Tactical Pistol Light: How to Choose the Best One for Your Needs

Tactical flashlights are helpful in many areas where weaponry is being used, such as law enforcement, military, and hunting. They allow people to see and properly assess the target before pulling the trigger and to make sure they have an accurate shot. What’s more, tactical pistol lights can also be used to illuminate an area, or even to temporarily blind and disorientate the enemy as a form of self-defense. Based on this, it goes without saying that a tactical pistol light should perform without a hitch.

As with most pistol accessories, shooters have plenty of options to choose from which can make the process of choosing the right tactical pistol light overwhelming. Since different lights are designed to meet different needs, first, you need to ask yourself how you intend to use it. With that being said, here are some important things to consider.

The Range of Use

If you’re dealing with long-distance shooting, you need your tactical pistol light to provide you with a long throw of illumination. However, for close proximity use, such as for self-defense, it’s better to have a beam with a wider circle of illumination. In other words, you want the light to illuminate a wider area, not just one dot. The light’s throw usually depends on the head design which includes the reflector and the lens. As a result, this affects the light’s size and weight. Lights that can provide a longer beam distance usually weigh more, so you need to consider whether the additional weight is a problem for you.

How Bright Do You Need It to Be?

The level of brightness you need to identify a suspect and what they’re holding in their hands is a lot more than what you need to simply navigate in the dark. A very bright light is definitely a lot more reliable, but it does have its downsides, like for instance reduced runtime, a heavier weight, and the tendency to heat up when being used. In other words, the brighter the light, the faster it will drain out your batteries. That’s why in order to get the most of your tactical pistol light, it’s recommended to choose a model with several modes – low, medium, and high brightness.

The Type of Bulb

Of course, like all light sources, different tactical pistols come with different bulbs. Currently, the most commonly used bulbs are LEDs and incandescent. LEDs are almost universally better, whether for residential, recreational or tactical needs. They are a lot more durable, with an average lifespan of 50 000 hours which means they should last through hundreds of use cycles. What’s more, LEDs are much tougher, able to withstand bad weather and the various rough conditions that come with tactical use. Despite all of this, they are much smaller and lighter than incandescent bulbs. All in all, LEDs are everything one needs in a tactical light.