Red Dot Sight

An LED shines onto a coated lens that reflects the dot back to the shooter's eye while letting ambient light pass through, so the sight picture stays a simple, unmagnified view of the target with a dot overlaid on top rather than a traditional scope's tunnel view.

Because there's no magnification to manage, target acquisition is fast and works naturally with both eyes open, which is why red dots dominate CQB and general-purpose builds. They pair well with a magnifier flipped in behind them for guns that need to cover both close and mid-range engagements without swapping optics.

Battery life varies enormously between models — some run for tens of thousands of hours on a single coin cell, others need frequent changes — which is worth checking before a purchase rather than discovering mid-season that a favourite optic drinks batteries.