The Glock 19X is a sort of attempt by the company to crack the U.S. military market and very nearly became the standard-issue sidearm in the course of the XM17 Modular Handgun System competition. Even while the most-issued Glock variant to law enforcement and certainly one of the most popular with civilians, the Glock 19X lost out to SIG Sauer’s P320 military variants due to their strategically lower bid and SIG’s ammunition partnership with Winchester.
The U.S. Government pegged SIG Sauer’s most aggressive pricing, coupled with its ammunition partnership with Winchester, as being the key determinant in the final decision. Unlike SIG, Glock had no ammunition partner and thus was competitively disadvantaged from the word go. Secondly, SIG had submitted two models for testing, while Glock entered only its full-size variant.
If the competition had been based on law enforcement adoption, Glock would have won. In the United States alone, Glock pistols remain the handgun of choice for some 65 percent of local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, Customs and Border Protection, and the Secret Service.
Although Glock lost the XM17 bid, the Glock 19X has been quite popular among civilians. The company, since selling to the public in 2018, sold off 100,000 guns within six months. The U.S. military continually uses Glock firearms. In September of 2021, the Army awarded Glock a five-year $15 million contract for various firearms, spare magazines, and parts benchmark of continued relevance in special operations forces units.
The Glock 19X is Glock’s first “crossover” pistol. That means the company mated a full-size Glock 17 polymer frame to a compact Glock 19 all-metal slide. It also houses ambidextrous controls and possesses very strong accuracy via the GLOCK Marksman Barrel polygonally rifled barrel. The nPVD slide coating keeps corrosion low, while the finish in “coyote-colored” makes this Glock much different than its classic black siblings.
The Glock 19X ships with 17-round magazines but the pistol will also accept any 19, 24, 31, and even 33-round magazines. It comes in three different backstrap sizes-small, medium, and large-to accommodate different hand sizes. This loaded pistol weighs an estimated 31 ounces with a barrel length of just over 4 inches and an overall length of 7.4 inches.
Following Glock’s protest over the outcome of the first competition, the Government Accountability Office conducted a head-to-head test between the Glock 19X and the SIG Sauer M17/M18. Whereas the SIG models performed very well in many aspects, including initial reliability and ammunition performance, license rights, and manufacturing, including ammunition, the Glock 19X was rated outstanding in just initial reliability but acceptable in warfighter ergonomics and marginal in ammunition licensing.
These factors were licensing of ammunition, price, and ergonomics. Then came the strategic partnership of SIG Sauer with Winchester for ammunition that did the trick. At number two comes Glock, which is still very popular with the civilian market.
The other competitor in the XM17 competition was the FN 509, which just came from winning the service-pistol contest of the Los Angeles Police Department. The LAPD is the third-largest police department in the U.S. and chose the FN 509 MRD-LE after putting the pistol through a very grueling 20,000-round count test with no malfunctions. That just proves how their firearms are reliable and show good high performance.
It brings into play the patented FN Low-Profile Optics-Mounting System™, which allows officers to mount a wide variety of duty-rated micro red dots to their service pistols in a quest to heighten accuracy and sighting versatility. Chambered in 9mm, this particular variant features a four-inch barrel and comes with a 17-round capacity, making it one of those great juggernauts in the modern polymer-pistol category.
Although the Glock 19X did not achieve its mission to attain standard issues with the U.S. military, massive popularity ensued within law enforcement, civilian, and special operations communities. This is volumes when it comes to speaking about the Glock in terms of reliability and appeal. Events such as the competition for the XM17 contract continue to spur innovation and improvement within the industry, exposing true weaknesses and change.