Smith & Wesson on Tuesday announced the Bodyguard 38 2.0 revolver, a refreshed take on its compact five-shot wheelgun that swaps in a few ergonomic updates without abandoning the formula.
Announced from Smith & Wesson’s Maryville, Tennessee, headquarters, the Bodyguard 2.0 is chambered in .38 S&W Special +P and runs double-action only, which is to say there is no exposed hammer to thumb back and no single-action trigger pull.
The barrel is 1.875 inches of stainless steel, with the upper frame a single piece of aluminum alloy. The whole package measures 4.6 inches tall, 1.35 inches wide and tips the scale at 14.2 ounces unloaded—light enough to carry all day and forget about, heavy enough that +P loads will not feel like a punishment beyond the usual snub-nose tax.
The headline change is the cylinder release, which is now ambidextrous and center-mounted rather than living on the left side of the frame. Anyone who has tried to run a traditional Smith & Wesson revolver left-handed knows why this matters: the old setup forced southpaws into an awkward cross-hand reload that no amount of practice ever made elegant. Centering the latch is the kind of small mechanical decision that does not show up in marketing photos but reshapes how the gun actually gets used.
The sights have also been reworked. Out back is a machined U-notch; up front is a partridge-style blade with an orange dot. This is a meaningful upgrade from the usual trough-and-ramp arrangement. In low light, the orange dot gives the eye something to grab.
Rounding out the changes an enhanced boot-style grip, made of polymer and shaped to fill the hand a little better while still tucking close enough to the frame to avoid printing through a cover garment. The cylinder itself is stainless steel with a PVD coating.
Buyers who want a laser can have one. The Bodyguard 38 2.0 is also being sold in a configuration with an integrated Crimson Trace red laser, listed under SKU# 14508 at an MSRP of $549. The base gun without the laser is $449.
The compact .38 revolver is, in the larger handgun market, a category that remains popular. Subcompact, striker-fired pistols have eaten enormous chunks of the concealed-carry segment over the past two decades, and yet the small-frame wheelgun keeps selling, largely because it does a few things—pocket carry, simplicity of operation and tolerance of being neglected in a drawer—better than anything else on the shelf. Smith & Wesson’s Bodyguard line has been part of that conversation since its introduction, and the 2.0 is a refinement rather than a reinvention.
The full spec sheet on the Crimson Trace laser variant: 1.875-inch stainless steel barrel, double-action only, stainless cylinder with PVD coating, aluminum alloy frame, integrated Crimson Trace red laser, polymer boot-style grip, machined U-notch rear sight and partridge-style front sight with orange dot. The non-laser model is mechanically identical minus the Crimson Trace red laser.
Both models are available now. More information is on Smith & Wesson’s website.
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