Best LPVO for $100 or Less?

Whether you’re looking for something to throw on your airsoft gun, a range plinker, or you’re just really on a budget, you’re not alone in wondering what the best LPVO for $100 and under is.

Today, I have two champions of this category, VisionKing and Feyachi, and I intend on comparing the two to help you decide which is right for you.

To start, some basic info on both of LPVOs in question. The VisionKing is a 1.25–5x LPVO with an illuminated reticle in a 30mm tube. The Feyachi is a 1–4x LPVO with an illuminated reticle in a 30mm tube. Both scopes are in the $100 or less range, and both are regarded as very good options for the price.

I will be directly comparing the Reticle/Illumination, Eye Relief, and Focus/Parallax of these two scopes in order to determine which provides the most value.

TL;DR of it is the Feyachi edges out in eye relief, but the rest is personal preference. Continue reading to see specifics and how I came to this conclusion.

Some initial differences I noticed when looking at the two side by side:

• The VisionKing is slightly longer than the Feyachi
• Illumination controls for the Feyachi are in line with the windage and elevation adjustment knobs, where the VisionKing has it before the magnification wheel
• The Feyachi illumination is only red, with 11 brightness options, where the VisionKing is red and blue, with 5 brightness options each
• The VisionKing uses a Three-Pin reticle, where the Feyachi uses a Starburst reticle
• The VisionKing comes with a honeycomb kill flash, where the Feyachi does not

Reticle/Illumination

Sticking with the reticles and illumination for now, I wanted to see how the two directly compared. Between both reticles, only the center illuminates (all of the starburst, and the center circle of the three-pin). The lines/pins of the three-pin reticle remain black when the illumination is in use.

At the Feyachi’s lowest illumination setting, the reticle does not appear illuminated in daytime outdoors settings, is barely illuminated in light indoor settings, and is clearly illuminated in dark indoor settings. The VisionKing’s lowest setting (for both red and blue) is barely illuminated in daytime outdoor settings, but is clearly illuminated in both light and dark indoor settings. While the illumination is brighter on the VisionKing, there is a noticeable circle of faded light around the illuminated reticle that is visible in dark environments.

At the Feyachi’s highest illumination setting, the reticle is till dimly illuminated in bright outdoor environments, but is clearly illuminated in all other environments with precise lines and no bleed through of faded light. At the VisionKing’s highest illumination setting, the reticle illumination is brighter than the Feyachi in all environments, but the aforementioned circle of light becomes visible in brighter indoor settings and is obscuring in dark indoor settings.

As for the illumination dials themselves, I found that the location of the Feyachi dial was more convenient for adjusting on the fly. Being in line with the windage and elevation adjustments, it was easy to reach and I had plenty of space to use it. With the VisionKing, however, I felt myself fighting with the lens cover for access. It makes direct contact with the dial when flipped up and obstructed my view of it from behind the scope, which made the adjustment process a bit annoying for me. If you’re like me and see this as an issue, I would recommend either rotating the rear lens cover clockwise or remove it altogether when in use.

Reticle/Illumination Conclusions

When it comes to my thoughts on the reticle/illumination of these scopes, I think it ultimately comes down to the user’s personal preference. What some may see as a flaw, others may think of as a feature or irrelevant to them.

For example, while the VisionKing’s illumination suffers from bleed through issues, you’ll likely only notice it if you’re indoors or playing night games. Another example is that if you don’t care for illumination at all, the Feyachi being dimmer in bright outdoor settings and the VisionKing’s bleed through won’t be determining factors in your decision.

So while illumination clarity may be a make or break issue for some, others may not care for it or won’t experience that issue with their respective play style or typical environment.

Ultimately, illumination dial placement, color/intensity options, and the reticle pattern can all be chalked up to what you personally prefer to have. If you want blue illumination or a three-pin reticle, go VisionKing. If you want a starburst reticle or prefer sharper illumination, go Feyachi. If none of that matters to you? Keep reading.

Eye Relief

Eye relief is one of my personal pet peeves with budget optics, and why I prefer LPVOs over magnifiers. Most of the time, at least in my experience, it’s not great. VisionKing advertises eye relief of 4.3–3 inches, and Feyachi advertises eye relief of 4.13–3.93 inches. On paper, you would assume that this means that the VisionKing has better eye relief. But my hand testing tells a different story.

It must be said (for those who may not know) that eye relief gets worse the more zoomed in a scope is. Where the VisionKing and Feyachi LPVOs have different minimum and maximum magnifications, I have to find common ground to accurately compare the two.

Where the VisionKing’s lowest magnification is 1.25x, I matched that with the Feyachi and measured how far back I could go until the reticle was no longer taking up the entire sight picture (no black circles or view getting smaller). For simplicity sake, we are going to call this distance “effective eye relief” for now.

Yes, you can still see the reticle past these effective eye relief distances, but I believe that measuring the distance where there is no interference in the entire sight picture is a good metric for comparison. I will be measuring this distance with a measuring tape, from my eye to the closest edge of the eyepiece.

My testing at 1.25x resulted with the Feyachi having an effective eye relief of ~7 inches from my eye. Doing this same test with the VisionKing gave me an effective eye relief of ~5.5 inches. Adjusting each optic to 4x, the Feyachi had an effective eye relief of ~5.25 inches, while the VisionKing had an effective eye relief of ~4.5 inches.

While this is how they compare at their mutually shared peaks, it is also important to note that I measured Feyachi’s 1x effective eye relief to be ~7.5 inches and the VisionKing’s 5x effective eye relief to be ~4 inches.

Where both scopes are marketed as “long eye relief” optics, I also want to introduce the term “max distance” into the equation, meaning the distance at which only 50% of what you can see on the ocular lens is what the objective lens can see (aka: too much black, can’t effectively use the scope if it’s any further from your eye).

For the Feyachi’s max distances, I got ~16 inches on 1x, ~12 inches on 1.25x, and ~6 inches on 4x.

For the VisionKing’s max distances, I got ~8.5 inches on 1.25x, ~5.5 inches on 4x, and ~5 inches on 5x.

Eye Relief Conclusions

If you’re looking for an objective winner in this category, it would be the Feyachi. While the VisionKing’s effective eye relief range is a respectable ~5.5–4 inches, and would likely still beat out many other LPVOs in its price range, the Feyachi has an effective eye relief range of ~7–5.25 inches. My testing showed that not only does the Feyachi have better eye relief when matching magnifications, but at the Feyachi's most zoomed in point it has almost as much effective eye relief as the VisionKing’s least zoomed in point.

I do want to reiterate that both optics have good practical eye relief distances, and depending on how close you mount your optics, you may not notice a difference when they are in use on your setup. But if you keep your scope a fair distance from your eye, you have more room to breath with the Feyachi.

Focus/Parallax

I’m going to be completely honest here, I’m not an expert on parallax or testing for it. But after some googling and watching way too many videos on focus and parallax adjustment, I will do my best to give an accurate comparison.

In my search for more information on LPVO parallax adjustment I discovered that since both scopes are low power variable optics, neither have a dedicated parallax adjustment knob. When it comes to low power scopes, the diopter (focus ring on the eye piece) is the only adjustment you have, which focuses the reticle to your eye.

If you’re looking at the amazon listings I linked to above, the diopter adjustment range on the Feyachi is +2/-2, where the VisionKing’s range is ~+2.2/-2.2 (listed as parallax on the VisionKing spec sheet). Everyone’s eyes are different, so my reticle focus point may not be the same as yours, but I was able to easily set the focus on both scopes.

The Feyachi is listed to have a fixed parallax adjustment set to 100 yards, and while the VisionKing doesn’t have a listed fixed adjustment distance, in testing the parallax between the two scopes at different ranges I was getting very similar results throughout. This leads me to believe that the VisionKing is also fixed to 100 yards, or close to it.

Focus/Parallax Conclusions

If we take the VisionKing’s approximate range as definitive, it would technically have a wider focus adjustment range than the Feyachi on paper. In practice, however, I found the focus to be easy to set on both scopes and the parallax to be practically identical at various ranges.

To me, this stat is negligible when comparing the two, as they might as well be the same based on my testing.

Which Is Right For You?

If you aren’t particularly partial to a three-pin reticle or being able to light it up blue, my personal opinion is that the Feyachi is the better LPVO. There are no bleed through issues with the illumination in dark situations and the eye relief is better.

I will give one note in support of VisionKing, however. If you’re an airsofter who finds themselves getting their optics shot out frequently, a kill flash can act as a soft barrier that a BB will have to break through first before damaging the glass. The honeycomb pattern on the supplied one is on the larger side, but it comes with the scope and is better than not having it at all.

Whichever one you buy, you’ll most likely have a good time with it. Just remember that neither optic comes with scope rings, so pick up a pair of 30mm (NOT 1 inch) scope rings or a mount when you buy it!