Obviously I have to mention the new GLOCK offerings.
They’ve pretty much had the service and duty pistol design locked down for a long time now, as with all firearms technology there’s not really much more than can be done to wring any better performance out of a handgun, broadly speaking. The idea of a concealed carry pistol though is of course very different and I think a lot of companies have been trying to find that ideal balance of capacity and grip area vs ability to conceal for some years now.
I think it might be fair to say they went perhaps a tad too small for some people’s tastes with the 42 and 43, people find they’re extremely easy to hide but perhaps a bit tricky to get a full grip on and you only get 6 rounds of 9mm in the flush fit magazines. Not a bad capacity for civilian defensive uses but having the option of more trigger pulls is never a bad thing, so it’s good to see the 10 round mags in the new G43X and G48 with only a slight increase in thickness and length of the frame.
For the majority of human hands the difference in length between the 43 and 43X will amount to the difference as to whether they accommodate all their fingers for a full grip on the handgun. The 43X follows the 19X in that it is the exact same slide length as it’s numbered brother, it just adds some bulk to the grip area of the frame allowing for a better purchase and more magazine capacity within the footprint of that frame. The 48 is interesting in that its’ silhouette is essentially exactly the same as the absurdly popular and fast selling G19, it’s just slimmed down to a single stack type width as depicted here.
Have Glock now found their ideal middle ground for size vs capacity in a concealed carry pistol with this new 10 round slim format? It will be interesting to see if any new sizes of pistol are released next year.
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