South Carolina Knife Laws: No Carry Statute Since 2024, and the 2-Inch School Rule

The Short Version

South Carolina does not regulate the carry of knives. For decades its concealed weapons statute, 16-23-460, made it unlawful to carry a concealed deadly weapon and then exempted "dirks, slingshots, metal knuckles, knives, or razors" in the same breath, so knives were never within it. On March 7, 2024, the South Carolina Constitutional Carry/Second Amendment Preservation Act repealed the section altogether. No statute bans a knife by type, sets a blade length in public, distinguishes open from concealed carry, or requires a permit. The state constitution requires uniform criminal law, and the Attorney General has said the handful of city knife ordinances still on the books are likely void.

What South Carolina does have is a school statute with teeth: 16-23-430 makes it a felony, up to five years, to carry a knife with a blade over 2 inches on elementary or secondary school property, with an exception for a knife locked in a vehicle. And 16-23-490 adds five mandatory years for visibly displaying a knife during a violent crime. For a TEKTO customer every knife we make is legal to own and carry in South Carolina, OTF automatics and the double-edged A7 Zastava included. The rules to remember are the school line and the courthouse door.

The Repeal: 16-23-460 and the 2024 Act

The old 16-23-460 was a concealed deadly weapon statute of the familiar Southern pattern, and from its 1880 origins it carried a list of exceptions that grew to include dirks, knives and razors. After the 2008 amendment the exceptions read "dirks, slingshots, metal knuckles, knives, or razors," which is why AKTI could write, before 2024, that there was "no issue under South Carolina law as to concealed carry of knives." The 2024 Act, H.3594, which made South Carolina a permitless carry state for handguns, repealed the section entirely in its Section 15, effective March 7, 2024. The code page now reads "Repealed" with a history note. Nothing replaced it. There is no concealed knife offense in South Carolina today, and there was none in practice before.

What Is Left: 16-23-405 and the Weapon Definition

16-23-405 defines "weapon" for the chapter as a firearm, "a blackjack, a metal pipe or pole, or any other type of device, or object which may be used to inflict bodily injury or death," and provides that a person convicted of a crime "shall have a weapon used in the commission or in furtherance of the crime confiscated." The definition once also said "a knife with a blade over two inches long," which is where the 2-inch figure in the old city ordinances came from. Later amendments removed it. A knife is a "weapon" under this section only when it is used in a crime, and the consequence is confiscation on top of the sentence. For the ordinary knife owner the section never comes into play.

Schools: The 2-Inch Rule

16-23-430(A) makes it unlawful "for any person, except state, county, or municipal law enforcement officers or personnel authorized by school officials, to carry on his person, while on any elementary or secondary school property, a knife, with a blade over two inches long, a blackjack, a metal pipe or pole, firearms, or any other type of weapon, device, or object which may be used to inflict bodily injury or death." A violation is a felony: "fined not more than one thousand dollars or imprisoned not more than five years, or both," and the knife is confiscated. Subsection (B) is the exception that matters to a parent: the section "does not apply when the weapon remains inside an attended or locked motor vehicle and is secured in a closed glove compartment, closed console, closed trunk, or in a closed container secured by an integral fastener and transported in the luggage compartment of the vehicle." The 2024 Act deleted the old clause limiting that exception to concealed weapon permit holders, so it now applies to everyone. A 2-inch blade is short. The A5 Spry Mini and A2 Badger at 1.85 inches are under it, and every other knife we make is over it. The rule for school property is the glove box.

Knives in Violent Crime: 16-23-490

16-23-490 provides that a person who "visibly displays a knife during the commission of a violent crime" and is convicted of the crime "must be imprisoned five years, in addition to the punishment provided for the principal crime," with the five years mandatory and ineligible for parole or good-time reduction. "Knife" is defined broadly as "an instrument or tool consisting of a sharp cutting blade whether or not fastened to a handle which is capable of being used to inflict a cut, slash, or wound." The section tells you what South Carolina cares about: not what knife you carry, but whether it comes out during a robbery or an assault. The list of violent crimes in 16-1-60 is long, and the five years are real.

Local Ordinances and the Attorney General's Opinion

South Carolina has no knife preemption statute, but it has something equivalent: Article VIII, Section 14 of the state constitution requires that criminal laws be uniform statewide, and the General Assembly has occupied the field. Several cities, Columbia, Charleston and Greenville among them, still carry knife ordinances written when 16-23-405 defined a weapon to include "a knife with a blade over two inches long." In response to an inquiry from a legislator, the Office of the Attorney General wrote that "a court would likely hold the local knife ordinances listed in the request letter are inconsistent with state criminal law and, therefore, violate S.C. Const, art. VIII, section 14," because the ordinances "continue to criminalize conduct that the General Assembly has since authorized." The opinion is persuasive, not binding, and the ordinances have not been repealed. An officer in Charleston may still write the ticket. The Attorney General's view is that it will not survive. We would carry a pocketknife in any South Carolina city without a second thought and would not test the question with a sword.

Where You Cannot Carry

• Elementary and secondary school propertyNo knife with a blade over 2 inches. Felony, up to five years. A knife locked in a vehicle, in a closed compartment or container, is exempt.
  16-23-430
• Colleges and universitiesThe campus statute, 16-23-420, is about firearms. Campus policies bar knives on their own authority. Check the student handbook.
  16-23-420
• Courthouses and public buildings with screeningCourt security refuses knives at the door under the Supreme Court's security orders, and many county buildings screen. Leave it in the car.
  Court security
• Correctional facilitiesNo knife of any kind in a state or local correctional facility. 24-13-440 makes furnishing one to an inmate a felony.
  24-13-440
• Airports and federal propertyNo knives past the checkpoint at Charleston, Columbia, Greenville-Spartanburg or Myrtle Beach under federal rules, and none in a federal building or courthouse under 18 U.S.C. 930.
  TSA
• Private property and workplacesAn owner may bar knives and an employer may set a policy. The remedy is being asked to leave or being disciplined, and after that, trespass.
  Trespass

Penalties

South Carolina has no misdemeanor knife offense at all. The only knife crimes are the school felony and the sentencing enhancement, which is unusual and worth knowing: there is no small charge here, only none or a serious one.

What the Internet Gets Wrong

Three things. First, that South Carolina has a 2-inch concealed carry limit. The 2 inches is the school rule, and was once part of the weapon definition. It was removed from the public definition years ago, and the concealed weapons statute that people cite was repealed in 2024. Second, that Charleston and Columbia have enforceable knife ordinances. They have ordinances. The Attorney General has said they likely violate the constitution's uniformity clause. Third, that a dagger or an automatic is restricted. Neither has ever been named in a South Carolina statute. The rule people miss is the one that matters: a 3-inch folder in a pocket at a high school football game is a felony, and the glove box is a defense written into the statute.

TEKTO Knives for South Carolina

Every TEKTO knife is a South Carolina knife. The A5 Spry in any blade style and the A7 Zastava with its double-edged spear point are legal in a pocket here. The F2 Bravo is a 3.30-inch D2 folder with nothing in the Code to say about it. The X1 Atlas fixed blade in MagnaCut is the knife for the Lowcountry marsh and the Upstate woods. For school property the only TEKTO knives under the 2-inch line are the A5 Spry Mini and the A2 Badger at 1.85 inches, and even those belong in the glove box on a school day.