Things That Don’t Suck: Magpul Bipods

When Magpul first released the aptly named Magpul Bipod in mid-2018, I didn’t get the appeal. It appeared to be effectively all-polymer, and I tend to lean into my bipods and load them up fairly firmly. So I had doubts.

But then I got my hands on one, and my opinion changed 180 degrees. Magpul’s bipods most definitely do not suck.

When folded, you’ll find that the knurled tension knob is capped on the bottom with a rubber bumper. It’s designed to be used as a monopod when the scenario dictates. And it won’t scratch your hood. Simply turning the tension knob left or right loosens or tightens the bipod’s movement when deployed.

To deploy, just start the legs moving downwards — they don’t lock in the “up” position — and a spring takes over and whips them all the way into place, where they lock securely.

Pushing the button at the top of either leg unlocks them to be folded back up. A quick whack on the top of the legs and they’ll snap right down again.

Now that the legs are deployed, the bipod will tilt — lean left and right — as well as pan — swivel / rotate. With 50° of tilt available, you may never have to extend a single bipod leg again to compensate for shooting on a side-angled surface.

With 40° of pan, you can track a moving target or quickly transition between targets without having to shift the bipod’s feet. Or, as was the case on my last hog hunt, you can put both bipod feet in the window track of a hunting blind and load up the bipod effectively despite shooting at a sideways angle out of the window.

Thanks to the rapid-deploy legs, the tilting, and the panning, the Magpul bipod is as fast as it gets from sighting your target to putting lead downrange. After over a year using the Magpul units very regularly, I have yet to require screwing with the length of the legs or found myself in a situation where the bipod didn’t tilt or swivel into the exactly, flawlessly perfect position near-instantly. It’s so dang fast on a hunt.

For those who don’t want a panning bipod, one cool feature of the Magpul unit is that you can lock the pan at 0° while still maintaining tilt functionality. Or, if you crank down hard enough on the tension knob, it’ll behave like a fixed bipod. At every tension level from there down to full-on loose it moves smoothly and quietly.

Should you find yourself needing a little extra height, the legs do, of course, extend. An easy-to-use button on the rear of each leg unlocks it to slide down through seven adjustment notches, moving from 6.3 inches of height to 10.3 inches in half-inch increments.

On a side note (pun intended), with both legs collapsed to their shortest length I was able to balance that Pork Sword pistol in the images while pointed side-to-side on that same roof. The bipod had to be tilted as far as it would go, but that’s how much adjustment we’re talking about here, folks.

I could deploy the bipod, plop down, tilt the gun until it was level, and take my shot (I mean, were it a safe and legal place to shoot, obviously). No messing with leg length adjustments, whether collars or detents, until the gun got level-ish like I would have had to on many other setups. It’s super fast.

The staggered rubber feet in the Magpul Bipod can be removed by punching out a roll pin. And guess what? Most Atlas pattern bipod feet will fit in their place. So whether you want steel eagle claws or shiny spikes, you’re good to go.

Made primarily from steel and aluminum with Magpul’s famous polymer overmolded on top, these bipods have proven much stronger than I anticipated. While I’m sure if I loaded one up like a maniac it would break before the significantly larger, heavier, more expensive, slower-to-use, all-metal bipods like an Atlas, I just don’t care anymore.

The Magpul bipod has laughed off everything I’ve put it through, and I’ve broken a couple all-metal ones in the $50 to $125 price range.

The Magpul’s MSRP is only $109.95. Typical retail price, like on Black Collar Arms’ website because it was our obvious #1 suggestion for all-around use, is $99.99.

On top of that, the Magpul Bipod weighs only 11 ounces. Can you believe it? A ridiculous amount of functionality in one of the quickest-to-deploy-and-adjust bipods on the market, which weighs in at a scant 11 ounces and costs just a hundred bucks. It’s a hell of a thing.

Magpul makes their bipods in both Black and FDE, with four different mounting options available: direct to M-LOK (super sleek), Picatinny rail clamp, ARMS 17S compatible, and Sling Stud QD. That sling stud design is pretty cool, actually, as they’ve truly managed to make it a quick detach sort of a process that’s far easier and faster than anything else on the market designed to clamp to a sling swivel stud.

In one of the biggest reversals I’ve experienced from my initial assumptions to my as-tested, in-practice opinion, I can most assuredly state that the Magpul Bipod does not suck.

In fact, it’s definitely my favorite bipod on the market for general, hunting, range use, etc. Sure, a PRS setup or a true long-range precision rig will typically benefit from the ability to lock the legs in different positions at the cost of being slower, and will take increased strength at the cost of increased weight. But the straightforward little Magpul Bipod can hold its own in those scenarios and just crushes it otherwise. I’m a big fan.