Topic: Best Rangefinder Binoculars of 2023, Tested and Reviewed (Read 42 times)
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Topic: Best Rangefinder Binoculars of 2023, Tested and Reviewed (Read 42 times)
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Score Card
Key Features
Pros
Cons
You may be attracted to this exceptional rangefinding binocular by the price, but you should appreciate its abundant features, especially if you’re an archery or whitetail hunter looking for a great deal on a mid-range model.
Its co*pact 32mm frame makes it a natural choice for tight-quarters hunting in a treestand or ground blind, and it easily handles with a single hand. A free firmware update gives you Sig’s Archery Mode, which co*pensates for extreme angles at the distances bowhunters regularly encounter.
But the Sig’s diminutive size—it’s also available in a 10×42 version—shouldn’t fool you. There’s a ton of both optical and ballistic horsepower in this 26-ounce, 5-inch marvel.
For starters, the KILO6K connects to Sig’s excellent BDX app, and tethers to BDX-co*patible riflescopes and LRF monoculars. Under the hood of the 10×32 binocular, the unit carries Applied Ballistics Ultralite software, which delivers bullet-specific ranges out to 800 yards. And when connected to an external device, the unit can run on AP Xtended Range, which provides range-adjusted holds out as far as you can shoot. The unit also connects to the BaseMaps app, which is useful for dropping location-specific waypoints. The KILO6K has a programmable display and pairs with Garmin and Kestrel environmental sensors.
So much for its brains. How about its brawn? Every tester noted a distracting blue distortion, evidence of optical coatings designed to boost the red OLED display. In terms of ranging acumen, we were able to get about half the stated value on a variety of targets in bright sunlight; we fared a little better in low-light conditions. Some testers wanted a configurable reticle, noting that the circle is overly large and takes up too much of the field of view on distant targets.
The Sig ships with one of the best harnesses in our collection, and every tester noted the tremendous value they deliver for about $1,100.
“As a [precision rimfire] match director, I found this to be an extremely useful unit when connected to the BaseMaps app,” noted Gibson. “I can quickly plan where to place targets and have the distances easily added to my match book.”
With the addition of Sig’s Archery Mode software, the handy size, and the huge amount of both optical and ballistic capability in the diminutive binocular, this is possibly the perfect laser rangefinding binocular for archery, whitetail hunters, and target shooters who don’t intend to engage targets beyond about 2,000 yards. It’s the overwhelming pick for our Great Buy award, and came very close to taking our Editor’s Choice award, as well as the test’s top rangefinding binocular.
Read Next: Best Binoculars for Hunting
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Key Features
Pros
Cons
There’s a new player in the long-range shooting and hunting game. Revic, the optics arm of the long-range rifle co*pany Gunwerks, has co*e out with a rangefinding binocular that packages all the excellent ballistics capability of its LRF monocular in a sharp and useful field optic. The Acura BLR10b allows shooters to connect via Bluetooth to the Revic Ops app, or to use on-board ballistics and wind solutions to make shots at truly impressive distances in challenging conditions.
The Revic does so many things so well that it lost to the excellent Leupold by a single point for our best rangefinding binocular award. Because it’s configured so purposefully for long-range shooting, it gets our nod for the best long-ranger of the test. And it’s a unit you should consider as you look at the other ballistically superior LRF binoculars on the market: Sig’s exceptional KILO10K, Leica’s Geovid Pro, and the Vortex Fury 5000 AB.
On the basis of measurable attributes, the ranging sensitivity of the Revic Acura is on par with those of Sig and Leupold, which is to say excellent, though testers noted that the Revic’s speed is noticeably slower than its peers. Its glass is a touch better than the Leupold’s, as measured by our resolution and low-light assessments. And its interface with the excellent Revic Ops ballistic app is very good.
Among the attributes that elevated the Acura: its twin wind modes, its three holdover notations, and its ability to connect to an external Kestrel or Garmin without slowing down its processor. That last attribute is worth dwelling on. Many rangefinders operate at lightning speed when deploying on-board ballistics software, but tend to run slower and drain batteries when connected to an external device. The Revic slowed slightly when we connected it to both the mobile app and a Kestrel meter, but not tragically.
Tester Kyle Gibson noted the easy exchange of information between the Revic Ops app and the Acura unit.
“I was impressed with how quickly and easily I was able to build different [ballistic] profiles in the app and move them to the LRF,” Gibson noted.
The wind notations are useful. Use either the on-board wind inputs for horizontal range-adjusted holdoff values, or input a vector wind to get the full suite of wind holds, including spin drift, aerodynamic jump, and Coriolis effect. Holdovers are delivered in either MIL, MOA, or Revic’s own “Shoot-to-Range” hold that informs dial values for a ballistic turret to deliver a bullet at a specific range.
We also liked the ergonomics of the co*pact, short, and lithe unit. And for testers who have priced the Revic’s peers, the $2,700 price tag is a relative bargain for the ballistic and optical horsepower it delivers.
The unit lost points in ranging distance; on our test field we couldn’t quite get half its stated value of 5,000 yards. And some testers co*plained about sluggish returns, including a full second delay for some distant readings.
“Seems like this is a unit that’s made for a very specific use case,” wrote one tester. “Overall good and limited use, but glass is not better than the Leica [Geovid Pro] and is much slower than the Sig.”
We noticed some edge distortion and low-light performance was in the middle of the pack. Some testers had trouble with erratic auto-intensity settings on the display. But those are fairly minor quibbles that don’t degrade the Acura’s main job, which is to get long-range shooters on target quickly and confidently. And for a fair price, considering its prodigious talents.
Read Next: Best Binocular Harnesses
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It’s interesting that Leica led with the sized-down 10×32 version of this excellent rangefinding binocular. The smaller version of the Geovid Pro wowed our test team last year, and in some ways we wish Leica had stopped there. The 10×32 Geovid Pro remains a high-water mark for a rangefinding binocular’s optical and ballistic capabilities.
With the 10×42 version of the model, introduced earlier this year, Leica has added some optical horsepower—the larger objective lens adds about 10 minutes to effective viewing in early morning and in late evening thanks to its better light transmission. But with its larger lenses and overall dimensions, it’s given up the ergonomics and field-worthy capabilities of the smaller version.
The new Geovid Pro is an optical marvel. It easily won our low-light and resolution tests, and for users who mainly want a very good binocular, it’s our consensus pick as the optics of our test. The open-bridge design allows for fair handling, but users longed for the quick deployment of the smaller Geovid Pro.
“This 10×42 version feels like a battleship, co*pared to the speed-boat action of the 10×32,” said one tester. That’s a fair assessment, though we also noted that the 10×42 version is better suited to long-range co*petitions and many Western big-game hunting scenarios which rely on optical resolution.
Like its little brother, the 10×42 is loaded with Applied Ballistics Ultralite software, which provides adjusted aiming solutions out to 800 yards. If you want to go farther, connect to Leica’s app for custom holds out to 2,000 yards, which derives aiming solutions from Applied Ballistics Xtended Range version. It’s for those long targets that users will appreciate the fine optics of the 10×42 model. One of the value propositions for the Leica is its tracking capability. Say you shoot a deer across a canyon. You can range the spot of the target, drop a waypoint, and then connect to a mapping app to have that specific shot captured, allowing you to walk to the spot of the shot, but then to track the animal across the landscape. It’s a useful feature, though we had trouble with the stability of the connection between binocular and mobile app.
From a ranging perspective, testers appreciated the fast read of initial targets, but universally noted the slow reset of the ranging engine. Many wanted a scan mode to confirm distance of frustratingly slow or moving targets, and others noted the spendy price for a unit. But the Leica has the best optics of the test, and it’s worth noting that the optically excellent 10×42 Ultravid binocular sells for only about $1,000 less than the Geovid, and delivers none of the ballistic intelligence of the LRF binocular.
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For those hunters and shooters who want an optically superior binocular but only a minimalist rangefinder, this is the unit for you. The Geovid R brings Leica’s excellent glass and coatings to the game along with a rangefinder that will tell you the dead-level distance to your target, but that’s about it. It doesn’t have any ballistic functions, angle-adjusted ranging, or even targeting modes.
What’s very interesting about this unit, and the detail that sets it apart from Leica’s fully featured Geovid Pro, is that it doesn’t pretend to be more than it is. This is essentially Leica’s mid-level Trinovid binocular with a bare-bones rangefinder worked into its architecture. The price, around $1,400, is on par with the price of the Hawke and Burris laser rangefinding binoculars in our test, but the Leica brings way more optical performance to the game, even if its rangefinding talents are a little flat.
Let’s talk about that rangefinding. The Geovid R gives you line-of-sight ranging at targets from about 10 yards, which we confirmed, out to about 1,800 yards, a little bit shy of the 2,000-yard advertised range. The red LED display is crisp and handy, and the ranging and mode buttons are easy to reach and to navigate.
But that’s the extent of the Geovid R’s ranging capabilities. Instead, this is a unit that leads with optical performance. It finished near the top of the field in both optical resolution and low-light performance, and testers noted its fine edge clarity and overall brightness, especially co*pared with peers that have such heavy optical coatings that images can appear washed out.
But testers also noted with concern the pedestrian ranging.
“It took forever to get from angle to distance modes,” noted tester Luke Cocolli. “Overall, the electronics seemed glacial co*pared with other units in our test.”
Testers noted the sloppy focus wheel but applauded the locking eyecups. Overall, the Leica Geovid R was a mild hit with testers, who noted that it’s the best of the optics-first rangefinders in our evaluation, and a very good value at about $1,400, given that it brings basic rangefinding to the viewing equation.
Score Card
Key Features
Pros
Cons
Along with the Burris and the Leica Geovid R, the Hawke is one of a line of bare-bones rangefinders conjoined with a fairly capable binocular. But, in the case of the Hawke, the rangefinder’s performance exceeded our expectations while the optical performance disappointed testers.
Let’s start with the rangefinder. Hawke advertises that the unit will stretch from 11 out to 1,200 yards, but we managed readings as close as 6 yards and way out to 1,970 yards, making us question the modesty of the advertised range. We also liked the repeatability of the rangefinder, and the precision, especially given the oversized circular reticle.
The ranging speed was on par with our expectations, and the modes—the Frontier LRF includes last-target, near-target, fog, and hunt modes as well as both angle-adjusted and line-of-sight ranging modes—are what we’d expect for the type and price of unit. In this regard, it has all a hunter or shooter engaging targets at moderate distances needs. It doesn’t connect to a ballistic app or have any on-board ballistics software.
The Hawke ships with a very good chest harness, and the binocular—which is also available in a 10×42 version—is covered by one of