Whenever the subject of inherent, or at least potential, reliability comes up when discussing the smallest of revolvers and pistols, I think back to over 20 year's worth of time watching folks shoot a variety of each in practice or qual courses of fire.
Ignoring the problems exhibited by .22's & .25's when it comes to really diminutive pocket pistols, the .32's, .380's & small 9's offered more feeding problems and general stoppages for their user's than the little revolvers.
Every once in a while you'd come across someone who didn't seem well practiced with their snub revolvers, and they might short stroke the DA/DAO trigger for a subsequent shot, but that's happened with some folks using one or another of those smaller 9's with their really long DAO triggers, too.
The revolvers seem more tolerant of budget ammunition issues, too.
Grip stability, especially when some amount of stress seems to be exhibited by a shooter, or their attention may be distracted from their grip, may be an issue for some folks when shooting really small pistols. Revolvers sometimes seem to be less sensitive to shooter grip stability issues.
These are things that probably some of the many things which ought to be carefully considered by each potential owner & user of either design when they're considering which will best serve their needs.
Granted, there are always going to be those folks who claim their little pistols have been perfect for them, and that's certainly to their advantage. Good for them. They deserve no less.
It's just that overall, the folks who found their small revolvers to be less problematic when completing courses-of-fire (not standing around making leisurely, slow-fire shots) outnumbered those who had similarly satisfactory experiences with their pocket pistols. Some of the problems experienced by small pistol owners were easily identifiable as shooter-induced (grip interfering with slide movement), some as maintenance (not cleaned or lubricated; weak magazine springs, etc) and some as ammunition problems (power to cycle the slide; sensitive to bullet nose profile). Things like that.
Then there were those folks who really liked their small pistols, but handled and shot their small revolvers better over the same courses-of-fire ... and vice versa, of course.
I try to never get too involved in someone's choice of firearm being lawfully carried as a dedicated defensive weapon. It's not something that's going to have to work for
me, after all, but for whoever it is that's doing the choosing.
I look more toward skillset and mindset issues than simple equipment issues and selection.
In more recent years, as the J-frames have seemed to catch fire in the imagination of younger shooters, I've seen some folks who had bought one or another of the newest 5-shot wheelguns for either off-duty or secondary weapon usage. The majority of these younger folks learned their handgunning skills on pistols, not revolvers. It could make for some frustration as they had to relearn a lot of their foundation skillset when it came to grip, trigger control and follow-through on sight picture or sight alignement (even when just indexing the weapon for very clsoe range shots).
I still miss the days when cops learned their handgunning skills using DA revolvers ... (or at least came to LE work with revolver skills).
I'll say a couple of other things before I stop rambling ...
When I was doing some shooting with a couple of the then-new .500 S&W Magnums (4" & 6"), I found the recoil to be heavy, but the recoil impulse to be less painful, overall, compared to when I was shooting one of the Ti/Sc 5-shot .357 Magnums. Sure, I demonstrated I could make fast and accurate doubles and triple using the little beast out to 10yds, but it punished my hand much more than the bigger .500 Magnum.
Although my pair of M&P 340's are chambered in Magnum, and I've used various Magnum loads in it (for both quals, practice and to find those which didn't exhibit signs of bullet pull in
my gun) ... I carry one or another of the +P loads I favor in my other +P rated Airweights, not Magnum. As well as I can shoot them with the Magnum loads, I can shoot them faster (and longer) using the +P loads.
That's where I draw the line for myself. Everyone else has their own opportunity to develop and express a preference for where and how they may choose to accept compromise for a really small, lightweight and conveniently carried defensive handgun.
