The FN Reflex XL MRD Pistol: Full Review

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Just as we’ve seen with just about every sub- and micro-compact pistol on the market (the SIG 365, Springfield Hellcat, Taurus GX4, the list goes on and on), FN has introduced an upsized version of their 9mm Reflex micro-compact, introduced in 2023. The Reflex XL increases capacity of a flush magazine from 11 to 15 rounds and stretches the barrel from 3.3 to 3.8 inches. As for why this growth phenomenon is happening, I will dive into that after I cover the details of this particular pistol.

FN pistols didn’t get a lot of traction in the market, for a while, because of two things. First, sure, they were modern in that they had polymer frames with replaceable backstraps and corrosion resistant coatings and good sights, but they were DA/SA hammer-fired guns, which have fallen out of fashion. Second, their ergonomics weren’t quite there, much like S&W’s 2nd-generation autos. But then, FN introduced the 509, a striker-fired pistol with better ergos, and the rest, as they say, is history.

All the FN pistols share looks, and the Reflex looks like a downsized 509C (compact), and the Reflex XL looks like a full-size 509, at least until you get it in your hand and you feel the reduced dimensions. However, unlike the striker-fired 509, the Reflex is an internal hammer-fired single action only (SAO) design.

The original Reflex had a 3.3-inch barrel and shipped with one flush 11- and one extended 15-round magazine. The Reflex XL stretches the barrel out to 3.8 inches and extends the frame so that the flush magazine holds 15 rounds. It is also supplied with an extended 18-round magazine. And, technically, this is the Reflex XL MRD, meaning the slide is machined to accept a mini red dot. While the original Reflex can be had with or without the MRD 
option, the Reflex XL is only available in MRD form.

Overall, this pistol is 6.75-inches long, 5.2-inches tall, and 1.08 inches thick at its thickest point (the slide stop). The slide itself is only 0.92 of an inch thick. FN advertises this pistol as weighing 20 ounces; with an empty flush magazine in place it weighed 19.7 ounces according to my scale, which is unexpectedly light for its size.

Interestingly, the original Reflex and Reflex MRD have a solid grip. This pistol has interchangeable backstraps, and you get two, small and large. The small is installed at the factory. If you’re looking for a little more meat under your hand, the large backstrap doesn’t just have a slightly bigger hump but adds material under the web of your hand, which large backstraps on other pistols don’t do but should. You have to punch out a roll pin to swap them out.

If you look at photos of the Reflex XL it might look like a full-size pistol, but it has been narrowed and shrunk as much as possible, and is slim and trim when compared to the 509 (much like how SIG’s P365 is significantly smaller in every dimension than the P320, while still being chambered in the same caliber). Currently, it is available in black or FDE, and there is a version with neutered 10-round magazines if you insist on living in one of those states. Original Reflex models were ultimately offered with frame-mounted manual safeties, and I expect the same will be true of the Reflex XL, but currently, the only model available is the NMS (no manual safety).

FN still calls this a micro-compact pistol. Sorry, I know words mean whatever we decide we want them to mean on the day in question, but I cannot in good conscience call a pistol with a nearly four-inch barrel and a full-length grip a “micro compact.” I wouldn’t even consider it a subcompact, just a compact, because of how thin it is and because the barrel is under four inches. It is small enough to conceal with the right choice of holster and covering garments, but big enough that you can run even the hottest ammo through it without hating yourself at the end of the range session.

Let me repeat something I wrote when reviewing the original Reflex, “The sights on the Reflex are better than those offered on any factory pistol of any size twenty years ago, and that’s not exaggeration. The sights are steel and dovetailed into place. The front sight has a tritium insert that glows in the dark and will for ten years, and it is surrounded by a very bright orange ring that is visible in any kind of lighting conditions.” And that’s still true. The rear sight on the original model had white dots. The rear sight on this XL MRD is plain black. Some people who run red dots prefer subdued or plain black front sights, so there’s nothing distracting them from the dot, but not everybody is topping their guns with optics.

As shipped, the FN Reflex XL MRD has a steel cover in place atop the slide. Remove the two screws and you can direct mount any red dots with Shield RMSc/Holosun 507K footprints. This seems to be the most popular red dot for narrower/compact carry pistols. FN supplies two sets of screws for mounting your red dot to the slide.

The barrel is hammer forged and is slightly flared at the muzzle to better mate with the slide. The ramp is polished, and at the top of the barrel hood you’ll see a generous cutout that (unlike some I’ve seen) actually works as a loaded chamber indicator.

There are flat-bottomed serrations forward and back on the frame. The PVD finish is matte, and between the finish and the relatively aggressive serrations you should be able to work this slide even with sweaty hands.

The controls on this pistol are relatively flat, which is what you want on a piece designed for concealed carry. The takedown lever is short and rotates upward. The slide stop is a small piece of steel that you might struggle to use as a slide release. The magazine release is steel, teardrop-shaped, and checkered. It is reversible. The black parts/controls make a very nice color contrast with the FDE slide and frame.

The frame of the XL is the same length at the front as the original Reflex, only the slide is longer. So, you’ve got the same single-slot frame rail for mounting a light, but you’ve got more room on this pistol for a light that won’t stick out past the muzzle like a bad underbite—the bezel of a Streamlight TLR-7 sits just about flush with the muzzle of the Reflex XL.

The serial number is etched into a steel plate embedded on the right side of the frame above the grip. The texturing on the frame I think looks more aggressive than it is, but it will still lock your hand in place while shooting without tearing up your clothes. On the front and back of the frame are rows of raised rectangles. The texturing on the sides of the grip is finer, but actually more aggressive than the raised rectangles.

Instead of having a safety lever inside the trigger, the trigger itself is the pivoting lever which incorporates a drop safety. The trigger is polymer, gently curving, with a flat face. It breaks at roughly a 90-degree angle, which is the new trend, and what you want. Why? The closer a trigger is to 90-degrees when it breaks, the less side-to-side and up-and-down movement you’ll have, helping to keep your sights on target.

I want to talk about the trigger pull, because it is that which determines just how shootable (or not) a pistol is. Most people would be far better served by a trigger pull two pounds lighter than what they’ve got than sticking a red dot atop their pistol—both will increase speed and accuracy, while only one has batteries that can die, screws that can come loose, and electronics to fail—but that’s a discussion for another article, and I’m in the minority opinion on this subject, telling people their baby is ugly.

Anyway, FN’s 509 has a marginally better trigger pull than their DA/SA guns, although it is still heavier than average for duty-grade striker-fired guns (and generally heavier than what they say it is). The FN 509 MRD-LE, meant for law enforcement and first adopted (I believe) by the LAPD, has a better trigger pull than that (4.5–6.0 pounds), but it’s still not great. So, the great trigger pull of the original Reflex was unexpected, and you get that same trigger system in the Reflex XL.

The factory specs call for a 4.5–5.5-pound trigger pull in the Reflex line. Every sample I’ve shot, including this one, has provided a trigger pull right about five pounds, and that trigger pull is crisp. It feels much better, cleaner, than a standard striker-fired trigger because the Reflex is a 
single action only pistol, and SAOs uniformly have the best trigger pulls of any kind of handgun. While the trigger pull on the Reflex/XL isn’t quite as clean and crisp as what you’ll find on a 1911, it is far above average, and just about perfect for a concealed carry piece.

The magazines are steel, with numbered index holes in the back and red polymer followers. The extended 18-round magazine has a grip extension, but honestly, unless you are just a freak of nature, your hand won’t be big enough to stretch down past the grip frame. From the bottom of the trigger guard to the end of the frame is 2.6 inches, which is a lot of room.

Okay, so, why are all of these manufacturers taking these eminently concealable CCW pistols and turning them into larger, harder-to-conceal guns? I’ve got bad news for you—if you don’t know why, you’re not out practicing with your carry gun nearly as much as you should be.

It’s as simple as this—small guns are easy to conceal, but hard to shoot. While, unfortunately, a large number of consumers buy their guns and only shoot them once or not at all, some people who actually buy concealed carry guns take them to the range and shoot them. A lot. And when they do, they find that the sub- and micro-compact pistols on which they can barely fit their entire hands are not easy or pleasant to shoot.

The quickest and easiest way to fix this is to equip these pistols with a longer frame or an extended magazine (with a grip extension) providing the equivalence of a longer frame. The more of your hand you can get on the gun, the more you can manage recoil, and get that gun behaving consistently. This positively affects both your accuracy and speed. If you know exactly where that front sight, or the dot on your optic, is going to be at the end of the recoil cycle, you can shoot faster. FN equipped their original Reflex with an extended finger hook basepad on their flush magazine just so you could get all your fingers on the gun, but it provided no added capacity.

For some of my initial shooting, just to get a feel for the gun and to capture some good action shots for this article, I was pounding some Winchester Active Duty ammo down range. This is hot stuff, a 115-grain FMJFP bullet heading down range at an advertised 1,320 fps. In the original Reflex, or in any micro-compact pistol, it would have been painful and abusive. In the bigger Reflex XL, it was just a bit spicy. Standard 9mm ammo wasn’t bad at all, and the Reflex XL handles nearly like a full-size pistol. The only real difference is weight and girth. The Reflex/Reflex XL has a slim grip that is a little thinner than I prefer, even with the Large backstrap in place—if you’ve got big hands that might be an issue, but if you’ve got smaller hands it might be perfect for you. And the Reflex XL is lighter than a full-size gun, so it is more convenient to carry but you do notice those missing ounces when you start touching off live ammo.

Following the bouncing ball (the big bright orange dot on the front sight) was easy even on an unevenly-lit indoor range, and between the Hi-Viz sights and the good trigger and the full-length grip I was able to go 90+% as fast or as accurate as I wanted when compared to a full-size gun, which is great. I mostly just went fast on silhouette targets during my first range session, getting used to the trigger and recoil impulse. Later on, I knocked down a bit of steel, where the XL served admirably. During accuracy testing there were no surprises—I had to work hard to shoot up to the accuracy potential of the pistol.

Weirdly, the FN Reflex XL seems to me like a modernized version of another FN pistol, the classic FN Hi-Power. Both are SAO 9mms, but look at the difference 
90 years (1935–2025) has made—the Reflex XL is smaller, lighter, holds more rounds, is far more corrosion/rust resistant, is more reliable, has better controls, and sports much better sights.

The pistol is so new that nobody has any holsters specifically for it, not even FN. FN sells an IWB holster for the original Reflex that has an open muzzle, so it will fit this pistol, as will any open muzzle design meant for the original Reflex. If you want a closed muzzle design, they might be available by the time you’re reading this, or you might have to wait a few months. Even the original Reflex is still a relative newcomer into a crowded field, so you’ll find not every holster company makes a rig for it. However, there are a number of smaller, more quickly pivoting holster companies that do.

The pistol comes with two backstraps, two magazines, a cable lock, and a discreet zippered soft case for carrying the pistol, with a pocket for the spare magazine. The outside of the case is FDE, at least for this pistol, and I wonder if you get a black one with a black gun. The FN logo is embroidered on the outside of the case, so it doesn’t exactly work as discreet in-hand carry…then again, anyone who would recognize the FN logo probably isn’t somebody you have to worry about. Probably.

Great trigger, great sights, beveled mag well opening in the frame for smoother reloads, complete reliability…and the FN Reflex/Reflex XL is just one such offering in the modern marketplace. It just goes to show how blessed/spoiled we are. It is priced a little above competing designs on the market, but that seems to be par for the course for FN products, and people seem willing to pay that money for the guarantee of FN quality.

FN REFLEX XL MRD PISTOL SPECS

• Type: Single action only internal hammer-fired semi-auto
• Caliber: 9mm
• Capacity: 15+1, 18+1
• Barrel: 3.8 in.
• Length: 6.75 in.
• Height: 5.2 in. (with flush 15-round magazine)
• Width: 1.08 in.
• Weight: 19.7 oz. (with empty magazine)
• Finish: Black or FDE PVD
• Grip/Frame: Polymer, interchangeable backstraps
• Sights: Steel, dovetailed. Tritium insert front sight with orange ring. White dot rear notch Optics ready, slide machined for direct mounting of Shield RMSc/Holosun 507K footprints
• Trigger pull: 4.5–5.5 lbs. (5.0 lbs. as tested)
• Safety: Trigger lever, striker block
• Accessories: One 15-round magazine, one 18-round magazine, screws for mounting red dots, zippered soft case, cable lock
• Price: $719
• Contact: FNAmerica.com

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