Whew! It’s finally here! We first saw the Avidity Arms PD10 in January of 2017, and it was a functional and effectively finished product at that time. Rob Pincus, long-time defensive shooting instructor, designed and developed the PD10 based on experience and feedback from thousands of students and dozens of instructors.
Now that all of the manufacturing hurdles have been resolved, Rob’s PD10 is officially available and TTAG got our hands on one.
Rob’s general philosophy with the PD10, if I’m not distilling it down too much, is that larger pistols are easier to shoot and smaller pistols are easier to carry. Fact check: true.
His PD10 design bucks most modern pistol trends and manages to check both of those boxes simultaneously.
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The Avidity Arms PD10 is extremely skinny. Nearly every part of the pistol is only about 0.90″ thick, with its widest point (the mag release button and/or slide lock) only an inch across on the dot.
At the same time, its silhouette is effectively that of a duty-size pistol. It has a 4-inch barrel and a standard 1911-height frame.
The PD10 is also extremely lightweight, especially for its size, at just 18.8 ounces.
Taken together, this footprint makes for a firearm that carries extremely easily. Its slim width works very cleanly when carried IWB. Its 4-inch barrel is just shy of the point where length starts to be noticeable when carrying, and its minimal heft won’t weigh your belt down.
Carry position and cant of the firearm will be important, however, when it comes to preventing the heel of the grip/magazine from printing underneath your shirt. The PD10 certainly doesn’t have a sub-compact frame height. If you’re carrying IWB under a light garment and are the type to be concerned about printing, choose the correct holster and carry in the right location and you’ll be just fine.
Magazines for the 9mm PD10 are more or less standard 10-round, 9mm, 1911 magazines. Avidity Arms strongly suggests using the specific models they ship and offer with the PD10 for the most reliable function. However most decent 9mm 1911 magazines will fit and function at least well enough for practice and range use.
A large, bright, square front sight with a Tritium vial graces the front of the PD10’s slide. A 4-inch barrel definitely provides a longer sight radius than what’s found on popular micro-compact pistols that compete for space on our waistlines.
At rear is an all-black sight with a “claw” front for one-handed or emergency slide manipulation.
While opinions on this obviously vary, Pincus trains to only use rear slide serrations, therefore the PD10 only features rear slide serrations. They’re clean and aggressively grippy.
Likewise, the grip frame texture is comfortably grippy, but it won’t tear up your hands or your skin. Its large pattern strikes a good balance between grip-in-hand without being abrasive to skin.
Also of note: the front of the magazine baseplate features a pronounced claw. Combined with the finger relief cuts at the base of the grip, there are multiple ways to rip out a stuck magazine. Under normal circumstances, however, the stainless steel mags drop free and spring cleanly out of the frame.
I like the sleek magazine release and the unique texture on its surface. It’s guarded by a raised portion of the grip frame at its rear, helping to prevent unintentional mag drops, but it operates crisply with an intentional thumb press.
Overall, ergonomics and features of the PD10’s frame are pretty solid and well thought out. Smooth areas for the web of the hand and by the rear of the trigger guard, textured recesses on either side for an indexed trigger finger or support hand thumb, an undercut trigger guard for a high grip, and a grip frame size and shape that’s going to work well for a huge variety of hand sizes.
Up at the muzzle end, the PD10 features an aggressive taper on each side to make re-holstering easier.
Takedown of the Avidity Arms PD10 is identical to most striker-fired pistols.
There are zero MIM components in the Avidity PD10 and everything is made in the U.S. Internal components are tool steel, high carbon steel, quality stainless steel, and even the pins are made in-house to extremely tight tolerances.
There’s the angled trigger shoe when the striker is at rest.
And that’s where it sits when the striker is cocked. It features a drop safety tab in its face (in addition to multiple, internal safeties).
On the shooting range, I found the trigger to be pretty much exactly what I would design were I making a pistol for self-defense use. That is to say it’s not as short or as light as the market has seemingly been looking for over the past few years.
The PD10’s trigger breaks between 5 and 5.5 pounds with a long, consistent pull. Well, scratch that. It isn’t long like a double action handgun is, but it’s long compared to most striker-fired pistols these days. It’s smooth and consistent, but it travels a little ways before stopping against a pronounced wall, then breaking fairly cleanly.
If you ride the reset, trigger pulls for follow-up shots are shorter and faster.
This is exactly what I believe is the “correct” trigger for a self-defense pistol. Correct pull weight and correct pull length. It’s clean, crisp, and fast, yet it provides some safety fudge factor with enough weight and travel to ensure any trigger pull must be fully intentional.
Pincus is correct…the gun shoots like it’s a full-size but carries like it’s one of the skinniest and lightest pistols available, which it is.
The ability to get a 100 percent, complete, full four-fingered grip on the PD10 means fantastic control. Its skinny width works well with its grip shape to allow for a firm, very high, all-encompassing grip with pressure where you want it to really drive the gun hard and control recoil effectively.
Dan and I both shot the PD10 accurately. Follow-up shots were fast thanks to that fairly short trigger reset, and the bright front sight is easy to follow and center in the generous rear notch.
Dan had one stoppage — a failure to feed — while he was shooting the PD10 during the first three or four magazines of ammo through the gun, and I had none during dozens of full mags of assorted ammo.
Magazines loaded easily and dropped free with some spring power helping to pop ’em out. There’s a slight flare to the magazine well, but you’ll still need to line things up a bit more precisely with the PD10 than with a double-stack pistol with its fatter grip frame and tapered magazine.
Based on how the PD10 shoots, I think it compares extremely favorably to other skinny 9-millimeter single-stacks like the 10-round Slimline GLOCK 48 and 43X. In fact, it’s skinnier, shorter, and lighter than the G48 but doesn’t necessarily shoot like that’s the case. Just don’t expect aftermarket magazines that increase the capacity of the PD10 as we’ve seen with the GLOCKs.
At the same time, it’s obviously much more svelte and lighter weight than double-stack guns of a similar footprint, such as the G19.
Comparing the PD10 against double-stack, micro-compact guns, really, is the big question I’m left with. Back when Rob originally designed this gun, it was a no-brainer. Today, with so many micro-compact, double-stack pistols (a la the SIG P365, Springfield Hellcat, FN Reflex among others) available that carry as much or more ammo in a smaller footprint, it requires some thought and consideration to come to a decision to carry the 10-round PD10 instead.
Frankly, I hope it finds market success, because the PD10 is a fantastic gun. It’s far easier to shoot well than a micro-compact. Heck, with its full-length grip it’s also far easier to draw from concealment quickly and properly.
Easy to carry and easy to shoot is a combination we’re all looking for in a carry gun, and the Avidity Arms PD10 nails that in full. But will it find a home in a market that has largely gone in a different direction? I hope so. You may well want to give the PD10 a shot.
Specifications: Avidity Arms PD10
Caliber: 9mm
Action: striker-fired
Capacity: 10+1
Barrel Length: 4”
Frame: Polymer
Overall Length: 6.94”
Width at widest point: 1” (slide is 0.9″)
Height: 5.625″ from tip of magazine baseplate claw to top of sights
Weight: 18.8 oz (without magazine)
Finish: Isonite Coating on most metal parts
MSRP: $599 ($625 w/ Optic Cut)
Ratings (out of five stars):
Overall * * * *
The Avidity Arms PD10 is a fantastic carry pistol. It’s designed to be very shootable and very carryable, and it successfully achieves that balance. It shoots like a full-size pistol, but it carries like the insanely skinny, lightweight gun that it is. I’m keeping this PD10 and I’m going to carry it regularly. My only question is, can it compete with the teeny, tiny guys that hold as many or more rounds and are, arguably, a little easier to conceal due to their shorter grip lengths. If you give more consideration to a full grip on the draw and to more control while shooting than to sacrificing those things in exchange for lowering the chance of printing, I think it’s an easy enough choice to make.
Rob Pincus can stick his gun into his ass
You can do the same with this idiotic comment
with no lube
I’ve never heard of Rob Pincus. Why the animosity?
He’s Not a friend of gun owners! Do yer due diligence officer🙄
former, I was just asking a question. I did look him up. From what I saw he’s basically a firearms instructor. My question still stands, why the animosity?
Yep. Rob’s a douche.
Speaking of douche bags. Why couldn’t you just answer the mans question. Moron.
Rob is not a douche. He’s a smart, sincere, friendly guy with intelligent opinions on all sorts of topics. I’m a pretty darn hard-line Second Amendment absolutist, which means most people don’t fully agree with me on this topic. They aren’t all douches or worthy of my ire because they have different priorities or maybe even the same priorities but disagree on how to achieve them. Rob is closer to a 2A absolutest than 99.5% of the country, despite how he has been portrayed in our community.
TTAG interviewed him a couple times to learn more about what he was trying to achieve:
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/rob-pincus-answers-pointed-questions-about-his-support-for-expanded-background-checks/
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/no-rob-pincus-does-not-agree-with-joe-biden-on-warning-shots-or-shooting-to-kill/
He stuck his foot in his mouth on ARs some years ago and is widely seen as a FUDD. I believe Nugent took him to task on it and he supposedly came to Jesus. Whether or not you trust him is like whether or not you trust Springfield, S&W, Ruger, Troy or anyone else who ever stepped in it. If there room for forgiveness? Is the contrition real? Don’t know.
I don’t see anything wrong with the pistol. Another offering that may meet someone’s requirements. I see no reason for me to dump my 43X and 48 either. The reduction in size does not justify the loss in capacity for me with the Shield Arms additions I have in place. The gain in conceal-ability from a G19/23 down to a 48/43X solved all weight and conceal-ability problems for me. This gun is a solution to a problem I do not have.
But as mentioned, it may fill a niche for others. Moar guns onda market iz betta.
As an addendum, I would probably not have replaced the Kahr with the 43X/48 if it were for rounds popping out of the spare mags in mag pouches and holders, and the slide rusting or tarnishing. The 48 is so close in size that they fit in each other’s Alien Gear holsters. I had years of experience with G23/19 and the only issues were size and weight.
The Kahr beat it on that hands down 6 days a week and twice on Sunday.
But going back to Glock in 43X/48 I got the size and weight of the Kahr with the capacity, reliability, and durability of the G19. The best of both worlds.
Crimson, he badmouthed the AR platform? That’s it? I’ve done that thousands of times. With good reason. It’s not a very good weapon. I was issued the things from 1979-2014. Owned more than a few. Own three now. Don’t trust them for more than a couple of hundred rounds without cleaning. My BCM is the current ready rifle because I don’t want to lose the Galil or HK to a burglary. I have a standing wager I’ve offered to many. Bring your clean and lubed AR to the range with 1000 rds of ammunition. I’ll do the same with my Galil. We’ll pause shooting to allow for cooling, but no cleaning/lubing allowed for the duration. First weapon to malfunction is surrendered to the other shooter. If the AR makes it through the 1000 rds without malfunction, the steaks are on me. I’m not worried about surrendering my Galil. I’ve put thousands of rds through it without cleaning or malfunction. No one has ever accepted the bet. If Pincus’ only sin is pointing out that ARs kinda suck I’d like to buy him a drink.
I trust Ruger since old Bill passed on and isn’t running the company any more.
Please cite the part where I “stuck my foot in my mouth about ARs”.
I am well aware of my statements that actually have confused or angered people, so I like to ask when I hear a new internet rumor being spread around. 😉
ROB’S Gun is ideal for many living behind the walls of California and other states with restrictions.
Walther PPQ and PDP aren’t much bigger and hold 15 rounds.
The PPQ/PDP is almost twice as thick, that’s where the PD10 shines.
Marketing-wise, using the word “avidity” is gonna lose people right there. Many can’t read it or say it.
It’s like manufacturing potato chips in Panama and calling them “Isthmus Crisps.”
So … it’s a Glockteen-eleven?
Just on the name, if it’s a PD10, one might expect it to be, oh, 10mm…?
The important question to ask is, is each and every gun hand-assembled at Jeremy’s well-stocked bar? 🙂
“Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms”.
Oh thank goodness! We nearly went a month without a new Glock clone. Whew.
I’ll keep my HellCat! 11+1, 13+1, 15+1 now 17+1………..
“For those that don’t know what’s going on, Pincus wrote an open letter recently with Dan Gross, the former president of The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, entitled, “Guns in America: Ending the Culture War & Starting a Productive Conversation,” that calls for both sides of the gun divide to come together to embrace strategies to curb gun violence in America.”
he was in favor of enhanced background checks
which means he doesnt know anything
so it should be no surprise that
“Pincus trains to only use rear slide serrations, therefore the PD10 only features rear slide serrations”
and therefore hes probably not going to sell enough of these
to make any real money off them
sound, thanks for an intelligent answer. That explains a lot.
Fact Check: 34% correct.
I did co-write an article with the guy who quit his position as the president of Brady primarily because he was tired of trying to get gun grabbers to realize that things like “assault weapon bans” and “capacity limits” were useless agenda items. We certainly don’t agree on everything, but we agree on that.
Also, I do teach people to run the gun from the rear, not the front.
Otherwise? Not so accurate.. here’s some real answers:
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/rob-pincus-answers-pointed-questions-about-his-support-for-expanded-background-checks/
The firearm has a nice high grip and low bore, the muzzle end is nicely rounded and the trigger looks good. One the other hand the trigger guard is too rounded for me and the rear guide rails appear to be polymer and integrated with the receiver. Street price is alright but still it’s a hands on purchase decision.
For those who berated my instructions for fabricating a Glock Trigger Plug from the fat end of a tire stem perhaps you should practice drawing and holstering your chambered dingus safety firearm fast like the genius in the video…fools can proceed.
“For those who berated my instructions for fabricating a Glock Trigger Plug from the fat end of a tire stem…”
*Sigh*.
For the last time, I didn’t “berate your instructions for fabricating a Glock Trigger Plug” I berated your utter lack of wisdom and intelligence in someone deliberately jamming *anything* behind the trigger of *any* gun someone expects to save their life, or the lives of anyone they care about, with… 🙁
But Debbie, I don’t think it’s made in Turkey.
Costs too much to retrain officers for a minimal gain in perceived safety. Not worth retraining 10k repetitions to get the movement down to memory for the majority of shooters. Glock is fine not sure on your obsession with this novelty product but good for you for finding a way to make use of it.
“the rear guide rails appear to be polymer” …no, they’re steel
It’s a modified Glock pattern P80, if it took Glock mags though I would have wanted to buy.
It’s not that
It looks like a glock, a styre and 1911 had a 3 way and this is the product. Glock operating system/manual of arms, Styre M9 ergonomics/low bore access and 1911 mags for reduced thickness. Not a bad combo.
🥱
Thank God we now have a polymer single stack striker fired pistol available for about 5 bills. I finally feel like I’m actually living in the 21st century!
Full size yet 10 rounds? I can’t imagine wanting those two features together in a carry pistol.
I understand the philosophy, but the Shield Plus and P365 XL are easy enough to shoot. They hold as much, or more, and they’re considerably easier to carry.
Odd shaped hands (tall but short fingers) with a slim waist? It makes some sense in capacity restricted states but outside of that would need a bit more info to guess.
In limited capacity states this looks pretty good. So does moving to America Actual.
Longer term that tends to be what happens as the census would indicate.
I don’t care for the all black rear sight trend. It isn’t necessary. I believe it’s a carryover from competition guns where they’re usually shooting in good lighting conditions. It’s also cheaper to make. I prefer subdued rear tritium dots. No it doesn’t draw my attention away from the target. People who say to use the top of the sights don’t understand how vision deteriorates as you age. That straight line turns fuzzy when you get older. You won’t always be able to accurately line them up like that. In low lighting conditions, your all black rear sight can vanish depending on the background. I can get on target quicker in all lighting conditions with subdued rear tritium sights, like Trijicon HDs.
Know a lot of people with good vision who cannot see the space between the front sight to rear sights to tell if they have things lined up. Agree with the tritium, not always going to be used for it’s intended low light purpose but does seem to work well with almost everyone.
Innovation is cloning a Glock 48 instead of a 17 or 19, lime everybody else.
To be fair, the design of this gun was finished years before the G48 came out
Low bore axis is nice. Reminds me a lot of the Steyr M9, which is on the list and shall be mine one of these days…
Just say … Wow
Could be a great pistol but I don’t know. My concern with these small unknown manufacturers is how is warranty service going to be now and later? How is parts availability going to be now, in a year, in 5 years, etc.
Absolutely lost me at the grip length the same length as a full sized 1911.
The P365 Macro TACOPS is better in every way. This pistol is sadly very late to the party.
Trash gun made by a traitor. Might sell well in comifornia!
Says the guy posting from a fake name account…
Responding to every moron in the comments section is going to get exhausting, and isn’t a good look for you. If the product is good, it will sell. Talk about the positives, and forget the d-bags.
Rob Pincus:
Re: “…fake name account.” There are good reasons for using a nom de plume in a public forum like TTAG. It has to do with maintaining privacy and not exposing oneself to abuse from cranks. That’s why this particular commenter uses (more than) one. Maybe you’re finding that out for yourself now.
I’ll admit I have not followed this gun from inception to its release. I can tell you that I attended the Maryland Handgun Roster Board’s meeting on September 13, 2023 and it was tabled because it could not reliably load rounds from its magazines.
Years ago I was very eager to see the PD10 come out. Basically, it promised a slim Glock 19 with a 10+1 capacity. But as Alan Jackson said, “Time marches on.”
Problems and delays plagued the PD10 and then Glock released the G43X and G48. Still the PD10 didn’t come out. In fact, I assumed the company had abandoned the project. Why release a gun from a brand new company that offers basically the exact same thing as the G43X/48 but with none of the support or aftermarket modifications?
Now I see Avidity has finally released the gun, but the concealed carry market has moved away from single stacks to the double-stacked micro 9s.
The PD10 is a concealed carry gun, not a duty gun. No one is going to duty carry a 10-round single stack when they can carry a 17- or even 20-round double stack. And very few people in the concealed carry market want a five-inch tall gun with a four-inch barrel. It was a great idea but it came out WAY TOO LATE.