If you’re a gun owner you better have a way to keep your firearms secure, putting your guns in a bag in the corner of your closet isn’t enough. This is especially true if you have children in your household. Not only is it the law, but it’s part of being a responsible gun owner. SentrySafe is one of the largest firearm lockbox and safe makers in the world, if you’ve shopped for a way to secure your guns I’m sure you’ve seen their products on the market.
We got the chance to review the SentrySafe XL Quick Access Pistol Safe. The safe fits two full-sized pistols (hence the XL) or one pistol with plenty of room for spare mags and ammo.
The body of the safe is made entirely of steel with a durable black coated finish. The interior has foam padding to prevent your firearms from getting scratched.
The four electronic keypads, the safe includes override keys just incase you forgot your code. Programming your own code is simple via the supplied instructions from SentrySafe.
Cheaper priced safes are easy to pry into with a big flat head screwdriver, not the SentrySafe XL. The sides of the door fit very closely to the body of the safe, there’s no space to pry the door open easily. The bottom part of the door next to buttons is angled downward making it very hard to pry open as well. Is it impossible to pry open this safe? Absolutely not, most safes can be broken into with the proper tools and enough time. The purpose of a safe like this is to keep your pistols away from kids, smash and grab break-ins etc. The safe is also California DOJ approved for all the CA residents out there.
The safe quickly and quietly opens via a compression gas strut.
The safe already has two holes drilled into it along with the necessary hardware to bolt it down, why get a safe if someone could just walk off with it? Bolting down this safe was pretty easy as the bolt holes are easy to access from inside the safe. I highly recommend bolting down your safes, especially pistol safes. If you’re bolting this safe onto your wall be sure you bolt it directly into the wall studs and not just into the drywall. It would be pretty easy to yank this safe off the wall if not correctly bolted down.
The buttons and interior of the safe has bright blue LED lights making it easier to quickly open the safe and retrieve your pistol in low light conditions. I tried using the safe in the dark, it took a couple tries but after a few attempts opening it and grabing your pistol was pretty easy. I’d spend the extra few bucks for the LED model.
This safe has plenty of room, it’s stated as being large enough for two pistols. The interior dimensions are 2.2″ x 14″ x 6.5″. It fit my Glock 17 which is a bit bulkier than your average Glock 17. It’s equipped with a flared magwell, Holosun red dot sight on an Alg Defense 6-second Mount and a Strike Industries G4 Slidecomp Glock Compensator which adds a bit of length to the pistol.
It easily fit my Glock 19 with a Streamlight TLR-1 HL Tactical Light with plenty of extra room for spare magazines and other valuables you might want to keep safe.
True to its specs this safe can definitely hold two pistols, it fit my Glock 19 and full-size 1911 easily.
Final Thoughts
Keeping your guns out of the hands of children and undesirables is always a must, but if you need quick access to your pistol in a self defense scenario at home the SentrySafe XL Quick Access Pistol Safe is a good choice. The quick access buttons and bright LED lights make it a great choice, it also has the room for up to two pistols. Be sure to bolt the safe down.
The SentrySafe XL Quick Access Pistol Safe retails for $169.99 and the LED version goes for $199.99. Check out SentrySafe.com for more info. The safe is also available on Amazon.com.
Check out all our past reviews on our Reviews Page.
I have one of these safes, I keep my home defense pistol and 2 spare mags in it. The LED light is an awesome feature. With some practice it’s very quick to open and draw your weapon.