Optic Review: Atibal X 1-10×30 FFP Scope

I first got my hands on an Atibal X in late 2018, a few months before they were publicly announced. A 1-10x zoom LPVO (low power variable optic) at a reasonable price? Heck yes. That’s a combo I simply had to try out, and I immediately put the X to use.

Within six months my Atibal X 1-10×30 FFP had been on multiple ARs and bolt guns. It found a perfect home on a prototype Black Collar Arms Pork Sword and took a nice axis deer at 195 yards.

Last year my X found itself on a 375 Raptor Pork Sword SBR where it took out two running hogs at about 30 yards. They surprised me when I spooked a sounder of ’em while stalking through brushy Texas woods and they suddenly popped up and took off.

And this is precisely why an LPVO is so darn cool.

When I took that 195-yard-distant axis deer shooting off a bipod rested on the roof of a pickup, I had the X cranked up to 10x zoom. Seen above is a cell phone shot of this very scenario; that’s two juvenile axis at about 210 yards and the Atibal X at full zoom.

When I took those two feral hogs, I could only see as far as about 30-ish yards through that brushy woods and, stalking on foot, knew if I was going to take a shot it was going to be in-close. I had the X dialed down to 1x — no zoom at all — with the reticle illuminated (the reticle illumination is off in the photo above, but when on it lights up only the center ring and dot) so I could shoot both eyes open.

Basically, I was using the X exactly like a red dot optic. And it worked. Looking through and shooting through scraggly brush at pigs running across my field of vision just 25 to 30 yards away would not have been possible with much of any zoom at all. Even at 2x zoom it almost certainly would have been too slow with too much visual interference from the brush between me and the hogs.

Moving from 1x to 10x is exactly as easy as you’d expect. Simply grab the zoom dial — there’s a nice, big slab of aluminum to help — and rotate it around from 1x on the right side to 10x on the left side. Or anywhere in-between.

The X’s zoom ring moves smoothly. It’s firm enough to prevent accidental adjustment, but easy enough to be fast.

A MIL reticle allows for easy holdovers. When I took that 195-yard axis I didn’t dial, I simply held about 0.8 MIL high. If that shot were an inch in any direction it would have been a worse shot.

With a first focal plane reticle like this (and info on Atibal’s X V2 reticle is coming up below) I’m not one to dial for elevation or windage. I’m gonna just use the reticle tape and hold appropriately.

But I still need to zero the optic, of course, and the X has nicely-machined, locking turrets for windage and elevation adjustment. Pull them away from the scope to unlock and adjust, then push them back in to lock ’em down.

Each click provides 0.1 MIL of adjustment and the turrets can be reset to zero after you have the scope dialed in for your gun. Clicks are fairly crisp, clean, and audible. Mechanically the scope appears to be rock solid.

The left-side turret houses the CR2032 battery and rotates to provide six levels of reticle illumination with an “off” setting between each. I like scopes with an “off” between each “on,” as it means I’m only a single click away from my most-used two brightness settings.

Parallax is set at 100 yards. With a 10x zoom this is acceptable and works better than I would have expected for shooting at full zoom from 25 to about 800 yards.

Needless to say, the Atibal X 1-10×30 FFP is a great fit for a competition or self-defense sort of firearm. The ability to shoot both-eyes-open, no zoom, illuminated reticle and just treat the thing like a red dot is really fast and effective. Then quickly crank it up to 10x (or find a sweet spot somewhere in-between) and engage targets out to many hundreds of yards.

Each X comes with a handful of accessories included in the box. Normal stuff like a lens cleaning cloth, battery, tool, etc., but also some components that are often sold separately like the kill-flash insert seen above. Simply thread it onto the front of the X to reduce reflections off your objective lens.

A sun shade is also included and, like the kill-flash, threads into the front of the optic. Yes, you can run both of these accessories simultaneously.

So after a couple of years happily shooting the X on all sorts of guns in all sorts of environments in four different states . . .

I got another one. This is the Atibal X 1-10×30 FFP Platinum. It has an anodized platinum grey finish with Atibal’s new XV2 reticle.

Aside from simply desiring a second X so I could keep one in low-mount rings for bolt gun use and one in an AR-height mount for AR use, I really wanted to try the XV2 reticle.

As you can see above, when it’s at 1x zoom it creates a circular center reticle, which is illuminated along with the crosshair in the middle. Then, at 10x zoom, the circle isn’t visible and you’re left with the center crosshair and a full-on Christmas tree underneath.

Above the reticle is a small tape for measuring distance to your target, and below the reticle is the aforementioned Christmas tree. This makes simultaneously holding for range and wind accurate and easy. I love these setups.

Here she is at 1x.

And at 10x.

Yes, I chose an absolutely horrible background for this. The spotty black rocks make seeing the reticle in these cell phone photos extremely difficult. Apologies. I didn’t realize it when I was taking the photos because it looked totally fine to my eye.

1x with the reticle fully illuminated. Again, yeah, it does not look as bright in this photo than it does in real life. But the fact that you can clearly see the glowing red ring despite this photo having been taken in full Texas sun at 2:00 PM speaks volumes.

It’s extremely rare for an LPVO to legitimately have a daylight-bright reticle, and the X does. It isn’t as bright as a red dot, but it’s bright enough to catch your eye and, on a dark color background, it pops strongly.

Here she is illuminated and at 10x zoom on the same mistake of a background.

If you’re comparing the 1x and 10x, note that the gun hasn’t moved — the reticle is focused on precisely the same spot in all of the no-zoom and full-zoom photos.

In some lights the X Platinum looks grey, in some a little green-ish grey, in some a little blue-ish, in some it’s darker or flatter. In the full sun it was slightly green-blue-ish grey, but far more green-blue to my camera than it was to me. It’s more of a normal grey in person.

I’ve had zero issues with my Xs after lots of use and lots of trips. I’ve re-zeroed my first X on dozens of guns and fired it on everything from .223 to .458 SOCOM and 375 Raptor. It has banged around in cars and trucks and been checked on airplanes at least eight times. Still going 100%.

At 1x the glass is fantastic. At 10x I lose a little bit of brightness and clarity, but it’s nothing I’d complain about given the price point and awesome utility of this large zoom ratio. If the zoom lever stopped at the 8x point I’d be raving about the quality of the glass for a Chinese-manufactured optic, but squeezing the last bit of magnification out of it comes at a very slight cost.

Considering I’ve hunted and shot at dusk multiple times with my X at 10x and engaged targets past 600 yards with it on an overcast day and had no problems whatsoever in any of those cases, it’s fair to say that the glass is plenty clear and bright enough.

I’m a big fan of the Atibal X, and I actively suggest it to anyone searching for a solid LPVO for under $750. I realize an appearance of conflict of interest may exist here because I sell the Atibal X on the Black Collar Arms website, but the truth is that we only sell it because I’m so darn happy with the scope. When we decided to add optics to the site I had already been using the X regularly for about a year, and it was a no-brainer choice for our suggested LPVO.

Clearly this review was long overdue! After over two years with the Atibal X (and now especially with XV2 reticle) it remains one of my favorite all-around optics.

SPECIFICATIONS: Atibal X 1-10×30 FFP

Magnification: 1-10x
Focal Plane: First (also available in second focal plane SFP)
Length: 10 inches
Objective Lens Diameter: 30mm
Eye Relief: 3.6 to 6.5 inches
Field of View: 101 feet at 1x, 10.1 feet at 10x
Tube Size: 35mm
Adjustment Per Click: 1/10 MIL
Horizontal Adjustment Range: 52 MIL
Vertical Adjustment Range: 54 MIL
Weight: 21.1 ounces
Warranty: Lifetime
MSRP: $799.99 ($679.99 at Black Collar Arms which, yes, I co-own. We don’t stock the other versions of the X but we’re happy to get them for you. MSRP on the SFP flavor is $719.99)

Rating (out of five stars):

Overall  * * * *
Though the tube diameter was apparently a critical aspect of getting that full 1-10x zoom ratio, I gotta say it’s a lot more difficult to find rings and mounts for a 35mm tube than a 34mm tube. Between that and the slight loss of the otherwise-excellent clarity and brightness of the image when the X is at full 10x magnification, I can’t quite give the X a five-star rating. However, the X is still one of my absolute favorite LPVOs on the market and at a going rate of $680 it’s a darn great deal for the awesome utility and performance it provides.