Nitecore P10GT Review

“”: https://www.banggood.com/Nitecore-P10GT-XP-L-HI-V3-900LM-Tactical-Enhanced-Throw-LED-Flashlight-286M-p-1140318.html?p=H21509672085201407GR&utm_campaign=chrisc&utm_content=chendongling

I was waiting on a few other lights to arrive and I was asked if I’d like to give this light a go. I’m REALLY glad I said yes.
I’d like my review to just say “buy this light” and leave it as that. Seriously! It is that good I think you should just buy it but people obviously want to know more about a light before they buy it and this isn’t a “cheap” light considering it’s just an 18650 light and it’s 2-3x the cost of lots of other basic 18650 lights but I think it really is worth the extra.

First off, this light was provided to me by the good people at banggood and they’ve provided a nice bit of discount if you are interested. PM me for details.

The item arrived in a fairly normal grey plastic bag with some foam insets inside to protect the light. It just fitted through my letter box which was a bonus as I was out on the day of delviery. Opening the packaging will show you the normal yellow and black Nitecore packaging as below:

Opening the package up you get this little selection below: Flashlight, holster, manual, lanyard and a few o-rings.

This light doesn’t win on the numbers game with “just” 900 lumens from its Cree XP-L HI v3 emitter. On mine the emitter is nicely centered and the beam that it produces shows this. The glass is AR coated which my photo doesnt really show and the bezel is toughened and shaped to allow you to smash stuff with it.

The light is a bit longer than other 18650 lights you’ve come across and this is because of the heat sink and the reflector. The reflector is nice and deep on this light which allows it to have a much greater throw than other 18650 singles I’ve played with. When you compare the throw of this light which is 205kcd / 286m against a Thorfire VG15S with ~200m beam you notice instantly how much more focused the beam is which means when you’re outside the beam goes so much further and even on a short garden you notice how much more usable the light is. Indoors it doesn’t seem to struggle as the hotspot is still there and the light spreads nicely.

As you can see though the light fits nicely into the hand and the switches are within easy reach. You wont be clicking the light on/off by accident but at the same you wont be struggling to turn the light on.

The light is nice and grippy. The knurling is fairly normal for Nitecore products. I put the light in the bath then took it out and it certainly did not slip around. It also proved its waterproof claim by staying on without issue.
The light accepts all of the various 18650’s I’ve tried in it ranging from the 3600mAh Klarus protected cells to some cheap nasty “trustfire” cells. It doesn’t seem to be fussy over the length of the cell and with shorter cells there isn’t any rattle from the cell.

The light also comes with a spacer tube to allow you to use CR123 cells if you choose. I put this to one side as I don’t ever plan on using them and I lost it so I couldn’t take a photo!

The light has a belt clip that you can take off and an anti roll ring that isn’t on the light when you get it so I didnt put it on. I normally take these off straight away anyway so didn’t waste my time putting it on to take back off.

The 2nd best bit about the light (the first being the throw) are the dual switches. Much like the Klarus XT12GT that I love this light has two switches. One click on, another to change mode OR just press the tab switch and initiate instant strobe. I’m still not sure in day to day use where that would be useful but this really is a tactical light in that respect. They sell gun mounts, it has a decent throw, it has one press strobe. The features and modes on this light have really been thought about and they clearly know the market that this is intended for.

These switches allow you to use the multiple modes that the light has multiple modes with multiple outputs. I use mine on the general mode as I like to have all of the modes.

I also missed that the tailcap has an indicator light to show the battery status. I honestly didnt notice it and I must have skipped over that in the manual when I took it out and discarded it straight away!
Three blinks means the battery is above 50, two blinks mean above 10 but below 50. One blink means it’s got less than 10!

I will post a video tonight showing beam comparisons of this light VS a Thorfire VG15S and if people ask I can throw some other lights in the mix that I’ve got.

I’ve been really busy with real world stuff and have a pile of lights to test/review and I’m really struggling so any questions or something you’d like me to check please let me know.

Hi Guys,

A little bump as I’ve just been sent a better discount code bringing the price down even further for this.

If anyone is interested please PM me.

P10GT is basically a P12GT but with the mode button on the back instead of the front right?
Why does it have worse throw?

From what I can see the P12GT has 320m throw VS 286m throw. That is a bit I will agree but at the same time the P10GT is slightly shorter at 134mm VS 140mm and it weighs a bit less at 81g vs 91g.

Basically the light is a bit shorter, a bit lighter, has better switches on the bottom and thats about it as far as I can tell.

I love mine and I’ve not played with the P12GT so can’t comment too much further on that.