Ever since Glock kicked in the door to the U.S. pistol market, recommending pistols has been simple in the minds of a lot of shooters. Want a pistol? Get a Glock 17. Don’t want to carry a full-size pistol? Get a do-it-all Glock 19. But sometimes a compact isn’t small enough. When you need a gun that’s downright tiny, you need to check out the Glock 26.
The subcompact Glock 26 looks like something a spy would carry underneath a tuxedo — or maybe it looks more like a Lego brick more than any other Glock — but it’s every bit as rugged and reliable as the Glocks that earned legendary status as military and law enforcement sidearms.
Its short barrel and stubby grip have earned the pistol the “Baby Glock” nickname. Despite its small size, the double-stack magazine crams 10 rounds of 9mm into a grip that’s smaller than the palms of most shooters’ hands.

Glock keeps expectations high with its “Perfection” tagline, but is the Glock 26 actually perfect? Several rounds of revisions and relaunches suggest there is always room for improvement, but the Glock 26 makes a pretty damn compelling case.
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What Makes It Tick?
Don’t think of the Glock 26 as a subcompact pistol sold by Glock; think of it as a Glock that happens to be very small.
The Glock 26 is built on the same platform as the company’s greatest sales successes: the full-size Glock 17 and compact Glock 19. That means it’s just as tough and reliable but packaged in a more discreet subcompact frame.
Inside the short grip is a double-stack magazine that holds 10 rounds of 9mm ammo. The polymer frame keeps weight down while the metal slide and 3.4-inch barrel hold up to abuse as well as any other Glock pistols.

Glock’s Safe Action trigger and striker-fire action make the Glock 26 safe and incredibly easy to operate. After all, if you’re in a situation that requires you to pull this pistol, the last thing you have time for is fumbling with a manual safety or long-pull double-action trigger.
While the Glock 26 has a shorter length and height than the Glock 17 and Glock 19, the scale and positioning of the trigger, magazine release, and slide take-down levers remain unchanged across all three models. That means that once you’ve built proficiency with one model, operating the controls on the other two will feel nearly identical.
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Glock 26 History
By the time the Glock 26 hit the scene in 1994, the manufacturer was already on a roll in the U.S. with the 9mm Glock 17 and Glock 19, 10mm Glock 20, .45 ACP Glock 21, and .40 Glock 24. What the brand needed, though, was something smaller.
The Glock 26 was designed to be discreet enough for investigators who needed to be armed without showing it, capable enough for police officers to carry as a backup to their primary sidearm, and small enough to satisfy the growing demand for civilian CCW pistols.

Glock 26 Gen2 (or is it Gen2.5?) and Glock 26 Gen3
The first time a Glock 26 appeared in the company’s lineup was during the second generation of Glock pistols, which ran from 1988 to 1997. The Baby Glock didn’t look like other second-generation pistols because it came with finger grooves and thumb dimples. But it also didn’t have checkering on the front of the frame like the Gen3 pistols that followed shortly after. Since checkering was eventually added, some people consider the prior version to be a Gen2.5 (colloquial, not Glock canon) and the latter as the Glock 26 Gen3.
While other Glock pistols got a frame-mounted accessory rail with the Gen3 updates, the Glock 26 did not. Even the current model lacks an accessory rail, although some compatible accessories are available.
Since Glock started producing Gen3 pistols in 1998, they are the last models available for sale in California. The state’s 2001 Unsafe Handgun Act bans any handgun not specifically listed on its approval roster and, since models are removed but never added, the Glock 26 Gen3 is as good as it gets for carrying concealed in the Golden State — for now, anyway.

Glock 26 Gen4
In 2010, Glock’s fourth-generation pistols brought about subtle changes like removable backstraps, a larger magazine release, and square grenade-like texture on the grip. A dual recoil spring was new to other models, but the Glock 26 needed one from the beginning to operate in such a short slide.
Glock currently lists the Glock 26 Gen4 as a law enforcement–only model. That doesn’t mean ordinary citizens can’t own one, it just means that Glock is limiting Gen4 support to duty pistols that are still in service so the company can focus on the production of Gen5 pistols.
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The Glock 26 Gen5 Is the Best One Yet
The Glock 26 Gen5 broke cover in 2017 and hit shelves in early 2018. Changes to the outgoing Glock 26 Gen4 include a Glock Marksman Barrel (GMB) with traditional rifling instead of polygonal rifling, improved trigger feel, an ambidextrous slide stop, and a black nitride diamond-like coating (nDLC) coating to protect the slide.
Standard magazine capacity remains unchanged at 10 rounds of 9mm. Because the Glock 26 is built on the same platform as the Glock 17 and Glock 19, it can accept longer magazines that increase capacity to 12, 15, 17, 19, 24, 31, or 33 rounds. The optional 12-round magazine protrudes more than the flat-based 10-round magazine, but it provides a lower groove for your pinky. Since the G26 has been around, people have carried it with a short mag in the pistol and a full-sized G17 mag as a backup magazine, just in case.

Gone are the finger grooves, which made the already stubby frame even more difficult to grip for many shooters. Unlike other Gen5 models, the Glock 26 Gen5 doesn’t come with a flared magazine well. Since this is clearly a dedicated CCW model, minimizing printing takes priority over speed reloads.
So what about the MOS version? Annoyingly, Glock offers an optic-compatible Glock 26 Gen5 MOS in the European market but not in the U.S. There are rumors of change on the horizon, but right now we have to settle for Glock’s traditional polymer, steel, or night sights.
For about $540, you can buy a Glock 26 Gen5 in person or order one online and have it shipped to your local FFL. If you have your heart set on using a CCW-friendly red dot, you can have your slide milled by a gunsmith or buy an aftermarket optic-ready slide.
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Glock 26 Gen5 Specs
Caliber: 9mm
Frame size: Subcompact
Grip: Polymer
Capacity: 10+1
Action: Striker-fired
Barrel length: 3.4 inches
Optic ready: No
Safety: Safe Action trigger system
Weight: 26 ounces (with a loaded magazine)
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Glock 26 in Law Enforcement
The Glock 26 has seen relatively limited use as a law enforcement pistol due to its size. Still, it has been used by various departments as a backup pistol. The FBI listed this subcompact pistol as one of the few personally owned pistols approved for agents to carry.
In 2019, U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced the replacement of existing .40 service pistols with the 9mm Glock 19 Gen5 MOS, the Glock 26 Gen5, and the built-to-order Glock 47 MOS.

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Hollywood and Glock: The Love Affair Continues
Glock owes much of its success to an aggressive product placement effort that started during the 1990s and is clearly going strong today. Hollywood can’t get enough of the Austrian gunmaker, and the Glock 26 has made high-profile appearances on the big screen as a law enforcement and espionage sidearm.
The Baby Glock’s tough, blocky visuals made it a perfect pistol for Willem Dafoe’s rule-bending character in The Boondock Saints. It made sense for Leonardo DiCaprio to carry the famously reliable Glock around Africa in Blood Diamond. The pistol’s subcompact frame is also ideal for smaller hands, which might be why it’s been included over and over by the Marvel franchise as the go-to pistol for characters played by Scarlett Johansson and Florence Pugh.
The Glock 26 got another moment in the spotlight when Keanu Reeves dug the perfectly sized pistol and a trove of gold coins out of the floor in John Wick: Chapter 2. Then again, which guns haven’t been in a John Wick movie?

What Hollywood sometimes struggles to acknowledge is that tiny pistols simply don’t shoot as well as larger ones. Although slipping a Baby Glock or Walther PPK out of an ankle holster has serious secret agent vibes, it’s not exactly an equalizer in the face of a full-size pistol (let alone a long gun).
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Should You Make the Glock 26 Your EDC Pistol?
The Glock 26 packs a lot of capability into a super-portable frame, but it’s not perfect and there are a few good reasons why more people opt for something larger. Whether you choose the Baby Glock or something else depends on how you plan to use it.
In terms of concealability, it’s hard to do better than a Glock 26. It’s truly tiny but the standard magazine’s double-stack configuration keeps enough ammo on tap to be relevant in a world where carrying fewer than 10 rounds is unconscionable to some people. If you have to carry in revealing or formfitting clothing, it doesn’t get much better than this.

Keeping the Baby Glock so compact has a price, though, and that becomes evident in its performance. In addition to sacrificing magazine capacity, it takes a surprising amount of skill to keep a snappy, subcompact 9mm pistol on target. It’s possible to be fast and accurate with this pistol, but nowhere near as easy as it is with a larger Glock or Springfield Hellcat Pro.
With companies like Tier 1 Concealed and 5.11 Tactical making it easier than ever to discreetly carry, you’re usually better off sizing up to something with a slightly larger frame. On the other hand, if you have your bases covered and want a backup pistol that prioritizes compactness, it might be time to welcome a Baby Glock into your family.
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