A bullet button is a replacement magazine release for semi-automatic rifles that can only be activated by poking a small tool into a recess, instead of being pressed with a finger. It was designed to meet California’s older definition of a “fixed magazine” and keep AR-15 style rifles out of the assault weapon category. That workaround ended on January 1, 2017. A rifle equipped with a bullet button is now classified as an assault weapon in California unless the owner either registered it during a window that has since closed or physically modified the rifle into a compliant configuration.
How a Bullet Button Works
On a standard AR-15, the magazine release sits on the side of the lower receiver. Press it with your index finger and the magazine drops free. A bullet button replaces that flush button with a recessed mechanism. To release the magazine, you have to insert a small pointed object into the recess. The tip of a cartridge works, which is where the name comes from, but a pen tip or any similar tool will do the same job. Reloads take noticeably longer than with a conventional release.
The device was never about safety or handling. It was built to satisfy a legal definition. If a magazine could not be removed without a tool, California at the time treated it as “fixed,” and a fixed magazine kept the rifle outside the assault weapon classification even when it had features like a pistol grip or flash suppressor.
Why Bullet Buttons Existed in the First Place
California’s Assault Weapons Control Act defines an “assault weapon” to include a semi-automatic centerfire rifle that lacks a fixed magazine and has any one of several listed features: a pistol grip that protrudes beneath the action, a thumbhole stock, a folding or telescoping stock, a flash suppressor, a forward pistol grip, or a grenade or flare launcher.1California Legislative Information. California Code PEN 30515 – Assault Weapons Most AR-pattern rifles ship with at least one of those features, so avoiding the assault weapon label meant removing the detachable magazine from the equation.
Before 2017, the regulatory definition of “fixed magazine” was loose enough that a magazine requiring a tool to drop was treated as fixed.2California Department of Justice. Information Bulletin 2022-DLE-19 – Application of California Assault Weapon Laws to Fixed Magazine Devices Manufacturers started selling bullet buttons around 2007, and for roughly a decade a rifle with a bullet button and a standard pistol grip was legal in California while an otherwise identical rifle with a flush magazine release was not.
What Changed in 2017
Governor Jerry Brown signed Assembly Bill 1135 and Senate Bill 880 on July 1, 2016, and both took effect on January 1, 2017.3California Legislative Information. California Senate Bill 880 – Firearms Assault Weapons The new laws redefined a fixed magazine as a feeding device that cannot be removed without disassembling the firearm action.4California Legislative Information. California Assembly Bill 1135 – Firearms Assault Weapons A bullet button does not require any disassembly. Poking a pin into the recess is enough. The legislation specifically targeted weapons “with an ammunition feeding device that can be removed readily from the firearm with the use of a tool.”
Hundreds of thousands of previously legal rifles became assault weapons overnight.
Your Options If You Own One
Anyone who lawfully possessed a bullet-button rifle before January 1, 2017, had several paths to stay legal. One of those paths is closed now. The others still work.
Registration Is No Longer Available
The main option was to register the rifle as an assault weapon with the California Department of Justice. The original window closed at midnight on July 1, 2018.5California Department of Justice. Bullet-Button Assault-Weapon Registration Information A federal court order in Sharp v. Becerra reopened registration for 90 days in 2022, but only for people who could swear under penalty of perjury that they had tried to register the first time and been blocked by technical problems.6California Department of Justice. Reopening of Bullet-Button Assault-Weapon Registration Both windows are closed. If you did not register during one of them, you cannot register now, and keeping the rifle in its bullet-button configuration is illegal.
Convert the Rifle to a Truly Fixed Magazine
You can install an aftermarket device that forces you to separate the upper and lower receivers before the magazine will come out. Products such as the Mean Arms MA Lock meet the current definition because removing the magazine now requires disassembling the action. Once converted, the rifle is not an assault weapon and does not need to be registered. Reloads become slow, but the firearm is legal.
Go Featureless
The assault weapon definition only bites when a rifle lacks a fixed magazine and has one or more of the listed features. Strip the features and you can keep a standard detachable magazine. In practice, going featureless means replacing the pistol grip so your hand wraps over the top of the stock rather than beneath the action, pinning any telescoping stock in place, swapping a flash suppressor for a muzzle brake, and removing any forward pistol grip.1California Legislative Information. California Code PEN 30515 – Assault Weapons A featureless build can be bought, sold, and transferred like any other non-assault-weapon rifle in California.
Surrender the Rifle
You can also turn the firearm over to law enforcement. The DOJ recommends calling your local police department or sheriff’s office to arrange the surrender rather than walking in with a rifle.7California Department of Justice. Frequently Asked Questions – Registered Assault Weapons Surrendered assault weapons are destroyed.
Living With a Registered Assault Weapon
Registration keeps you legal but limits what you can do with the rifle. A registered assault weapon in California cannot be sold or transferred to a family member. It can only be sold to certain law enforcement officers with written approval from the head of their agency, or to a licensed dealer who holds a DOJ dangerous weapons permit. A regular gun shop cannot process the transfer.7California Department of Justice. Frequently Asked Questions – Registered Assault Weapons
Inheritance is tightly limited. If you inherit a registered assault weapon, you have 90 days to sell it to an authorized dealer, move it out of the state, or render it permanently inoperable.7California Department of Justice. Frequently Asked Questions – Registered Assault Weapons
There is one way out of these restrictions. If you remove every feature that makes the rifle an assault weapon under Penal Code 30515, you can ask the DOJ to cancel the registration. Once deregistered, the rifle can be sold or transferred like any other firearm.7California Department of Justice. Frequently Asked Questions – Registered Assault Weapons
Penalties for Keeping an Unregistered Bullet-Button Rifle
Possessing an unregistered assault weapon in California is punishable by up to one year in county jail or by a term in state prison.8California Legislative Information. California Code PEN 30605 – Possession of Assault Weapon The prosecutor decides whether to charge it as a misdemeanor or a felony.
A narrow first-offense exception exists. If you lawfully owned the rifle before it was reclassified, have no prior assault weapon convictions, were caught within one year after the registration period ended, and you surrender the firearm, the penalty drops to a fine of up to $500.8California Legislative Information. California Code PEN 30605 – Possession of Assault Weapon That one-year window has long since passed, so the reduced fine is unlikely to be available today.
Other States
California was the center of the bullet button phenomenon, but around ten other jurisdictions have assault weapon laws built on the same detachable-magazine-plus-features structure, including New York, Connecticut, Maryland, Delaware, Illinois, and the District of Columbia. None of those statutes mention bullet buttons by name, and whether a tool-activated release would be treated as a workaround depends on how each state defines a detachable or fixed magazine. California’s experience showed how quickly a tool-based workaround can be shut down. Before relying on one in any state with an assault weapon ban, talk to a firearms attorney licensed in that state.