Illinois · Fishing license · Cost
How much is a fishing license in Illinois?
$15 a year if you live here, $31.50 if you don't. Trout needs the inland stamp, Lake Michigan salmon its own — 6.50 each, on top of the licence.
Just passing through? Sport fishing, 24 hours costs $10.50 — the annual pays for itself from about 3 of those.
Every license price
| License | Who | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Sport fishing, annual | Resident | $15 |
| Sport fishing, 24 hours Runs 24 hours from the start, not to midnight. | Resident | $5.50 |
| Sport fishing, 65 and older | Resident | $7.75 |
| Sportsman's licence (hunting and fishing) | Resident | $26.25 |
| Senior sportsman's licence (hunting and fishing) | Resident | $13.50 |
| Lifetime sport fishing | Resident | $435 |
| Inland trout stamp For all water except Lake Michigan, and only sold to licensed anglers. | Resident | $6.50 |
| Lake Michigan salmon stamp Only sold to licensed anglers. | Resident | $6.50 |
| Sport fishing, annual | Visitor | $31.50 |
| Sport fishing, three days | Visitor | $15.50 |
| Sport fishing, 24 hours | Visitor | $10.50 |
| Inland trout stamp | Visitor | $6.50 |
| Lake Michigan salmon stamp | Visitor | $6.50 |
Fees inside the price
Trout and Lake Michigan salmon each need their own 6.50 stamp, and IDNR sells the stamps only to anglers who already hold a licence.
How long your money lasts
Illinois sells the sport fishing licence by the year and the short ones by the hour — the cheapest option is a 24-hour licence, not a calendar day.
What we could not pin down
Rather than fill these in from somewhere else, they stay open until IDNR states them plainly.
- IDNR's fee pages give prices but no quoted sentence on the age at which a licence becomes compulsory; the 16-year threshold is taken from the structure of the fee table rather than quoted.
- The licence year dates were not stated on the pages read.
- Free fishing days: no dated 2026 announcement was read.
