Thread: Red dots pros and cons

I'm interested to hear your experience with the
Red dot? Pros and cons?
Bush hunting and target identification
Effective range?
Have you gone back to a scope
Types of rifles you run them on.
General experience.

most common mistake is people rank up the brightness at dusk and dawn, your pupil contacts and the target is harder to see.
good on short range, fast moving targets but useless on shotguns unless you are shooting slugs.

Ran one on an ar, effective to 250 m on animal size targets without the doubler, can shoot both eyes open, ideal for snap shooting and moving targets. Have it on a 10/22 now and it does bunnies and possums just fine.

Bought an Aimpoint years ago when they were the best part of $1000, still got it but broken, best unit ever on a .375 Win lever gun for stags in heavy bush...shot a sika stag two hours after chopper landed with it...shot many since. You can hold dot on animal with your peripheral vision while searching straight ahead...had this happen once when younger stag approached me from the side while I was looking for another stag straight ahead, put the dot on him and kept looking ahead, as soon as he spotted me I decked him. Moving from clearing to bush, light to dark and back again one needs to continually keep rotating intensity of dot. On a pump shotgun shooting possums, nothing is as quick to drop them from a perch.

i had a leupold cqb on my ar, its a dot, crosshair, circle reticle. gave the best of all worlds. no longer have a use for it

or etched illuminated reticle so no power and you still have sights

Limited experience. I have one that I had on an AR found I didn't like it in the Bush. Was hunting goats and if animal was mostly obscured at a distance was hard to find an aim point for a clean shot. Always wanted to try it with a magnifier. Was not right often enough for me to keep using. Now have 2 x 7 scope and like that better. Would like to try it on a shotgun. Holosun brand

They suck if you have asitgmatism. The dot becomes a smear.

tried them and I want/need more magnification
very happy with VXRs

They're pretty useless on anything other than a semi.

You get parallax issues on the traditional style stocks you normally use on a hunting rifle.

Occluded Eye Gunsights (OEG) work well on any firearm but require both eyes open. They don't suffer parallax issues. https://www.armsonusa.com/armsonoeg.html

I have had the Eotech and Magnifier, Aimpoint micro, Bushnell TRS25, Burris fastfire iii and a few others.

For me personally they are great for ~ 150m and under stuff on anything (200m+ if you are confident), great on shotguns for up close if that is your thing and even a semi .22 for rabbit/vermin control. I only have the aimpoint now which is on my Kriss .22, it will probably end up on some pistol calibre lever gun when I get one.

To be honest though I think with semi's being gone it is hard to justify a red dot when you can get something like VX-R or VX5/6HD firedot in 1 to 6 power (or one of the various other brands) . The 5/6HD are particularly good as they offer a true one power and you end up something which is almost as fast as a red dot at 1x and also have up to 6 power on tap when you need it. Some of the other brands go up to 8x.

I think SOCOM are replacing their mainstream ACOG fixed 4x/RMR red dot "combos" on their M4's with NF 1-8 scopes now as they are so versatile...

Ive got a trs25 on a rossi puma 44. Not used it in anger yet but sighted in at 25yards, 2 inch high. My plan is to use it on goats in creeks and bush.

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Great out to 200 meters.
Holosun is my preferred brand.
Have used / used on pistols, bolt action rifles, semi centre fire and rimfire rifles and semi shot guns.
Fast and accurate.
Modern units, batteries last for 10s of thousands of hours and turn on automatically as soon as you move them.


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I’ve been using a Aimpoint for over a decade its got the best battery life and can handle hard abuse. Really good for stalking fast runners in the bush and in big thick dark native forest where a standard non illuminated reticle would be near impossible to use in dawn and dusk with rain or mountain mist. A 2MOA is good for anything under 150m-200m depending on calibre. Only used them on bolt action 223,308 and a 300 blackout. Depending on the type of hunting I’m doing for a trip and the weather I’ll swap the Aimpoint for a longer range scope with quick release mounts.