Holosun unveiled its new Advanced Enclosed Micro Sight (AEMS) at this year’s Primary Arms Range Day, and product reps at the event described the rugged little optic as a “best of both worlds” between size, weight, and field of view.
The company has expanded beyond its initial lineup of products over the last few years to offer a variety of high-end options, and the AEMS fits neatly in that category. At $470-$505 MSRP, the AEMS ain’t cheap, but it comes with all the features we’ve come to expect from quality optics.
The AEMS features a 2 MOA dot reticle encompassed by a 65 MOA circle to allow for both precision work and snap shooting. The reticle can also be adjusted to show only the central dot, only the outer ring, or both the dot and outer ring.
The ShakeAwake feature turns the optic to the last brightness setting as soon as it’s moved (eight daylight, four night vision settings), and the 50,000 hours of battery life means you won’t have to change the CR2032 battery very often.
The AEMS is clearly designed for durability. The optic is rated to function between -30˚C and ~60˚C, can be submerged deeper than one meter (IPX8), and comes in a rugged, black anodized housing constructed from 7075 aluminum.
That housing features flip-up windows that can be flipped down for maximum clarity or kept up for greater protection. We didn’t notice any difference between viewing the reticle with the lens covers up or down. Those windows are also user-serviceable—if they break, the user can remove them and replace them using two simple screws.
The AEMS can be mounted directly onto a picatinny rail for a height of 1.02 inches above the rail. It also comes with a high-rise mount, which bumps that height up to 1.63 inches. Holosun’s footprint is proprietary, which means it can’t be used with any other company’s mounts.
The optic is obviously built like a tank, but it only weighs 3.9 ounces and measures 2.2×1.54×1.7 inches. The window size measures 0.87×1.1 inches, but the nearly square shape gives it a greater field of view than you might expect.
Holosun has not published field of view numbers on its website, and the product rep we spoke with couldn’t recall them at the event. But looking through the optic, it’s easy to see that the AEMS boasts a huge field of view for a reflex sight of this size. We had no trouble keeping the reticle on target while shooting full-auto with this IWI Galil.
That healthy field of view, combined with the optic’s durability, crisp reticle, and ease of use, should make the AEMS a strong contender for your next rifle optic.
Jordan
Thank you very much for the article, and being a second amendment supporter.
One thing though I really like the solar panels that HoloSun usually has on there optics and you didn’t happen to mention it this one has a solar panel or not?
Just a minor thing.
About Mark’s comment regarding firearms safety edict.
You were aiming over there heads technically and in a combat type situations where you are giving it to the bad guys firing over top of the good guy and girls to take out the bad guys and save the good girls and guys is a good thing.
Also a lot of people have never been to one of these try it out real quick try to take some good pictures and write up an evaluation on a product.
So the real deal is sometimes in the moments that you have, you have to do what you need to do to make it happen.
For example;
Your out fishing on a lake or a stream with some friends and or family in your all in bear country and your the only packing the defensive hardware, bears are bears and or bad people do what they do so there may be a time to have to make the life saving shot that isn’t the shot that you want to try to make, but it’s the quick on the money shot that you have to make with only an instant to make it happen.
Be prepared and confident in your self and your equipment to do the best that you can do with what you have available.
A sight like this from HoloSun could make all the difference, so I don’t care where it’s made just that it works out for the best in my families and friends favor.
Thanks again Jordan for your article, you’re support of our constitution and that you made this article happen.
If you click on the Click here to check it out feature you can see that it does have a little solar panel on it, my other HoloSun products with a solar panel have a setting to allow the brightness or dimness to be automatically adjusted by the amount of or lack of light hitting on the solar panel.
It’s mostly a good feature unless you’re in a dark building or area trying to sight in on something in the bright light and or sunlight, then the sighting system can be not as bright as you think that it should be, but it’s still there just not as bright as what you’re aiming at out in light.
Any which way it’s a good piece of kit and they can be adjusted for brightness manually.
As with anything the more practice or experience you get with things the more familiar and better you can become.
Protect the second amendment, never surrender or give up in a fight for your rights and liberties.
Jordan,
Thanks again for the article.
Unless that is photoshopped, there is a person’s head with baseball cap clearly visible in the lower portion of the optic. Pretty lax firearm safety at a sponsored event. Whatever happened to “never point the firearm at anything you are not willing to kill or destroy”, or “treat every firearm as if it was loaded”? Poor example to set for novices. Below GunsAmerica standards in my opinion.
It WASN’T mounted on a firearm.
If you look closely you will see he’s holding it with 2 fingers and its not mounted on a rifle.
I was there and can confirm it was not mounted on a firearm. It was being held up in the photographer’s hand, which is clearly visible in the photo.
The 4-5 folks downrange are either oblivious to a weapon being pointed their way or they are very trusting.
Looks like the sight isn’t on a gun based on the hand in the picture. Think it’s just a hand holding a sight for the photo
Holosun is China made. US or European sights please. There are plenty of other sight options just as good without buying from China.