Fresh pecans are increasingly popular for their sweet taste and high nutritional value. To facilitate their commercialization, it is crucial to screen the proper moisture content for efficient mechanical shelling while retaining nutritional quality and finding a reasonable packaging method for storage. This study compared the mechanical shelling efficiencies of fresh pecans with different moisture contents via a standardized evaluation system used by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for over 70 years. The results indicated that pecans dried for 24 h (17.51% moisture, wet basis) achieved the highest mechanical shelling efficiency with the lowest kernel shoulders damaged (DSh%, 31.7%), shortest separation time (10.67 min·kg