If you are a regular at shooting ranges, you may want to have an easy way of assessing your shots from a distance. Many use sighting scopes for this purpose, but the thing with sighting scopes is that they a) can be quite expensive and b) are a fairly specialized piece of equipment that you may not have much use for outside a shooting range. Binoculars will often solve your problems plus be quite useful for other activities while providing good value for money. The best binoculars for gun range will have a number of features that will make them particularly well-suited for this purpose:
- Adequate magnification: you’re going to be looking at very small things (bullet holes) a fair distance away, so you need decent magnification. 10x will probably be enough in most cases. Though this magnification may be too shaky in some other situations, e.g. when boating out on the water, it should not be a problem at a shooting range.
- Lens diameter will matter if you are planning to shoot in twilight conditions.
- Comfort, weather-resistance and durability are things to look for if you’re planning to use the binoculars for other activities as well.
Note that this is all for an outdoors shooting range, as opposed to a indoor shooting range where the distances are typically smaller.
Let’s have a look at some binoculars for gun range that you may consider:
Good magnification, big lens, low price. These binoculars are a good choice if you’re looking for something simple and cheap. They will give you a clear view of your targets, but don’t expect these to fair well in bad weather or tough conditions. They are not made to be waterproof, so they may get damaged in the rain and they may not handle impacts too well. They do have dioptric correction which means that you can adjust them to either of your eyes individually if you have differing eyesight in your eyes.
Now these here are much more serious binoculars for gun range use or otherwise. They offer 10x magnification and large 50mm lenses and the internal coated optics are of superb quality. They are highly praised for astounding image brightness and clarity and also for their durability. People have used them in the military without having them break. They won’t fog up in humid weather and won’t get soaked in the rain either. If you wear glasses, them you don’t need to worry because these Steiner have 17mm eye relief which should be enough for most glass wearers. You can use them at the range, but you can just as well take on a hike through Yellowstone or a cruise to Alaska and expect them to work perfectly. They look pretty badass too – not some flimsy opera glasses.
Now this is not a binocular, but I’m throwing this one in in case you decide that binoculars are not what you need at the gun range and that you’d prefer to have a sighting scope instead. This Gosky scope is a good option because it does everything you’d expect from a nice scope without being too hard on the wallet. You get a tripod and a smartphone adapter with it. The zoom goes all the way up to 60x which is great for long-range shooting. It’s a really popular model with plenty of positive reviews, so you might as well take a look at it.