XS Sights

In GunPartPicker builds

• #55th most added iron sight set brand

Why XS Sights

XS Sights grew out of a 1996 idea from Ashley Emerson, and the Pastusek family runs it today in Fort Worth, Texas, where everything is made. Ruger, Smith & Wesson, Beretta and Colt have all shipped guns with XS sights.

It's known for the Big Dot: a .166 inch front dot with a tritium center over a V-notch rear. You put the dot on the target and press, which is fast up close. For ARs, the part to know is the tritium front post, steel with a vertical tritium stripe and a white outline.

The AR line adds the CSAT rear aperture, with a notch for a 7 yard zero and a small hole for 100 yards, sold with the tritium post for about $100. There are flip up tritium BUIS on Picatinny at about $318 a set, plus DXT2 and R3D pistol night sights.

XS iron sights cost about $120 against roughly $49 for the typical set, because most of them carry tritium. They're the fifth most added iron sights and the sixth most added front sight.

The trade-off is precision. A Big Dot is built for speed at close range, not small groups at distance, which is why XS also sells ghost rings. Tritium also fades with age, and the glow is warranted for 12 years.

We'd put an XS tritium front post on any rifle that might be used in the dark. Start with the post and CSAT rear set if your AR has a fixed front sight base.