Who is eligible for US military draft as automatic registration to start later this year

The US government will start to automatically register eligible men for the military draft in December 2026.

On 30 March, the Selective Service System (SSS), responsible for maintaining records of people who could be called up if a draft were introduced, officially submitted the rule change to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.

Under current law, most men aged between 18 and 25 must register with the SSS within 30 days of turning 18, while late registration is allowed until age 26.

At the moment, there is a fine of up to $250,000, with the possibility of five years in prison and loss of eligibility for federal programs for men who fail to register.

From December, however, responsibility to register falls on the government instead of the individual, and the SSS will use information from federal databases to automatically register all eligible men, besides Barron Trump.

Donald Trump threatened to blow up the whole of Iran earlier this week (Kyle Mazza/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Who is eligible for the US military draft?

• US citizens aged 18–25, including dual citizens

• Male immigrants aged 18–25 living in the US

• US citizens living abroad in the same age group

• People assigned male at birth, including transgender women

• Most men with disabilities (even if they might later be found unfit for military service)

The US will automatically register eligible men for a military draft pool starting this year (Getty Stock Images)

Who isn't eligible for the automatic US military draft?

• Women

• Men younger than 18 or older than 25

• Foreign men in the US on valid temporary non-immigrant visas

• Transgender men assigned female at birth

• Men who were continuously institutionalised, hospitalised or incarcerated from ages 18 to 25

The US hasn’t activated the draft since 1973 during the Vietnam War and has relied on volunteers ever since.

“This statutory change transfers responsibility for registration from individual men to the SSS through integration with federal data sources,” the agency said. “It will result in a streamlined process and corresponding workforce realignment."

Automatic registration will allow the agency to allocate advertising money elsewhere.

What has Trump said about the possibility of bringing in a draft?

Last month, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said 'it’s not part of the current plan right now' when quizzed about the possibility of bringing in a draft.

However, she added that the president 'wisely keeps his options on the table'.

Introducing a draft 'is not part of the current plan right now'(Kyle Mazza/Anadolu via Getty Images)

After the US and Israel launched coordinated strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities on 28 February, Richard Shirreff, a former deputy supreme allied commander of NATO in Europe, warned that 'future historians' will 'look back' at war on Iran as 'the final catalyst for a third world war'.

Meanwhile, the conditional two-week ceasefire agreement between the US and Iran remains in place following Donald Trump's warning that 'a whole civilisation will die'.