Or maybe using a staff or other item could be less dangerous eg if you lose control of the magic the staff would blow up instead of your hands.

I like that. It could be an interesting event.

In the world I am designing, all practitioners use items when using magic because it is faster, conserves energy, easier to focus or whatever than other ways.
By items i mean: Rings, wands, staves, etc.
My protagonist, typically, does not use items or props. The original reasoning for this was because he never had any type of formal training so he learned everything using hand gestures and words

But I thought of something a few minutes ago and I was hoping for some input on it.
My idea now is that it is simply more practical to use magic without items and props. It would help with discipline and focus. He could travel lighter.
He would be faster than other Practitioners. Of course this is all long term stuff. He would be forced to improve his knowledge/skill with Magic to compete with Practitioners who use items.

Any thoughts?

Thanks for the replies, they were very helpful.