Walther PP 380 Auto Model 4796027

The Walther PP (Police Pistol or Polizeipistole in German) was introduced in 1929 and was designed for the law-enforcement market. It was adopted by police agencies throughout Europe and was embraced by the commercial market prior to  WWII. During  WWII, the German military issued Walther PP models mainly to Luftwaffe troops, as well as other military organizations. In nearly 100 years of production, it is without doubt one of the most successful semi-automatic pistols ever manufactured. That is because the PP was innovative, with features like an automatic hammer block, a combination safety/decocker, and a loaded chamber indicator. The PP is a safe and reliable pistol that uses a simple blowback mechanism and feeds from a single-stack magazine. It inspired other models like the PPK and PPK/s, which are just as iconic and classic. The design also invited copies from the Eastern Bloc, Turkey, and China. The pistol was licensed in France after WWII by Manurhin. PPK and PPK/s models were built in the U.S. by Ranger Manufacturing in the late 1970s as well as by Smith & Wesson from 2002-2013. In 2024, Walther Arms, Inc. in Fort Smith, Arkansas, reintroduced the model PP to the U.S. market. As of late 2025, Walther announced the suspension of this legacy pistol as well as the PPK and PPK/s models. Walther plans to update the design and reintroduce it at a later date.

What’s interesting is Walther decided to re-introduce the PP in 380 Auto and 32 Auto. The latter caliber, though extremely popular in the early 20th century, was overshadowed by the 380 Auto. A few companies still manufacture subcompact 32 Auto pistols — Keltec, Beretta, and Seecamp come to mind, but the caliber is not that popular because it is considered anemic when put up against the 380 Auto or 9mm. We wanted to take a look at the new PP models and sourced one in each caliber. We also found a used model in excellent condition in 32 Auto to see if there were any differences between a model imported from Germany a few decades ago to a new American-built model. If the older gun turned out to be better than the newer ones, we’d send you out into the used market with a hearty “good luck” and the assurance that the effort would be worth it.

All three of these pistols share similar features, like the manual thumb safety/decocker. This lever is conveniently located on the slide near the thumb of a right-handed shooter. The gun is on Safe when the safety lever is down and on Fire when the lever is up, exposing a red dot. This is the opposite of the way the safeties on most American pistol designs operate, like the 1911 and thumb safeties on striker-fired pistols. A safety on the slide was popular for decades. Both Beretta and S&W, for example, produced pistols like this until they understood that shooters could rack the slide and accidentally rotate the safety into the Safe position. Part of the experience with vintage designs is understanding the weak spots. 

With all three pistols, the safety lever allows the user to safely de-cock the pistols and put the trigger back in double-action mode. This might seem odd for striker-fired pistol users, but a decocker was an innovative feature back in the day of only hammer-fired pistols. With the gun on Safe, the trigger cannot be fully pulled to the rear. An automatic hammer block requires the trigger to be pulled fully rearward to fire the pistol.

The loaded-chamber indicator is a pin that protrudes out of the rear of the slide just under the rear sight. This tells the user there is a round or an empty case in the chamber. The hammer has a groove cut into it so the pin is visible, even when the hammer is fully forward. 

All the PPs are natural pointers. With the flush-fit magazine, our small finger barely had any front-grip strap to hang on to. With the finger-rest magazines, the grip felt more secure.

The magazine release looks like a slide stop and seems odd for American shooter who expects the magazine release to be located behind the trigger where the trigger guard meets the front-grip strap. On the PP, the round magazine release is easily accessible with the thumb of a right-handed shooter.

These are the similarities of the Walthers. From here, there are some distinct features that separated the new U.S.-built guns from those manufactured in Germany.

The new U.S.-made PP models were redesigned from the ground up because none of the tooling from the original PPs was in the U.S. They were basically built from scratch. One major design difference is that a drop safety is built into the new U.S.-built models. There is a cut out in the hammer that is designed to accommodate the safety plunger lever. When the hammer falls, the safety plunger lever fits in that slot on the hammer, allowing the safety plunger lever to move out of the way. This is what keeps it drop safe when the hammer is fully back and cocked. The German-built PPs do not have a drop safety, so, in theory, if the pistol is dropped, the firing pin could move forward from the momentum and fire a round.

There’s something important to note about U.S.-built Walther PPK and PPK/S pistols manufactured under license by S&W from March 2002 through February 2009. These pistols are potentially unsafe. The hammer blocks are defective, and the pistol may fire without the trigger being pulled when the manual safety is deactivated, or when the manual safety is used to de-cock the pistol. Go to the S&W web site (Smith-Wesson.com) for details.

Ammo used consisted of both 380 Auto and 32 Auto selections. For 380 Auto, we used Hornady Critical Defense loaded with a 90-grain FTX bullet, Winchester SilverTip with an 80-grain JHP, and Speer Gold Dot with a 90-grain GDHP bullet. For 32 Auto ammo, we enlisted Buffalo Bore 32 Auto +P with a 75-grain hard-cast flat-nose bullet. Regular-strength 32 Auto consisted of Hornady Critical Defense 60-grain FTX bullets and Aguila ammo with a 71-grain FMJ. Extra magazines in blued or nickel finishes in 32 Auto or 380 Auto are available from Mec-Gar ($33.25 to $39.35; Mec-Gar.com) with the helpful finger rest or without, the flush-fit versions. 

All the PPs exhibited good accuracy at 10 yards using a rest. At 7 yards and performing the Failure Drill, we were able to determine they all could be employed as defense guns, but some were better than others. One thing we noticed with all the Walthers was with our support-hand grip. There is very little frame for the support hand to contact, so you either have to rest your thumb against the slide, and every time the slide cycles reposition your support hand, or you shoot the gun with your support-hand thumb over your firing-hand thumb, like when gripping a revolver. There are other features that differ, which we will get into. The bottom line is these pistols show the age of their design. That doesn’t mean the pistol is incapable of defense use, but there are a few quirks you need to know — like the support-hand thumb rest — to optimally run these pistols. Slide retraction took about 12 pounds of effort on all of the pistols. There are serrations only at the rear, and there is enough texture to do the pinch-and-pull method or the pinch and over-the-slide method to rack the slide. We had no function issues with any of the PP guns, but we did take issue with their tiny sights and heavy trigger pulls, which are a known characteristic of PP pistols, and in our opinion, should have been enhanced in newer guns. Here are the details.

Walther PP 380 Auto Model 4796027,

$983 (New Production)

Gun Tests grade: B-

The 380 Auto PP offers more ballistic performance with slightly more recoil. It has a very heavy DA trigger, tiny sights, great accuracy, and a longer beavertail. 

The new stainless PP is chambered in 380 Auto, which we feel is a better cartridge than the 32 Auto for self defense, if the shooter had to chose between the two chamberings. Like the blued version in 32 Auto, the stainless model came in a blue-velvet case. For magazines, it came with two nickel-plated sticks, one flush fit and the other with a finger rest. We preferred shooting the 380 Auto with the finger-rest magazine; it allowed us a better grasp because we could use all four fingers.

The matte-stainless finish was very nice and contrasted with the black-plastic grips. The serrations on the top of the slide were wavy and elegant.

The sights were milled out of the slide and the red dot/stripe showed up slightly better on the matte-stainless finish. We still didn’t like these sights, but we were able to shoot good groups. Accuracy groups were not as tight as they were with the 32 Auto guns. The trigger pull was nominally better; 17 pounds in double action and 4.6 pounds in single action.

The best group with the 380 Auto PP was with Winchester SilverTips, which gave a 1.04-inch group and an average of 1.12 inches. Next best was Hornady Critical Defense with 1.23 inches and an average of 1.36 inches. The Speer Gold Dot had a best group of 1.69 inches and averaged 1.88 inches. Still, this is good accuracy out of a compact pistol.

Moving to the Failure Drill, the trigger was a bit easier to press in single-action mode, but we still had to compensate for the initial 17-pound double-action pull. Our right-handed shooters aimed slightly to the right, so during the trigger press, hits would be in the center. The pistol also shot low. So we aimed higher to place hits in the head A-zone at 7 yards.

Our Team Said: The stainless 380 ACP PP offered good accuracy and more power than the 32s. The 380’s sights were tiny, and the trigger heavy, but if we wanted a PP model for self defense, this would be the one.

At the end of the day, however, it’s hard for us to recommend any of these guns for serious work. There are so many better, lighter, less expensive choices out there, certainly in 380 ACP. These PP pistols are fun plinkers, however, and for that, we liked shooting them.

To collect accuracy data, we fired five-shot groups from a bench using a rest. Distance: 10 yards with open sights. Velocities and energies were recorded using a Garmin Xero C1 Pro chronograph.

Written and photographed by Robert Sadowski, using evaluations from Gun Tests Team members. GT