New Jersey · Fishing license · Cost
How much is a fishing license in New Jersey?
$22.50 a year if you live here, $34 if you don't.
Just passing through? Vacation fishing, two days costs $9 — the annual pays for itself from about 4 of those.
Every license price
| License | Who | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Fishing, annual, ages 16 to 64 Covers fresh water only. Trout needs the stamp on top. | Resident | $22.50 |
| Fishing, annual, ages 65 to 69 The discount runs for five years, then the licence stops being needed at all. | Resident | $12.50 |
| All Around Sportsman, annual Hunting and fishing in one. Only worth it if you hunt as well. | Resident | $72.25 |
| Fishing, annual, age 16 and over | Visitor | $34 |
| Vacation fishing, seven days Visitors only. | Visitor | $19.50 |
| Vacation fishing, two days Visitors only, and the cheapest legal fishing in New Jersey. | Visitor | $9 |
What comes on top
These are separate from the base license. Buying the license alone is not always enough.
| Trout stamp, resident aged 16 to 69 Needed on top of the licence to fish for trout or salmon. It runs to December 31 like the licence. | $10.50 |
|---|---|
| Trout stamp, nonresident aged 16 and over Nearly double the resident stamp. | $20 |
| Boat ramp permit For the state-run ramps, separate from the licence. | $15 |
How long your money lasts
NJDEP Fish & Wildlife: "Fishing licenses and Trout Stamps are valid from date of purchase to December 31 of each year." Buy in November and you have weeks — New Jersey does not run the year forward from the day of purchase.
What we could not pin down
Rather than fill these in from somewhere else, they stay open until NJDEP Fish & Wildlife states them plainly.
- The free fishing days page says residents may fish without a licence or trout stamp. It does not say whether visitors are covered, so nothing is claimed here either way.
- Salt water needs no freshwater licence, but the digest reminds anglers to "comply with each state’s marine registry requirements" for anadromous species such as striped bass, river herring and shad in tidal water. What that registry costs, if anything, was not read and is left out.
- NJDEP links a disabled veteran licence from its freshwater pages. The conditions and price were not read and it is named rather than published.
- Where fresh water ends and salt water begins is set waterbody by waterbody, not by one rule. The digest lists a boundary line for each tidal creek and river by county.
