Each year, more and more shooters are adding optics to their pistols. But red dot sights are more than simply a fad, and here’s why.
by Brad Fitzpatrick
As with any other industry, there are fads in the firearms market. If you’re a rifle shooter, you remember how popular white line spacers were on hunting guns, and the popularity of pistol cartridges like the .40 Smith & Wesson and .38 Super have risen and fallen through time. But other trends truly change the face of firearms, and optics on pistols are one of those. Here’s why.
What Pistol Optics Offer Shooters
Just a decade ago, pistol optics were fairly rare. Even rarer were factory pistols with slides machined to accept optics. The first pistols that routinely wore optics were competition guns, and as more and more competitors began buying race guns with optics, interest in red dot optics grew within the shooting community.
Not so long ago, adding a red dot to your handgun required serious commitment. Sidesaddle optic mounts work, but they limited the practicality of a firearm. It was much simpler to just attach a red dot to the slide of your pistol, but that was easier said than done. Most times, it meant taking your handgun to a custom gunsmith who could machine the slide to mate with an optic. But the process was slow and costly and, at the time, a pistol with optics was considered to be almost exclusively a competition weapon.
Soon, interest in pistol optics grew within the law enforcement community, and traditional iron-sighted sidearms gave way to handguns with optics. Manufacturers saw the value in offering pistols with optics cuts machined into the slide since so many police agencies were searching for pistols that allowed them to mount red dot sights without modification. And, as more gun companies began offering pistols with optic cuts, the public began to take note. For the first time it was possible to buy a handgun and add an optic without the need for custom modification.
Eventually, pistol buyers learned what LE and military professionals and competition shooters already knew: optics make sense on a pistol. Dismissed early on as a gimmick, data-driven evaluations showed time and again that a shooter trained with a red dot sight could shoot faster and more accurately than when firing a gun with only iron sights.
Red dots offer many distinct advantages for shooters of all skill levels. First, they eliminate the need to adjust focus. If you started shooting handguns in the days before optics were common, you were probably told to focus on your front sight. The idea was that you focused your attention on the front sight and kept the target in “soft” focus — easier said than done when an attacker is bearing down on you.
The principal advantage of a red (or green) dot sight is that you remain target-focused. There’s no need to close your eye, no need to train your brain to apply hard/soft focus. And, as someone who has taught entry-level handgun shooters, I can assure you that red dots are simpler for novices to master. The concept of placing the dot where you want to hit and firing is far simpler for new shooters to understand than trying to teach the use of iron sights. This is particularly impactful during classes where range time is limited to four hours or so. The sooner students understand the basic concepts the more time they can spend practicing their skills. Students with red dots often walk away feeling confident in their marksmanship, which isn’t always the case for new shooters trying to master iron sights.
Some shooters learn to shoot red dots much more quickly than iron sights simply because of vision issues. My father is in his eighties and struggles to align iron sights, but he can shoot very quickly with a red dot. My wife is cross-dominant, and during our early days on the range I couldn’t understand what she meant when she told me she saw two front sight posts. I remedied the problem relatively quickly, but using red dots allowed her to shoot accurately without having to switch hands. Shooters with astigmatisms and other eye conditions oftentimes find that a red dot sight simplifies their shooting.
Red dot optics offer a rapid aiming point in any light conditions, and that’s important on a self-defense firearm. Bad guys rarely attack in full sunlight. In fact, many criminals use the cover of darkness to conceal their approach and attack, so having an optic that is visible at all times is essential. And when you’re faced with an attacker you won’t have to worry about front sight focus. Simply point and shoot.
As stated, red dots are actually faster than iron sights, a fact that has been proven in several studies — but there’s a caveat. You can be faster with a red dot if you practice. I was slow to jump on the red dot wagon and wanted to see actual proof that they were better than iron sights as a primary sighting system. Over the last three years, I’ve spent time with lots of instructors, LE professionals, and manufacturers, and have spent a great deal of time behind pistols with red dots. I’ve learned it’s true that red dots are faster because I’ve seen my split times drop. I also do a lot of accuracy testing on pistols and I’ve seen group sizes shrink with an optic in place.
Living With Red Dots
The most common complaints levied against red dots are that electronic optics are less reliable than iron sights, that they make it more challenging to carry a concealed firearm, and that that they add too much cost.
Let’s address each of these issues.
First, red dots (with a few exceptions) do require batteries and batteries die. Sure, optics manufacturers count battery life in years, but sooner or later a battery-operated red dot is going to run out of juice. This is why iron sights remain essential, if not for your primary sighting system at least as a backup in the event of battery failure. I believe red dot-equipped pistols need iron sights, and those sights should be tall enough to co-witness with your optic. If the red dot dies, you simply transition to irons. Of course, shooters will still have to learn to shoot iron sights, but they can get their start with a red dot and then transition to iron sight shooting when they are more comfortable with their firearm.
The argument that red dot sights are harder to conceal is largely levied by people who have never carried a gun with an optic. Most compact carry pistols use optics with a small footprint (the Shield RMSc is a very popular one), and I have never had a gun that was difficult to conceal due to an optic. In most instances, the primary cause of printing is a grip that extends far enough to cause a disruption in the clothing. Slide length and optics aren’t as likely to make a gun print, especially with modern holsters that are cut for optics.
The third argument — that optics add cost — is one that I cannot argue. Running a red dot sight will almost certainly cost more than carrying a pistol with iron sights, but since so many companies cut their pistols for optics and there are so many red dot companies, it’s not as expensive to add an optic as it was a few years ago. Some optics are very affordable (Ruger’s Ready Dot — which does not require a battery — sells for about $100), and there are more and more gun companies offering pistols that come equipped with red dots. This lowers the cost of the optic and eliminates the hassle of mounting the red dot. Prices for red dot-equipped pistols are often less than what it costs to buy the sight and gun separately.
There’s a lot to love about pistol optics, and they do offer real advantages. Even if you aren’t a fan of optics on pistols, you must realize that a red dot on a handgun is not a fad and it’s not changing anytime soon. That, to my mind, is a good thing.
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