We traveled to the GlockMothership in Georgia to get the scoop on the company’s new Sixth Generation guns and have all the juicy information.
Summary: The new Gen 6 Glocks look much like the previous five generations (even fitting most existing holsters), but address a lot of issues that people have asked for on an upgrade. The guns are direct-milled optics-ready, have a new flat-faced trigger while keeping many of the same internals, the ergos are much improved, and they still accept legacy magazines and sights. All for the same asking price as Gen 5 MOS models. Rumors of a modular fire control system are false.
Now let’s get into it
The new Gen 6s at first will be all 9mm, with the G19, G17, and G45 at launch and the G49 available overseas. We are advised that other models are inbound.
The Gen 6 Glock G19, G45, and G17. The additions to the ergos are obvious, including the trigger shoe, palmswell, texturing, and thumb pad/gas pedal. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
A closer look at the production Gen 6 G17. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
And note the ambi slide catch lever. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The Glock generations from 1 through 6 look very (very) similar when stacked side-by-side, and there is a reason for that: consistency. Anyone who had a Gen 1 in 1986 could be transported to 2026 and pick up a brand-new Gen 6 and figure it out in about three seconds.
The Six Glock generations side-by-side (Photo: Glock)
The Glock Gen 5 G19 compared to a Glock Gen 6 G17. Note that the legacy model has less texture, a curved trigger, and a dual spring recoil assembly. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
A look at the slides compared. The extractor channel is now sealed to prevent folks from oozing excess thread lock into their slide internals when mounting optics. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The frames are compared at the action, with the Gen 6 on the left and Gen 5 on the right. The layout is the same, but the geometry is a little bit different. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Backplates compared. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The Gen6 may look remarkably like previous generations, by design, but it is quite different when it comes to ergonomics, optics mounting, and parts. For instance, it has a new trigger, a new slide, and mostly new internals.
Legacy parts that will work besides the magazines, backstraps, and sights are the locking block, mag release, firing pin and spring, slide lock/spring, trigger pin/housing, trigger bar, recoil spring assembly, and connector. Almost everything else is Gen 6 only.
The differences are so substantial that Glock’s Training division told us that, moving forward, the traditional Glock Armorer’s Course, which has long been one day covering all generations, will now just cover the Gen 5s and 6s, with a separate course dedicated to “Classic” Glocks.
The downsized extractor package (extractor pressure piece, extractor frame, extractor package spring) is completely different but can still be removed with just the standard Glock armorer tool. It was redesigned to allow more space for the Optics Ready System, and the extractor channel is now sealed off. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
On the topic of user comfort, the new palmswell comes from scanning hundreds of Glock users to produce a cross median that provides a more optimal fit. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The new RTF6 grip texture combines the old-school RTF2 substrate with the RTF 4 polymids to create something altogether different. Further, the grip texture has been expanded to reach higher on the frame and onto the thumb rest to give the user more grip purchase opportunities. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The enlarged, frame-mounted beaver tail encourages a higher grip while still avoiding slide bite. It ships with two interchangeable backstraps (2mm and 3mm) and is compatible with Gen 5 straps. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The flat-face trigger has an advertised pull weight of 5.5 pounds, and we noted it to have a good reset. It keeps the traditional trio of Glock “Safe Action” internal safeties, including the trigger shoe pivot, firing pin safety, and drop safety. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
All standard frame Gen6 Glocks will be optics-ready, and it isn’t the old MOS system (which is gone) or the new A-Cut COA system. It uses a plate system on a slide that has been redesigned so that the optic bed sits deeper into the slide for a lower height over the bore axis.
The 3mm plate is polymer and is advertised as working as something of a shock-absorber/crush washer that fits in a 3mm recess, while the optic screws directly into the slide, which has four screw holes, sort of a direct-mount with a twist, if you will. (Photo: Glock)
The result is that the optics sit flat while having the benefit of a polymer buffer of sorts. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The ambi slide stop lever has been redesigned and now has a larger border around it molded on the frame to prevent accidental activation. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The undercut trigger guard (finally, Glock) helps with a higher grip while keeping enough “beef” so that you don’t risk frame cracking on duty holsters. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
It has deeper slide serrations, including front slide serrations, which have not been standard on legacy models. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
It uses a gently flared magwell and accepts Gen 5 magazines. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Glock has finally added a thumb rest/gas pedal/thumb pad on each side of the gun. To make sure it would still fit legacy holsters, the frame internals on this section have been redesigned to allow the extra texture without making the pistol wider at this point. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Looking at reliability, Glock— which has been working on the Gen 6 since 2022— has had test guns survive 40,000 rounds of mixed ammo, aced salt fog/mud/sand tests, and met all its other standard testing protocols. We fired all three production models on the range for a few hundred rounds and experienced no issues. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The Gen 6s will start shipping to be “on dealer shelves” for a Jan. 20, 2026, official launch, with three magazines and three optics plates, as well as all the standard Glock stuff. (Photo: Glock)
The MSRP on the new Gen 6 Glock models is $745, which is the same cataloged price as the Gen 5 MOS models.
We have review models inbound, so expect more details in the coming weeks.
Beretta is marking a half-century of the legendary Model 92, the company has released a retro SB variant of the type that went on to make history.
The original Model 92 hit the market in 1975, one of the first double-stack double-action/single-action pistols available, and soon went on to become a global icon. The company has been honoring the lineage of the “Italian Stallion” this year with limited-edition offerings, and the repro 92SB comes as part of Beretta’s “Celebrating 50 Years of the 90 Series” program.
The repro 92SB is full of classic features such as a polished anodized frame, polished blued slide and barrel, a rounded trigger guard, and a flat dust cover. On the inside, it features all-metal components and upgraded internals, including a short reset trigger bar and D hammer spring. It runs a slide-mounted Type F safety lever.
The new 92SB is engraved “Celebrating 50 Years of the 90 Series” on the left side of the slide and has a 1 of 1,526 serial number range, the latter an ode to Beretta’s first firearm contract. (Photos unless noted: Beretta)
Note the ambi Type F safety and all metal components, other than the G10 grip panels.
You have to love the polished externals.
The repro 92SB is a Beretta through and through and ships with a pair of classic-style 15-round magazines with flat base pads.
Finished with G10 grips, each pistol comes in special collector’s packaging, including a challenge coin and a history booklet chronicling the 90 Series legacy.
The history behind the 92SB
The 92SB was the third production model of the 92 series, building on 1977’s Model 92S, which added the slide-mounted safety/decocker to the pistol. Debuting in 1980, the SB added an automatic firing pin block and an ambidextrous safety lever, and was marketed in both the standard and a compact model, the first for the 90 series.
The Beretta 92SB hit the market in 1980, with the 92SB Compact arriving the next year.
The gun found fast success with consumers as well as LE/military customers.
It was soon adopted by the Connecticut State Police in 1983, among many departments.
Perhaps the 92SB’s greatest claim to fame was that it was submitted to the Army Pistol Trials in 1984 and 1986, which it won, and, with modifications including a squared trigger guard, a matte finish, and a chrome-lined barrel, became the 92SB-F, later just shortened to 92F.
The rest is history.
The Beretta 92SB beat out a crowded field in 1984-86 to win the Army’s Pistol Trials, with the modified 92SB-F being adopted as the M9. (Image: 1986 GAO Report)
The MSRP on the new Beretta 92SB repro is an appropriate $1,526.
Austria-based Steyr last week debuted a NEW (!) series of pistols designed for both competition (ATc) and defense (ATd) with a familiar feel to them.
As reported by the European gun sites All 4 Shooters andMilitaerAktuell, Steyr made the public debut of the new all-metal, optics-ready, hammer-fired pistols at a media event in Slovenia at the beginning of the month.
As such, these are the first hammer-fired pistols branded by Steyr since the old Gasbremse (GB) gas guns of the 1970s and 80s.
You remember the old Steyr GB, ja?
And the first all-metal pistols since the M.12 went out of production in 1945.
And who can forget the Steyr 1912?
The all-stainless ATc is pitched to competition users and features tuned 3-pound SAO triggers and heavy match barrels with options for 5- and 6-inch lengths.
Meanwhile, the three ATd model 6-pound DA/SA guns, geared more for defensive use, will have alloy frames in three barrel sizes (4, 5, and 6 inches). These use 18-shot double-stack 9mm magazines, with extended magazines available up to 25 rounds. The guns will have modular recoil spring and hammer spring options to allow easy user-level tuning.
The competition-oriented Steyr ATc. (Photos: Steyr via Militaer Aktuell)
The more defensive-minded Steyr ATd. (Photos: Steyr via Militaer Aktuell)
The new guns appear to be rebranded and upgraded Arex Rex Alphas, a pistol teased in 2017 and delivered to the market in small numbers since 2018. These have typically been imported to the States by the FIME Group.
The Arex Rex Alpha is a more competition-oriented version of the company’s Zero 1 and Zero 2 series pistols, which were essentially updated SIG P226 clones. (Photos: Arex)
Arex, based in Slovenia, has been owned by the Czech Republic-based RSBC Investment Group since 2017. RSBC purchased Steyr last year, making it all make sense. It will be interesting to see whether the guns’ production line will be in Austria or Slovenia.
Price is reported to start at €999, which translates to about $1,170, not counting tariffs. As for the likelihood of these guns making it to America, Steyr has a much more robust in-house Alabama-based importing ability over Arex, so the logic on the branding would seem to point towards the U.S. market.
On this side of the pond, the ATc could be a good competitor against SIG’s P226 X5, while the ATd could take on assorted DA/SA P226 SKUs, if the price were right.
Out of production for more than a quarter century, the moon-clipped S&W 940 snub-nosed wheel gun has been resurrected – and modernized.
The original 940 was a 9mm companion to the classic .357 Magnum Model 640, a hard-wearing stainless five-shot double-action-only J-frame Centennial series revolver with a snag-free concealed hammer. Using a moon clip to hold the rimless 9mm rounds, it was fast and easy to reload while opening the revolver to a wide range of easy-to-find ammo.
While the 940 was only produced between 1991 and 1998, huge advances in bullet and propellant design have made 9mm more popular than ever, meaning that in many cases, the variety of self-defense loads available at local retailers in the caliber is greater than any other. With that in mind, rebooting the 940 makes sense.
Further, the new model ships with an XS Tritium night sight in front, something the old model never had. Oh, yeah, and it has VZ black cherry grips and a fluted barrel.
The new S&W 940 in 9mm is a five-shot DAO snub-nose with a concealed hammer. Note the 2.17-inch 1:10 RH twist stainless-steel fluted barrel. Height is a pocketable 4.38 inches. Weight is 23.5 ounces.
Walther has reached into the vault to bring back one of its most classic designs, now refined and ready for a new century. Like a spy in from the Cold, the PPK in .32 ACP has returned unexpectedly, and we have the debrief.
The background of the gun is well established. In a nutshell, Fritz Walter, the heir to the famed Carl Walther rifle works, moved in the early 1900s to expand the company into handguns with a line of simple blowback pocket pistols to compete with models like the Colt Vest Pocket and Pieper Bayard. Moving to more advanced designs using a workable single-action/double-action trigger system by the 1920s, the Polizei Pistole, or PP series, soon became a smash hit, despite it being twice as much as the company’s earlier models.
While not the first DA/SA handgun on the market, the PP was much more successful, and soon an abbreviated version pitched as a detective’s gun, the Polizei Pistole Kriminal, hit the catalog in 1930. With a 3.25-inch barrel and offerings in not only .32 ACP (the original PP’s bread and butter) but also spicier .380 ACP, which was then and still is seen as big medicine for European LE types, the sleek, almost Art Deco, PPK soon filled holsters and desk drawers.
The Walther PP/PPK has some serious history to it. (All Photos: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
A huge driver for the gun came from pop culture. While the Walther PP series appeared on screen in films as early as 1938, it was the James Bond film franchise that kicked the pistol into the stratosphere. Sean Connery’s Agent 007 was first issued a Walther in 1962’s “Dr. No” to replace his favored .25 ACP Beretta.
It would continue as his standard through his six-film run and go on to be picked up off and on by successive generations of Bonds.
The pistol is iconic, and in many cases can be a work of art, as shown here at the Walther factory in Ulm, Germany.
By 2013, with the market demand for the .32 waning in favor of the .380, Walther put the models chambered in the smaller caliber to bed.
Now, with improvements in bullet and propellant design leading to the resurgence of 9mm over .40 caliber, and .380 seen as the new 9mm, and .32 seen as the new .380, the stubby little round is much more popular these days.
So, it should be no surprise that Walther is bringing the “old” caliber back for both the PPK and the PPK/S, in stainless and black variants. We have been testing one for the past couple of months.
The SCAR-SC. I mean, will you just look at it? How is this thing not in 150 different movies? (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The FN 15P debuted at last year’s SHOT Show as an NFA-compliant ode to the SCAR SC, which is on the no-no list due to the Hughes Amendment (which for the record should be repealed, thanks, Ronnie). The semi-auto 5.56 chambered large format pistol is the smallest SCAR in production, going even shorter, at under 20 inches long, than the 21-to-25-inch SCAR SC.
Now, the pistol-length FN 15P is available in .300 BLK, a caliber that is much more ballistically suited to a platform with a 7.5-inch barrel.
Being fully aware that Blackout shines in suppressed platforms, FN has updated the 15P in .300 to include gas regulator settings for subsonic and supersonic ammunition, a .30-caliber flash hider, and a dedicated 30-round magazine optimized for the stubby cartridge’s geometry. Plus, replacement barrel assemblies are on the menu for those who have the 5.56 variant and want to swap out to the BLK.
The FN SCAR 15P in .300 will be offered in both a tactical peanut butter (FDE) with black accents as well as good old-fashioned black on black.
CZ introduced the double-action/single-action hammer-fired polymer-framed P-09 series around 2013, and it has proved popular with “Czechnologists” ever since. However, an increasingly big drawback over the years is that it, as well as many of CZ’s other handguns, aren’t optics-ready.
About that.
While visiting with CZ during our Euro Trip earlier this year, we had the honor of seeing the updated P-09 series while it was still in pre-production. The best takeaways were a factory optics cut on the slide with co-witnessing iron sights, completely refreshed ergonomics, and backward compatibility with both legacy magazines and CZ’s Kadet subcaliber rimfire kits.
In a nod to the updated ability to carry a red/green dot– which is a superb sight option for low-light/night conditions– the new P-09 ORs would have a new name: the Nocturne.
I’ve been kicking around one of the production models for the past couple of weeks.
Arguably the first large format AR-style pistol to hit the market is now set to make a return, no brace needed.
Firearms maverick Mack Gwinn Jr., a Vietnam-era Special Forces veteran, in the early 1970s acquired the rights to Colt-made IMP-221, a stockless, gas-operated bullpup pistol intended to provide aircrew with a compact survival gun chambered in .221 Fireball. While the Air Force had already scrapped the project, Gwinn made lemons into lemonade, adapting the design to use 5.56 NATO and accept standard AR mags, launching the Bushmaster Arm Pistol.
Bushmaster Armpistol ads started popping up in the early-1970s
The original Gwinn/Bushmaster Arm Pistol borrowed from both AR-15 and AK-47 designs, with its AR-style rotating bolt and AK-type long-stroke gas piston.
Based on the Colt IMP-221/ Air Force GUU-4/P air crew weapon originally designed at Eglin Air Force Base, the original Gwinn Firearms in Bangor, Maine produced the 5.56mm Bushmaster Arm Pistol “in limited quantities” for the USAF in the early 1970s before sending it to the consumer market. Just 20.63 inches long, the Arm Pistol had a lot of M16-style features in a very abbreviated bullpup format.
With the Arm Pistol long out of production and Bushmaster now in at least its third reincarnation since Gwinn sold the company in 1976, his son, Mack Gwinn III, has founded Maine-based Hydra Weaponry and returned a much-improved version of the design to production.
We caught up with the fine folks from Hydra at the recent 2024 NRA Annual Meetings in Dallas to “lay arm” on the new BMP-23.
Hydra feels the BMP-23 is the 5.56mm pistol that Gwinn Jr. would have built if he had access to today’s CNC machinery and technologically advanced materials.
A simple new platform that will be headed to shelves this summer is from North Carolina’s Veteran-owned Dark Mountain Arms.
The Stowaway system is a single-shot bolt-action, take-down firearm that is initially being offered in 5.7 NATO but, as it is multi-caliber via an easy swap out of a bolt face and barrel, future options on the table include 9mm, 4.6×30, .22 LR, .22 WMR, .17 Mach2, and .17 HMR.
A packable design with a weight of less than 3 pounds (2.8 pounds for the 16-inch threaded barreled rifle and 2 pounds flat for the 5-inch barreled pistol), the gun can be stowed in two primary pieces and then easily reassembled.
One interesting new (well, rebooted) gun design that I am looking forward to testing this summer is the Heritage Roscoe.
A salute to the old-school pocket revolvers from the days of Mike Hammer and Philip Marlowe, the cigar-box-worthy .38SPL +P Roscoe looks right out of the mid-20th Century, clad in a deep glossy finish, classic round butt wood grips, fixed sights, and a 5-shot cylinder. Plus, it is available in both 2- and 3-inch models.
Best yet, it has an ask of $350, which should translate to $299-ish at retail.
Heritage, the Taurus subsidiary best known for its affordable single-action rimfire pistols and carbines, has launched the Roscoe line. This comes almost a decade after Taurus sunset its popular Model 85 5-shot small-frame revolver line– upgrading it to the larger 6-shot Model 856– and recalls the company’s history during the old Bangor Punta days (1962-72ish) when it was a sister to S&W and they shared tech.
