How to Choose the Right Firearm Optics for Your Custom Build

Adding the right firearm optics to your custom guns can make aiming faster, more efficient, and more precise. Whether it’s the best rifle scope for your ranch gun or choosing red dot sights for your pistols, shotguns, and carbines, there’s a lot to consider when weighing your options. While the right sight can dramatically improve your shooting performance and experience, the wrong sight can leave you down several hundred dollars while trying to aim through a more complex sight picture than you need. With so many options on the market, there’s an optic that’s perfect for every gun and gun owner out there, so let’s take a look at how you can go about finding yours.

Why Mess with Firearms Optics

The right firearm optics do more than just replace your iron sights. They completely upgrade your shooting experience by tailoring your gun’s sight mechanism to better suit your shooting style.

• Accuracy – The bright, illuminated reticle on modern optics gives you an aiming point with greater contrast for better shot placement you can count on.
• Precision – It’s also far easier to come back on target after the initial shot for tighter, more precise groupings with your follow-up rounds.
• Speed – Modern firearm optics create a crisp, clear sight picture across fewer focal planes, making aiming almost as easy as point-and-shoot.
• Magnification – The best rifle scopes don’t just give you a bright reticle. They give you a multi-functional one to account for bullet drop and the magnification to make the most of it by bringing your target closer to you.
• Situational Awareness – Red dot sights often not only give you a larger in-focus picture but also let you shoot with both eyes open, giving you a full field of vision when making tactical decisions.

Considerations When Choosing a Firearm Optic

• Range – Different optics have different effective ranges, so you need to choose an optic that will support better accuracy and precision out to the distances you’ll be shooting.
• Accuracy vs. Speed – Understand whether you need to prioritize low-MOA accuracy or faster target acquisition. This will help you ensure your optic has the right lens and reticle size to support your gun’s primary function.
• Size of Optic – If you want to conceal carry, you may want to consider red dot sights that are less bulky than their counterparts, while competition shooters might prefer a larger optic that gives them more real estate to work with during a shooting course.
• Firearm Type – The best rifle scopes aren’t going to be great for your self-defense pistol because the two guns serve entirely different purposes. Likewise, red dot sights may have their place on shotguns, carbines, or as secondary sights on some rifles, but they would offer almost no benefit as a main sight on a long gun. 
• Mounting Options – Red dot sights often come with a mounting footprint that matches the pre-milled pattern on an optics-ready slide. You want to make sure your gun and mount are compatible or that an adapter is available to make them work together. Likewise, you need a mount or scope rings to secure the best rifle scope if you want to get the accuracy and precision you need to make every shot count.
• Environment – You want an optic that will withstand real-world abuse. This means rugged construction at a minimum and a design that protects the emitter so you have a clear reticle to aim with if you frequently encounter environments with airborne moisture or particulates. 

Best Rifle Scopes

Rifles shoot rounds with longer effective ranges, so primary firearm optics for these weapons need to match your engagement range. Gideon Optics’ Guardian line of LPVO (Low Power Variable Optics) gives you the right magnification level for short to intermediate-range shooting and bright reticles to help you account for bullet drop. They mount easily to any Picatinny 1913 rail system with the optional Guardian Mount or traditional scope rings. They offer adjustable brightness, windage, and elevation to fine-tune your aim for field conditions and are the perfect complement to most AR-type and hunting rifles.

Red Dot Sights for Competition and Sport Shooting

Competitive shooting events often require speed as much as accuracy. Whether it’s a reactive shooting course or tactical exercise, you want firearm optics that give you short-range accuracy and lightning-fast target acquisition times. That means you want to look at red dot sights with big windows and larger MOA reticles than many smaller defense or general-purpose reflex sights use. The new Gideon Optics Granite Competition is a great example. It has a big window for fast and intuitive sighting and an eight MOA dot reticle that lets you paint the target with the dot and pull the trigger.

Red Dot Sights for Concealed Carry

When you’re carrying a weapon for personal defense, however, you likely want to minimize the bulk you’re concealing without sacrificing accuracy. The smaller size can also make your optic less likely to snag your clothes on the draw, leaving you vulnerable in a potentially dangerous situation. The Gideon Optics Rock for RMR compatible slides and Judge for RMSC mounting footprints both offer a small-lens red dot sight that’s perfect for keeping weight and bulk down on your gun, along with a 3 MOA dot reticle that balances accuracy and speed for defensive shooting.

Firearm Optics for Astigmatism

Astigmatism can make aiming properly difficult with standard red dot sights. Caused by an abnormally shaped cornea or lens, you may not be able to properly focus traditional reflex optics, leaving you with a blurry reticle and poor accuracy. The Advocate 1X Prism Scope mounts to any 1913 Picatinny Rail system and gives you many of the accuracy, precision, and speed benefits of other red dots. The prisms used to refract light as it moves through the optic leave you with a crisp, clear reticle (even with astigmatism) that seems to float forward of the gun, reducing apparent visual planes for easier aiming.

Enclosed Red Dot Sights for Harsh Environments

Enclosed reflex sights protect the LED emitter inside a housing and between the two lenses of the firearm optic. This prevents your reticle from being obscured by dust, ash, snow, or other matter blocking the path between the emitter and the lens it projects on. The Mediator and new Mediator II from Gideon Optics give you rugged enclosed emitter red dot sights that are ready for harsh environments with a rugged waterproof, shockproof, and fog-proof design.

Order Your Firearm Optics From JSD Supply

While we think Gideon Optics has some of the best practical firearm optics on the market, blending reliable performance and a budget-friendly cost, we’re proud to offer a range of tactical optics from companies that provide sights and scopes you can trust. Order your optics from JSD Supply today.