Air Force Promotes Fewer Staff Sergeants After Last Year’s Historic Surge

The Air Force is promoting around 12,500 Senior Airmen to staff sergeant, roughly 20 percent fewer enlisted Airmen compared to last year’s massive total.

The service announced Aug. 10 it has selected 12,671 out of a pool of 39,774 Senior Airmen to receive their first sergeant stripes—a selection rate of 31.86 percent, according to an Air Force Personnel Center announcement. The full list of Airmen selected is scheduled to be released Aug. 13.

In 2025, for comparison, the Air Force promoted 15,894 E-4s to staff sergeant out of 47,007 eligible, for a rate of 33.81 percent. That marked the largest number of new staff sergeants promoted since 2016 and the second most since 2002, at the start of the Global War on Terror.

The drop of 3,223 promotions outpaced the decline of 7,233 fewer eligible candidates, leading to the modest reduction in the selection rate by roughly two percentage points.

The Air Force has not seen the number of eligible senior Airmen drop below 40,000 since 2020 when only 33,341 E-4s were eligible to move up to E-5.

To be eligible for promotion to E-5, Airmen must have a 5-skill level, six months in grade, and three years in service. They must also complete a 24-day Airmen Leadership School, according to Air Force enlisted promotion guidelines. Changes in the pool of those eligible can indicate larger trends in Air Force retention, as more experience Airmen either leave or stay in the service.

Despite the rather considerable decline in the number of those promoted this year, the total is still much higher from the record lows of 2022 and 2023, when fewer than 10,000 Airmen made the cut each year. Those low points were part of a push by the Air Force to keep troops in midlevel enlisted ranks longer out of a concern that Airmen lacked necessary experience as they climbed the career ladder. The goal was to reach a healthier grade distribution by 2025, and promotion numbers have indeed climbed in recent years.

Staff Sergeant Promotion Rates