By Staff Writer: Kurt Gruber
A couple weeks ago at the NRA National Meetings Smith & Wesson introduced a new pistol that is designed specifically for concealed carry based upon its popular M&P Platform. This new pistol, chambered in 9mm and .40 S&W, is a single stack design that takes the M&P and cuts the width of the sidearm down quite drastically. The other unique thing about this product introduction is that Smith & Wesson had been manufacturing the gun prior to launch and instead of the old “check out this new product, it will be on the market in 3 to 6 months” the gun was in the hands of distributors on launch day. I got to get the feel of the gun and dry fire it a bit at the NRA convention and came home feeling like I might have just met my new carry gun.
A week or so passed and a local dealer let me know that he had one of the 9mm in stock, so I headed over and for less than $450; I left with a new pistol, and have not put it down since. My first thoughts when I got home with the gun, unpacked it, and broke it down for an initial cleaning was that the gun was very well made and seemed to be very solid. Once I had cleaned it I went to my holster bin to see if I had anything that was a good fit. As it turned out, the Safariland leather IWB holster that is designed for Glock 26/27 fit the gun very nicely. If you do not have a holster already that works, have no fear because Smith & Wesson worked with many holster manufacturers pre-launch to make sure that holsters were available when the gun was launched (http://www.smith-wesson.com/wcsstore/SmWesson2/upload/other/M&P_Shield_Accessories.pdf). There are a number of other accessories that were available at release such as laser units from Crimson Trace, LaserLyte, and LaserMax, and sights from Hi-Vis, Williams Gun Sight Company, and XS Sight Systems.
After some practice draws and dry firing of the pistol, I noticed a few things. One of those things was that although there is a thumb safety on the left side of the frame it was very well designed to be used by people who want to use it and ignored by those who do not. The safety rides extremely close to the frame of the gun, and unless in my testing unless you intentionally activate the safety, it does not enter the equation. The next thing I noticed was that while the white dot in the sights is bright, it would be fairly useless in the dark. Smith & Wesson instead of including night sights also thought this one through however and worked with many sight manufacturers to have sights ready at launch (see above link). A very positive thing I noticed was that the trigger on the Shield is much nicer than the stock M&P trigger. The draw is much cleaner and had a very crisp reset, something that the original M&P trigger lacked.
After my dry fire session I went ahead and headed to the range to put some ammo through the gun. At the local indoor range, I ran 150 rounds of ball ammo and 50 rounds of my favorite hollow points through the gun with zero malfunctions. The gun ran very smoothly and was very easy to shoot. The gun includes an 8 round magazine with a grip extension and a 7 round magazine that is flush with the bottom of the grip. The gun was very comfortable to shoot with either magazine. My hands are fairly big so only two of my grip fingers was on the grip with the flush magazine but the gun was still comfortable. The gun shot pretty tight groups as it got broke in.
I have been carrying this gun as my primary CC pistol ever since that first night at the range. I have since put about 200 more rounds through it. I will be replacing the sights with the XS Sight System Big Dot combat sights.
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I’ve had mine for about six months, and have run about 500 rounds through it. Not a glitch, and it delivers more than acceptable combat accuracy up to 25 yards. I wish it had night sights, but I’ll have some on it sooner or later – until then, the factory sights and my tac light will do. It’s rugged. It’s easy to breakdown, clean, and reassemble. It’s compact and carries well. Mine is chambered in 9×19, so it delivers a sufficiently powerful self-defense round without a lot of recoil, which makes it easy to bring back onto target. I’ve heard it called “ground breaking”, but I think that’s a bit hyped. Nothing really special here – just a very good gun at very good price. And it finally gives me something I never thought I’d find – a reliable and accurate automatic “snubbie.” What I mean by that is that it gives me nearly all of the advantages of my S&W 642, but in a package that provides a better sight picture and is much easier and faster to reload. Kuddos to S&W.
Close to a 1000 rounds ( 155 gr FMJ and 155 gr JHP ) through my .40 Shield and not a glitch! Love this little gun. Bought it to comply with the New York 7 round magazine limit as I know I will forget to download my Glock 27.
I have had my S&W Shield 9mm since December and carry it daily. It is a great gun and was well worth the 6 month search. The only thing that I would and did change about the gun was to install quality night sights and add rubberized Talon grips. I foresee many many years of this gun riding my hip ready to be used in the act of protection for myself and family.
I have a Shield too and have written up a bunch on my blog.
I think the trigger sucks…. but supposedly Apex Tactical is coming out with a kit very soon, and that should really fix things. Also, one guy I know installed the current Apex hard sear (for standard M&P) into a Shield and it greatly improved things. Josh Kolbeson recently did a little sear trim and polish (the same trigger job for a standard M&P that you can find instructions for online) and said it was a big improvement too… lightened it up and smoothed it out. So…. we shall see.
And I know Dawson Precision is working on sights. But to S&W’s credit, the factory sights are some of the better factory sights I’ve seen on a stock gun. Just take a Sharpie to the rear dots to blacken them out and the factory sights are acceptable.
It’s a nice little gun. I’m rather impressed with it. I ran 50 rounds of Speer Gold Dot 124 grain +P through it and it ran like a champ, accuracy good out to 15 yards (didn’t try more than that). Didn’t try the short barrel GD, but I reckon it’ll probably perform a wee better given the 3.1″ barrel.
The Apex Tactical trigger upgrade for the original full sized M&P is a great kit. I personally like the trigger in the Shield as mentioned.
The main reason I don’t like the factory sights is because I personally believe that a carry gun should have night sights. That is definitely a personal preference thing.
Very nice
I need to shoot it
I predict they will sell a kazillion of these
Have you run the Speer +P for short barrel load yet?