If you just want to buy a Glock that is ready to go right out of the box, the Gen 5 with its improved trigger pull, integral mag well, and AmeriGlo Bold sights is the closest thing to perfection Glock has ever made.

If you just want to buy a Glock that is ready to go right out of the box, the Gen 5 with its improved trigger pull, integral mag well, and AmeriGlo Bold sights is the closest thing to perfection Glock has ever made.

For its size, Glock is an unusual gun company. It doesn’t make pistols and shotguns and rifles. It just makes pistols—and only one type of pistol at that: the Glock pistol, a polymer-frame striker-fired semiauto with a distinct look. It is available in various calibers and sizes, but a Glock pistol is a Glock pistol. Therefore, any time Glock introduces a new model or makes any changes, it is much bigger news than it would be for another company.

That said, the Glock Gen 5 is kind of a big deal. Not just for what it is—a completely redesigned Glock—but because of how it came about.

The two Glock Gen 5 pistols are basically the commercial versions of the 17M and 19M models made for and adopted by the FBI. While the FBI was concerned with functionality, when designing these guns Glock was also concerned with increasing durability, accuracy and cost-effectiveness in manufacturing. As a result, there is a larger commonality of parts between the 17 and 19 in this generation.

Most of the changes are internal, but some, like the integral magazine well, are not. All told, there are 20 design changes in the Gen 5 guns, and while externally they don’t look much changed from previous generations, the number of interchangeable parts can be counted on one hand.

For testing, I secured a sample of the Gen 5 Glock 19. The Glock 19 has been this company’s highest-selling model almost since its introduction, and it’s the Gen 5 pistol that

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