Odds are you’re familiar with Kimber, a gun maker that’s been around for almost half a century. The latest pistol from Kimber is the CDS9, a gun designed with everyday carry and self-defense in mind. Kimber’s put serious thought into the dimensions and features of their newest gun. As it turns out, it performs well on the range, too.

The latest micro compact to be released by Kimber is the CDS9. (Photo credit: Kat Ainsworth Stevens)

What’s the Kimber CDS9?

The Kimber CDS9 is—as its name suggests—a 9mm handgun. It’s a double-stack model (hence the ‘DS’ in the model name). Exact capacity varies by magazine and there are three mags available; 10, 13, and 15 rounds. That’s a lot better than some of the older compact 9mm pistols, single stacks that held only 6 or 7 rounds. Of course, carry guns are about far more than capacity alone.

This pistol has a stainless steel, match grade barrel that’s 3.18-inches in length. The frame is aluminum and boasts the company’s KimPro II finish. The front strap and mainspring housing are nicely checkered to improve your grip. As for the slide, it’s stainless steel and provides good balance.

Serrations designed for aesthetic appeal as well as functionality are located fore and aft. The factory trigger is flat-faced with a vertical break point, grips are VZ Frag pattern G10, and sights are Tag Fiber Lock in the front and blacked out in the rear.

G10 grips and checkering on the front strap and mainspring housing help ensure a firm grip during live fire. (Photo credit: Kat Ainsworth Stevens)

How does the Kimber CDS9 shoot?

More ammo needs to be put through the CDS9 before I can attest to its reliability, but some range time with the pistol shows it fits my hands more comfortably than expected and shoots well, too. It’s a relatively flat-shooting pistol and delivered nice, consistent five-shot groups at close ranges (I’d like to see how it does outside 10 yards).

Considering that it’s a compact with a 3.18-inch barrel, the CDS9 is meant for close-range personal defense engagements. Within those distances it does quite well and didn’t have any failures.

The gun has a flat-face trigger and rounded trigger guard. The trigger is smooth and has a clean break. (Photo credit: Kat Ainsworth Stevens)

The real judgement as to whether a pistol will become your everyday carry gun comes when you know it can cycle your personal defense ammo reliably beyond a few loaded mags. We haven’t taken the Kimber CDS9 that far yet, but we will. It’s a promising little gun and it will be interesting to see what it can do.

The CDS9 is available as an optics ready model with an RMSc footprint cut and with or without a threaded barrel. The threaded barrel model has a barrel length of 3.64-inches. MSRP for the Kimber CDS9 starts at $1075 so you can expect to see it at dealers under $1K. More to come.

– Kat Ainsworth Stevens, Shooting News Weekly

This feature originally appeared in our Shooting News Weekly (SNW). If you would like to receive a weekly rundown of tip stories from Shooting News Weekly you can subscribe here to the Friday newsletter.