SIG Sauer P320-XFive SXG Pistol: Heavyweight Champion

SIG Sauer's P320-XFive SXG was built for winning shooting matches and squashing the competition.

April 10, 2025 By Richard Nance

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If you were designing the ultimate competition pistol, it would make sense to elicit feedback from one of the best pistol shooters in the world, and that’s just what SIG Sauer did. Designed with input from Team SIG captain Max Michel, the new P320-XFive SXG represents the highest evolution of the P320 platform. It’s also the heaviest.

Preceding the P320-XFive SXG was the P320 TXG, which featured a tungsten-infused polymer grip, and the aluminum-frame AXG. Both are heavier than the standard, polymer-frame P320. But compared to the P320-XFive SXG—SXG for stainless steel X grip—those P320 models are lightweights.

Tipping the scales at just over three pounds, the steel-frame P320-XFive SXG is certainly a heavyweight 9mm. I knew the gun would be heavy, but when I picked it up the first time, I was still surprised. I wasn’t alone. Everyone I’ve seen pick up the P320-XFive SXG for the first time has had the same response: “Whoa!” While extra weight isn’t ideal for concealed carry, a heavy pistol offers some distinct advantages to the competitive shooter.

A heavy pistol produces less felt recoil, which not only makes it more comfortable to shoot but also enables you to shoot faster. Weight minimizes muzzle flip, so there’s less wasted time waiting for the sights to settle. This translates to enhanced speed and accuracy, the combination needed to excel in competition.

Sturdy In Hand

close up of trigger — The flat-face SIG Blade trigger breaks at 90 degrees. The trigger on the test gun had a pull of 2.5 pounds on average. (Photo courtesy of Yamil Sued)

Less recoil also means you’re less likely to flinch while pressing the trigger. Flinching in anticipation of recoil is one of the most common shooting errors, and it can ruin a shot that was perfectly aligned. The P320-XFive SXG is so soft shooting that you can focus on pressing the trigger smoothly to the rear without having to worry about recoil.

Like the stainless steel grip module—which has a full-length, single-slot accessory rail—and the stainless steel slide, the five-inch carbon steel bull barrel adds weight. Specifically, that barrel adds weight to the front of the pistol, which further mitigates muzzle flip. A bull barrel can also improve accuracy by adding rigidity and reducing heat.

My inaugural run confirmed that recoil was negligible and that the P320-XFive SXG was, indeed, flat shooting. While I’m not a competition shooter, I was able to clean plate racks faster with this gun than with any other pistol I can recall. This prompted a colleague to quip, “Who are you and what have you done with Rich?” Not cool
Despite its weight, the P320-XFive SXG’s ergonomic design gives it a well-balanced feel. Like those on most modern pistols, the trigger guard is undercut. This provides as high a perch as possible for your middle finger and helps ensure a comfortable and consistent grip. The gun’s magazine well cradles your little finger.

Combined, these features act like the hilt and pommel of a sword, helping you to wield the pistol more dexterously. Checkering along the frontstrap provides traction to keep the grip from sliding in your hand.

Grips and Magazines

pistol grip and magazine well — Aggressive G10 grip panels provide optimal control, and the extended mags and mag well funnel make for sure, fast reloads. (Photo courtesy of Yamil Sued)

The P320-XFive SXG’s black G10 grip panels by Lok Grips can be swapped out, but I’m not sure why you would change them. The aggressively textured panels give you a solid grip even when it’s raining or when the heat of competition has your palms sweating.

The black backstrap features a palm swell and extended beavertail which, like the undercut trigger guard, promote a high hold for maximum recoil control. The Lok Grips backstrap shares the same texture as the grip panels. Overall, the characteristics of the P320-XFive SXG’s grip provide a comfortable interface between you and the pistol.

On a pistol designed for competition, you want controls that are easy to reach and intuitive to operate. Despite the P320-XFive SXG’s 21+1 capacity, in a match you’ll eventually need to reload. That’s where the round, knurled magazine release comes in handy. It’s easily accessible and when pressed, it reliably ejects the magazine from the pistol.

Sometimes, magazines—especially empty ones—won’t fall from a pistol’s magazine well because there isn’t enough weight to overcome the friction between the magazine and the well. The P320-XFive SXG’s three steel magazines are slick and heavy enough to fall free from the pistol every time, and they’re extended so they protrude below the magazine well—making them easier to seat than if they were flush. They are also easier to remove.

Sights and Feel

The undercut trigger guard and extended beavertail encourage a proper high hold, and the magazine release is extended for easy operation. (Photo courtesy of Yamil Sued)

The extension, along with texturing on the sides of the base plate, gives you something to grab hold of should you need to strip the magazine from the pistol, either to conduct a speed reload or to rectify a double feed. The oversize magazine well makes for more efficient loading by helping to funnel the magazine into the gun.

The ambidextrous slide stop is easy to reach and big enough to manipulate easily without interfering with your grip. While some advocate using the slide stop only to lock the slide open, it’s faster to depress the slide stop than rack the slide to chamber a round. And in competition, speed rules—especially when reloading.

The P320-XFive SXG has a green fiber-optic front sight imbedded in a black serrated post. Fiber-optic sights harness ambient light and transform it into an illuminated dot, and they’ve long been favorites of competitive shooters.

The P320-XFive SXG’s adjustable rear sight is integral to the slide plate. The notch-style sight is black and serrated on its face, with nothing to distract you from the front sight.

Optic Pairing and Trigger

red dot sight on pistol — The slide is cut for optics on the DeltaPoint Pro footprint, allowing direct mounting of sights like the Romeo3 Max Pro. (Photo courtesy of Yamil Sued)

The optic-ready slide is cut for the Leupold DeltaPoint Pro footprint, which SIG refers to simply as the Pro footprint. With the slide plate removed, you can mount an optic like the Romeo3 Max Pro directly to the slide. A direct mount is not only more secure than using a mounting plate, but it also allows the optic to sit lower for more instinctive aiming—and it minimizes height-over-bore issues. It will co-witness with suppressor-height iron sights.

The Romeo3 Max Pro ($699) has a large, 31mm aspheric glass window with a thin aircraft grade aluminum housing for a superior field of view. It’s available with either a three or an eight m.o.a. dot. I used the three m.o.a. dot, which is a little more difficult to acquire but provides a more precise aiming point. Fifteen brightness settings ensure you can have just the right dot brightness for any given situation.

The P320-XFive SXG has a good trigger, and it’s called the SIG Blade. It’s still a flat-face trigger that breaks at 90 degrees, but it’s thinner and wider than its predecessors. While four pounds is widely regarded as the standard trigger pull weight for carry guns, competition pistols tend to have lighter triggers for better accuracy. The trigger on my test gun broke crisply at 2.5 pounds, according to a Lyman digital pull gauge. It actually didn’t feel quite that light, but it was certainly light compared to most pistols.

Trigger reset is easy to discern with an audible but more importantly, a tactile indicator. You can feel it reset. And since the reset is short, you’ll be able to press the trigger again faster.

Easy To Shoot

accuracy results chart — (Accuracy results provided by the author)

Another reason the P320-XFive SXG is easy to shoot is the 1911-style recoil spring system. You can stick with the installed 12-pound recoil spring, or you could swap it out for the 14- or 16-pound springs that come with the pistol. The different springs allow you to tailor the pistol for your specific competition load so it’s completely reliable.

For accuracy testing, I used the 12-pound spring. As expected, the P320-XFive SXG was plenty accurate, with average group size ranging from just over an inch to just over two inches.

On a competition pistol, you want the weight in the grip and barrel—not the slide. Wide lightening cuts atop the slide reduce reciprocating mass, which makes the slide cycle faster while mitigating the recoil impulse. With the P320-XFive SXG, recoil is practically nonexistent.

The combination of ergonomics, weight, trigger and optic made the P320-XFive SXG a cinch to shoot both from a bench and offhand at speed, which is where it really shines. At 15 yards, I was able to shoot tight groups on steel and in the A zone of a USPSA target about as fast as I could press the trigger. Photographer Yamil Sued achieved similar results, producing a rapid-fire ragged-hole group at 10 yards.