Pocket pens - they are everywhere yet they are certainly not for everyone, so how would you know if it's something you could get into? - here's my idea: the Pilot Petit1 fountain pen.

The Petit1 - it is a part of a 3-pen series from Pilot, with the Petit2 (sign pen) and the Petit3 (fude brush pen) make up the whole collection. The purpose of their creation is very clear: the smallest possible package that could really perform as a good writing instrument.

The Petit1 comes with a very similar feel in comparison to fountain pens in the same price range, and it is especially similar in terms of the section to Pilot’s own disposable fountain pen - the Varsity or the V-Pen.

The whole package is rather small - well, duh - as the barrel is completely shortened to accompany the short cartridge given inside the pen, and also without any kind of plastic wrapping; oh and your instruction manual is stickered right on the side of the cap, so that would guarantee you reading it, even if you don’t understand a word in japanese like I do.

It achieves its purpose by being small and light weight, but to my surprise, the build is really firm and solid. At the first glance, it seems that the pod shape of the pen is easily bent or broken in half due to physics - but Pilot has reinforced the design with clever distribution of the plastic parts so that it is really hard to crush the pen from any angle. There are also 4 bumps at the end of the barrel to keep the cap securely posted whenever you use the Petit1.

I also noticed that the barrel, despite the light weight and the thinness of the wall, is also strengthened by the inner design - there are thicker and angled pieces to make the pen more resistant to crushing and dropping damage.

The cap is also tapered with an inner cap inside to prevent the nib from drying out. On the side of the cap there are 2 small holes near the inner cap in order to prevent a vacuum to form when you pop the cap open. Props to Pilot for solving a very big issue for users, as these pens are cartridge / eyedropper only so the problem of them spilling ink inside of the barrel is a real thing.

The section consists of  a plastic section and a clear feed, accompanied by a stamped nib with minimal branding and the letter indicating the nib size. To my knowledge, it only comes in Fine, it’s a pity but understandable. On the flip side, the Petit line makes up for it with the pens being available in several different colors and you could really go all out and get all the colors. For a $3 fountain pen, it writes surprisingly well. The feedback is really similar to that of the Kakuno nibs but I would not recommend you apply heavy pressure to the nib since the stamped steel nib is really thin and would spring itself in a matter of seconds. As an everyday pen to throw around in your pencil case or back pocket, this pen fits the bill really well, and I found myself finishing a whole cartridge in one morning. This is also one of the disadvantages that comes with this type of fountain pen.

The idea behind a pocket fountain pen is that when not in use, the total length when capped is short enough to be put inside of a pocket, thus the barrel has to shrunk down to the bare minimum to only being able to use a short cartridge only; and because of that, most of these pens would be unusable without the cap sitting on the end of the pen. Because of this, the action of capping and uncapping will eventually wear out the plastic of the pen, but this is to be expected and you could always get another one. However, the biggest drawback of the pen lies in the amount of ink available inside the cartridge. It is a given that you would have to spend a few extra bucks to either get a pack of mini-cartridge from Pilot specifically for this Petit series, or refill a used one with a syringe. The whole process is not really that big of a deal per say and it might turn off new users as it is finicky to get in there with a pointy needle that could spill ink out any second, but with a bit of practice, anyone could use this style of refilling with ease.

Overall, this Petit1 is a good trial run if you would like to dip your toe into pocket pens or even fountain pens in general - solid build quality, a decent nib that writes well, and priced as much as a cup of coffee. Even if you level up and find yourself spending more time with other pens, this tiny writer could also fit in your routine as a backup pen sitting around in your bag, waiting for that rare moment out of the blue to save you from not having a writing instrument to write with - but if you want something a bit better in terms of quality, how about checking the fountain pen section to find something else that fits your need?