Reader Reviews Beretta Nano

A long-time reader recently mentioned to me that he had purchased a Beretta Nano, so I asked him if he could do a short write-up for my blog of his first thoughts and impressions, to which he graciously agreed. He writes:

The Nano is a relatively new compact 9mm pistol from Beretta. Like many newer 9mm pistols, it is double-action only. And, like many newer 9mm pistols, the lower frame is predominantly plastic ("fiberglass reinforced technopolymer"). The serialized portion of the pistol - the receiver - is effectively a trigger group with integrated slide rails made from stamped stainless steel that is held in the lower frame by a couple of pins. The Nano comes with two six-round single-stack magazines. I won't go into the rest of the technical specifications, as they are available online: http://www.berettanano.com/
User Manual: http://www.berettausa.com/file.aspx?DocumentId=78
I took my new Beretta Nano 9mm pistol to the range for the first time the other day, and used 150 rounds of Federal 9mm ammunition for this initial break-in session.
The trigger travels a rather long distance before firing, but is fairly smooth. Certainly smoother than the Kel Tek P3AT, but not as smooth as a more expensive pistol like the Browning Hi-Power. Accuracy seems pretty good, with the first two shots hitting the same spot on the target. Then I started to flinch and my accuracy degraded. My accuracy improved as I got over the flinching. I believe the gun is fairly accurate for its diminutive size. My marksmanship skills are not up to the capabilities of this pistol.
Like other compact semiautomatic pistols, it does have a bit of a kick, but it was not unreasonable for its small size, and certainly less than the Kel Tec P3AT, which uses the less powerful .380 ACP (9mm short) round.
One very nice feature of the Nano, over the P3AT, is a slide lock which holds the slide open after the last round in the magazine is fired.
Over the course of my shooting session, three times the pistol failed to eject a spent casing (the case remained in the chamber). This occurred around the 70th, 90th, and 130th rounds fired. But, occasional eject/misfeed problems are not uncommon for a new semiautomatic pistol. I was not paying attention to which magazine was being used, and both magazines look look fine. (I've numbered the magazines in anticipation of the Nano's next trip to the range.) Further, there was nothing wrong with the casings to indicate what the problem might have been.
Disassembly and cleaning of the pistol is easy. First, a decocking pin is pressed with something like a ball-point pen. Then the take-down cam is rotated counter-clockwise one-quarter turn. Then the slide can be easily removed. The remainder of the disassembly and cleaning is similar to that of other modern semiautomatic pistols. Reassembly is the reverse of the disassembly, except that the take-down cam automatically rotates back into its locked position when the slide is reattached and racked all the way back (the user manual recommends checking the orientation of the take-down cam after reassembly).
Overall, the Nano is a fun little pistol to shoot - certainly not as brutal as other compact pistols I have used. It is very compact for a 9mm semiautomatic pistol. I have not decided if I am going to start using it as my every-day concealed carry pistol. As small as it is, it is still significantly larger and heavier than my current every-day carry pistol.