Nonresident hunting, fishing and combination licenses for 2022 will go on sale at midnight MST, Dec. 1, 2021. Nonresident deer and elk tags will go on sale starting at 10 a.m. MST on Dec. 1. 

Licenses and tags can be bought online at GoOutdoorsIdaho.com, or by phone at 1-800-554-8685, at a license vendor location, or Fish and Game regional offices during normal business hours. The number of available tags for each deer hunting unit and elk zone is available at https://idfg.idaho.gov/tag/quotas-nonresident.

Hunters can buy hunting or combination licenses prior to the tags going on sale, however, this does not improve the chances for any tags, does not secure a tag, and no refund will be issued for the license if the hunter does not acquire the desired tag.

When tags are made available at 10 a.m. MST, hunters can add a hunting or combination license to their “shopping cart” to purchase a license and tag together.

How to purchase on Dec. 1

If purchasing a deer or elk tag online or through the mobile app, a virtual waiting room will be available 30 minutes prior to the start of sales for all customers logging in.

At 10 a.m. MST, all customers in the waiting room will be randomly assigned a place in line and an approximate wait time to access their accounts.  

After a person’s place in line has been reached, he or she will be directed to the customer account, and then can click “Buy a License, Permit, or Tag” in the upper left of the customer account home page.

After the selected tag is added to the shopping cart, the buyer has 20 minutes to complete the transaction. If the transaction is not completed within 20 minutes, the tag will be cleared from the shopping cart and made available for other nonresident hunters to purchase.

Tag sales for Disabled American Veterans (DAV)

There will be limited quantities of nonresident DAV tags at the discounted price available for sale at 10 a.m. MST on Dec. 1. At that time, 500 nonresident DAV deer tags and 300 nonresident DAV elk tags will go on sale. After these discounted tags are sold out, nonresident DAV hunters can still buy tags, but at full nonresident prices.

Disabled American Veterans must be at least 40 percent service-connected disability to buy discounted tags, and must submit the required DAV certification documents to Fish and Game before Dec. 1 so that there is time for the buyer’s profile to be reviewed and updated with DAV status.

To prepare for the 2022 license and tag sale, we suggest all nonresident hunters: 

• Review the Big Game regulations on Fish and Game’s website.
• Nonresident deer hunters must select a regular deer tag or a white-tailed deer tag. 
• Remember that a Game Management Unit must be selected when purchasing a nonresident deer tag, and an elk zone must be selected when purchasing a nonresident elk tag, and there are A and B tags most zones.
• Review the number of tags available for the unit or zone you intend to purchase. Note that many units and zones have a limited number of tags available, and could quickly sell out on Dec. 1, so nonresident hunters may consider a back-up option. 
• If you have never purchased an Idaho license, permit, or tag, Fish and Game recommends that you complete your profile setup before Dec. 1 to expedite your checkout process. You may do so by visiting GoOutdoorsIdaho.com, and creating an account using the steps listed on the site.

Idaho’s nonresident tag allocation for deer and elk tags has changed. Nonresident hunters in most general season elk and deer hunts are limited to 10 or 15 percent of the total hunters in each elk zone or deer unit based on hunter participation estimates averaged over the five years prior to 2021. 

The new limits do not apply to capped elk zones, and the statewide quotas for nonresident deer tags (15,500) and elk tags (12,815) have remained the same for nearly 30 years.