Air Force Recruiting ‘Looking Good’ for 2026, With Growing Backlog

JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-RANDOLPH, Texas—The Air Force’s recruiting momentum is showing no signs of slowing in 2026, and leaders are already thinking about how they might get after even bigger goals in 2027 and beyond, a top official told Air & Space Forces Magazine. 

Coming into the new fiscal year, which began Oct. 1, the Air Force set a goal of 32,750 recruits—up from 30,100 in 2025—and so far this year, the number of recruits in the Air Force’s Delayed Entry Program awaiting their turn to start Basic Military Training is far outpacing last year.  

There are currently “around” 20,000 recruits in the DEP, said Col. Layne D. Trosper, deputy commander of the Air Force Recruiting Service. That’s more than 50 percent above the 13,000 in the DEP a year ago, which at the time leaders hailed as the largest backlog of recruits in a decade. The DEP has grown by 1,000 in just the past five months.

“2026 is looking good,” Trosper said. 

Leaders now expect the Air Force to hit its recruiting goal for the third consecutive year after a dismal 2023, when the Recruiting Service suffered its first miss since 1999.  

To recover, the Air Force dropped its goal in 2024 and started expanding the recruiting force. The goal rose in 2025 and rose again for 2026, and Trosper said AFRS is tracking positive signs beyond the DEP. 

There are still eight months left in fiscal 2026 and recruiters aren’t letting off the pedal. Now 2027 looms as a potentially momentous year, with President Donald Trump proposing to seek $1.5 trillion for defensenext year, up 50 percent over ’26. While far from sure—even the 2026 budget has yet to be passed into law—Trosper said AFRS and the newly revised Air Force Accessions Command has its focus on both present and future. 

“What we look at is trying to maintain our force so that, if there is a jump, that our forces are ready—that we have not only the personnel in place, but those personnel are trained,” Trosper said. “We’re looking at when we have opportunities to bring new personnel in, where’s the right places to put those individuals?” 

AFRS added 370 people to help meet its 2025 goal and is positioned to understand how to expand effectively if needed. 

The Air Force stood up the Air Force Accessions Center in December 2024, an umbrella that oversees both AFRS and the Holm Center, which runs officer accessions through Officer Training School and the Reserve Officer Training Corps. The two were combined to improve coordination and consistency between the two organizations most directly involved in attracting new Airmen and Guardians. 

A year later, Trosper said AFAC should reach full operational capability this summer. 

“The biggest thing is that right now, the Accession Center commander [Brig. Gen. Jeffrey W. Nelson] is dual-hatted as the Recruiting Service commander,” Trosper said. Come summer, Col. Lacresha A. Merkle will lmove up from the 360th Recruiting Group to take over AFRS, Trosper said: “So basically, we’re taking away that dual hat, and [AFRS] will be a standalone O-6 command.”