt from 16 November.
- A bow anywhere a general season is open.
- A crossbow in the Petersburg Management Area, which is bow and arrow only.
Any legal weapon
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations, Unit 3 and Unit 8 deer tables, printed pp. 48 and 62
- A rifle, shotgun, handgun, muzzleloader, crossbow or bow, in any general deer season.
- A firearm on the Kodiak road system between 1 November and 31 December — those hunts are bow, crossbow or muzzleloader only.
- A firearm in the Petersburg Management Area.
Hunting Hours and Orange
What the state defines as legal light, and what has to be worn in it.
Legal Shooting Hours
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations, general section — no shooting-hours rule appears in it
Alaska sets no legal shooting hours for big game. There is no half-hour rule and no sunrise-to-sunset rule; the prohibition is on artificial light, not on hunting in the dark — and artificial light may be used to track and dispatch a wounded animal, though not from a motorised vehicle. At these latitudes the difference is real: Ketchikan gets barely seven hours between sunrise and sunset at the end of December, and the season is open for all of them and the rest of the day besides.
Fluorescent Orange
No hunter orange requirement appears in the 2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations
Alaska requires no hunter orange. It is worth wearing anyway in the Kodiak road system and around Juneau, where the ground is busy, but the regulations do not ask for it.
Sundays
No day-of-week closure appears in the 2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations
Alaska closes no day of the week to hunting.
Standing Rules
The parts of the digest that are true every day of the season.
Harvest tickets and locking-tags
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations, general section
Every general deer hunt in Alaska is a harvest ticket hunt: no drawing, no quota, and the ticket is free.
A non-resident needs a $300 locking-tag for each deer in addition to the licence and the harvest ticket. Locking-tags must be bought before hunting.
- Harvest tickets must be validated in sequential order.
- Unused tickets must be carried when you hunt.
- A resident aged 17 or under needs no licence, but does need their own harvest ticket.
- Show your licence, tags, tickets, permits, game or equipment to any officer or authorised ADF&G employee who asks.
Evidence of sex, and salvage
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations, Unit 1-8 deer tables, printed pp. 42 (Unit 1), 46 (Unit 2), 48 (Unit 3), 52 (Unit 4), 54 (Unit 5), 56 (Unit 6) and 62 (Unit 8)
"In all hunts limited to one sex, evidence of sex must remain naturally attached to the meat or antlers must remain naturally attached to the entire carcass, with or without viscera."
That matters most in the units that split the season: a buck taken in Unit 6 in September has to be identifiable as a buck, where one taken in October need not be.
Aircraft, artificial light and access
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations, general section
- Same-day airborne hunting of deer is allowed, which is unusual: most Alaskan big game may not be hunted on the same day you have flown.
- Federal restrictions apply on some ground — Units 2 and 4 carry the federal-restriction marker. Know who owns the land before you hunt it.
- Using artificial light, except to track and dispatch a wounded game animal — and not while on or in a motorised vehicle.
- Using ground-based wireless communication to locate an individual animal for harvest, outside the specific hunts that allow it.
Tagging and Reporting
The clock that starts the moment the deer is down.
2026-2027 Alaska Hunting Regulations, Unit 1-8 deer tables, printed pp. 42 (Unit 1), 46 (Unit 2), 48 (Unit 3), 52 (Unit 4), 54 (Unit 5), 56 (Unit 6) and 62 (Unit 8)
Every deer must be reported as the harvest ticket directs — the ticket is validated at the kill and returned to ADF&G.
- Validate the harvest ticket immediately on taking a deer, in sequential order.
- Carry unused tickets in the field.
- Return the report as the ticket directs, or online at hunt.alaska.gov.
Where This App Is Coarser Than the Digest
Said plainly, because an absence is easy to read as a permission.
- Sub-area boundaries are not drawn. Unit 3 has four deer hunts on four pieces of ground, Unit 1C has three and Unit 8 splits the Kodiak road system from the rest of the island. A pin resolves to a subunit, which is coarser, so each block names the sub-area it came from and a pin near one of those lines may be shown a hunt that does not run on that exact ground.
- Federal subsistence hunts are not carried. Units 2 and 4 carry a federal-restriction marker, and federal subsistence seasons and bag limits on federal land can differ from the state's.
- Registration and drawing hunts for other species are not here; every deer hunt in Alaska is a harvest ticket hunt, which is why the tag list is short.
- The rut date is ADF&G's own, from a single fetal-aging study of Sitka black-tailed deer in Southeast Alaska (Johnson 1987: mean conception about 22 November). It describes the Southeast deer the department sampled; mule deer and white-tailed deer elsewhere in the state were not part of it.
- Bag limits are stated on the blocks rather than modelled. Alaska counts deer per unit and per residency, and "six deer total, of which the antlerless ones only from 15 September" is not a number the app can enforce for you.
Useful Numbers
The agency, when the app cannot answer it.
- ADF&G licensing and permits
- hunt.alaska.gov
- Ketchikan office
- (907) 225-2475 — the office Unit 2 wolf hunters must call, and the nearest to the Unit 1A and 2 deer country.
- Unit regulations
- Each unit's season table is a separate PDF at adfg.alaska.gov.
Transcribed from the published 2026-27 Alaska digest. Where this app and the digest disagree, the digest is the law. Read the Alaska Department of Fish and Game digest.