I tried Berettas before settling in with CZs for my defensive purposes. I have owned the M9a1 compact and currently own the P-01. For what it's worth, the Beretta was almost $200 more expensive. I then would have had to send it to Wilson Combat for the decock only modification($150). I also require night sights on my carry guns and the Beretta has an integral front sight with the frame. The last straw and deal breaker for me was how close in size it was to my 92a1. The frames were both aluminum and therefore weight was similar. The grip and barrel were ever so slightly reduced. So the pairing made no sense to me.
Fast forward, and the P-01 is my edc. The sp01 tactical is my range, shtf pistol. I like the ergos of the CZs more so than those of the Berettas. They came out the box as decock only models. I also feel that decocker is placed more intuitively than those of the omega and p09, p07 guns. The sp01 came with night sights and maybe $70? on Amazon got me a set for the P-01. Lastly, I must speak towards accuracy. The Beretta has it too, however I found myself working harder to wring it out of those guns as they never pointed intuitively for me. With CZs great ergos, I stack bullets into neat groups earlier in my range sessions, and more consistently overall.
I will give reliability to Beretta for a few reasons. The first and most obvious being the dropping lug design. This creates minimal space and effort for the bullet to chamber. Beretta also uses chrome lined barrels that extend to the albeit small feed ramp. Next, Beretta actually knows how to make a factory magazine that is both affordable and reliable.
Conversely, CZs are crudely finished and I found at least in the case of my sp01 tactical need a break in period. The brass has actually polished the feed ramp. They hate tulammo, and the 26 round factory magazines should not be run until the guns are broken in. They love magtech, and surprise Winchester Nato ball. These are Nato guns not necessarily made to eat all of the commercial ammo available to us. They like Mecgar magazines more than their own factory magazines. This makes me wonder if it was break in or the mags. I don't yet, as I can't seem to recreate my initial malfunctions, ftf, but give the above advise for a catch all approach. I have about 1000 rounds through the P-01 and can honestly say, that it just didn't like tula. The sp01 experienced the issues listed above. Neither have malfunctioned after their first 500 rounds and sp01 has about 1200 down the tube.
I give long term durability to the CZs. In my research, they tend to break the slide catch if recoil springs are not changed on time. Compare this to the Berettas tendency to break locking blocks even if the springs are changed, eventually. Those more knowledgeable than I suggest this is an easy fix, however I take pause with the idea of steel fragments locking up an aluminium framed pistol. For the record, this has resulted in even Beretta calling some frames "at the end of their service life". With current locking blocks going 22-35000 rounds, I still want a frame capable of taking more rounds.
I hope this helps and please don't discount the P-01 as the Omega is rarer, I've never seen one in person. And the decocker on the standard P-01 is well placed.
