Nocpix NITE Pro D50R: the dealer’s guide to the 8K day/night scope

The Nocpix NITE Pro D50R is a £999 digital day/night riflescope with an 8K detector and a laser rangefinder the customer can align to the reticle after zeroing, and it sits £200 above Nocpix’s own Nite D70R on the same shelf. In our test on muntjac and roe it gave superb low-light performance and clear identification to around 180m in the dark with an £80 850nm illuminator. For the dealer the pitch is simple: the customer gets more, but pays more, and at around 980g it is heavier than some rivals.

Digital day/night scopes have become a steady line for UK dealers because a single optic takes a customer from broad daylight, through dusk and, with an illuminator fitted, into complete darkness, which replaces two sales with one larger one. It is also a crowded category, so any newcomer needs to give the counter a clear reason to recommend it over the brands already in the cabinet.

Nocpix only moved into digital riflescopes this year, and with the NITE Pro D50R it appears to have thrown the kitchen sink at the category. Top of the specification is an 8K detector, which Nocpix bills as a world first for a digital riflescope, and the company is clearly keen to carve out a slot at the premium end of the range. What the trade needs to know is how it stacks up against the competition, and what a customer will ask about it.

At £999 the NITE Pro slips in just under the four-figure mark, but that still places it above some rivals, and £200 above the Nite D70R, so everything Nocpix has packed into it needs to be demonstrable at the counter.

What the test measured in the field

Nocpix NITE Pro D50R specification

Prices are RRP at the time of publication and may have changed.

Inside the NITE Pro: the specification the customer will quote back to you

The NITE Pro is built around an 8000×6000 detector running at 60Hz, which is where Nocpix’s 8K claim comes from, behind a 50mm F1.25 objective. Magnification runs from 3x to 36x and the field of view is quoted at 8.8°x7.4°, or 15.4x13m at 100m. The image lands on a 2560×2560 AMOLED display that Nocpix lists at 1.03in, with 60mm of eye relief, a 6mm exit pupil and dioptre adjustment from -4 to +4. A Light+ algorithm is said to lift performance as the light fades. Zeroing moves in 0.3 MOA clicks, and Nocpix quotes a one-second start-up, though in my hands it takes a little longer.

The Class 1 laser rangefinder is built into the objective bell and rated to 1,200m. It feeds an onboard ballistic calculator, and drop profiles are built in the Nocpix app, which pairs over Wi-Fi, before being sent to the scope.

Power comes from a 3,850mAh internal battery backed by a replaceable 18650, with a quoted runtime of at least six hours at 22°C. There is 64GB of onboard storage for stills and video, with microphone support, and the magnesium-alloy body is rated IP67, for use from -20°C to +50°C, and to withstand 7,000J of recoil, which covers every centrefire a stalking customer is likely to bring in. It weighs around 980g, measures 402x93x81mm, and the 30mm tube takes standard rings, so the mount sale is a conventional one. No illuminator is supplied, which leaves an IR torch and a dive board as the natural add-on sale.

Can you align the NITE Pro’s rangefinder with the reticle?

Yes – once the rifle is zeroed you can move the laser onto the centre of the reticle yourself, which answers a long-standing gripe with integrated rangefinders. The laser is aligned at the factory, but zeroing shifts the reticle, so the two rarely end up in the same place, and on some scopes the gap is wide enough for the laser’s aim point to disappear off screen at higher magnification. Here, once you have zeroed with your chosen load, you remove a cover on top of the objective bell, slot the supplied tool into the recess beneath and walk the laser onto the centre of the reticle.

I forgot to do it at the start of my test, which was a useful reminder of how irritating it is to aim off for a reading, and of how much the scope gains once the two are aligned. It is safer, and much faster, and it is the feature to show a customer who has owned a rangefinding scope before, because it answers the complaint they will already have.

Controls and handling: the Ace 2 layout with a central focus

Anyone who has handled Nocpix’s Ace 2 thermal will recognise much of the layout, which shortens the demonstration. The top turret carries the menu button, with a collar beneath for navigation. Because focus is handled centrally, with a removable plastic throw lever to help, the NITE Pro suits a left-handed customer as readily as a right-handed one. The USB-C port sits in the right-hand turret behind a rotating cover, while the left-hand turret houses the battery behind a screw-on cap rather than the sprung push-button lid of the Ace 2. Magnification is set on a traditional, stepless zoom ring with a small raised fin. In the field the central focus was quick and forgiving, and dividers between the power, photo/video and rangefinder buttons on top of the eyepiece mean you rarely press the wrong one. The menus are logical, so a new owner is never hunting for a setting, and the bellowed eyecup screws in and can be removed.

How good is the NITE Pro in daylight and low light?

Very good. The 8K detector gives a crisp daytime image and a beautifully clear reticle, and the low-light performance is superb, letting a stalker use every minute of legal light, which is the point a customer comparing it with a 4K scope will want proved. With deer stalking in mind, I wanted to see how the NITE Pro coped across a stalker’s day, so it went onto my 6.5 Creedmoor Bergara and, as with the other Nocpix kit I have tested recently, I settled into a familiar high seat in the hope of a muntjac or two.

Zeroing at 100m was made easier by that crisp image and reticle, which is becoming a Nocpix trait. Both help the shooter achieve a precise zero, the foundation of confidence in the field, and for me this is where the extra definition pays off and the 8K detector earns the premium.

I spent hours scanning every square inch in front of me, working through the magnification range, the settings and the image modes, which include “Auto”, “Day”, “Dusk”, “Moon” (night), “Yellow” and “Green”. My rifle wears a 24in barrel and a fairly large moderator, and I know a scope has a low base magnification and a wide field of view when I can see the moderator, blurred, at the bottom of the picture, as I could here. Field of view matters to me because I shoot a lot of muntjac at close range in woodland, usually picked up first through a thermal monocular or a multi-spectrum binocular. They rarely give you more than a fleeting moment, so anything that slows the move from thermal to scope costs you the shot. Close work is no problem either: it would focus down to around 1m, which is remarkable.

In daylight the rangefinder, which proved accurate and easy to use, put a pheasant lurking in the shadow of a hedge to my left at over 400m, and with the magnification wound to 36x I could identify it as a cock bird. The roe does came out in force, seemingly aware they were off the menu, and I spent much of my stint watching them, with detail and colour still showing as the light went. As so often with digital optics, I used “Day” mode with my own brightness and contrast settings to get the most from the image.

Which image mode to use as the light fades

Cleverly, in “Day” mode the NITE Pro changes its processing at 12x to deliver a sharper picture. As the light goes, that step comes with a noticeable drop in brightness, but switch to “Dusk” or “Moon” and the drop does not happen, so it is simply a matter of picking the right mode for the light you have.

The same scene a minute apart in four of the NITE Pro’s image modes. As dusk arrives, just pick your mode

How far can a customer expect to identify deer at night with the NITE Pro?

With an 850nm illuminator costing around £80, I would put clear identification at around 180m, which is the honest figure to give across the counter. Animals are visible well beyond that, but I picked out hares among rabbits at 170 to 180m and could tell a muntjac was a doe at 140m without difficulty. As always, the illuminator makes a big difference, and I found myself fine-tuning its brightness regularly to get the best from the image, so the torch sold alongside it matters.

NITE Pro D50R or Nite D70R: which Nocpix day/night scope to recommend

The NITE Pro costs £200 more than Nocpix’s other digital day/night scope, the Nite D70R, and the extra buys a higher-resolution detector, a lower starting magnification with a wider field of view, a much closer minimum focus and a lighter body. The D70R keeps the sprung push-button battery lid that the NITE Pro swaps for a screw-on cap. The customer who shoots at distance in open country may lose nothing with the D70R; the woodland stalker working close is the one the NITE Pro’s 3x and 1m minimum focus are for. The figures below come from our own tests of both scopes.

Which customer the NITE Pro suits, and which one to steer elsewhere

Recommend it if the customer

• stalks deer and wants the daylight image as close to a traditional scope as digital currently gets
• shoots muntjac at close range in woodland, where the wide field of view at 3x and the 1m minimum focus count
• ranges a lot of shots and wants the rangefinder lined up with the reticle

Steer them elsewhere if

• budget matters more than the extra resolution: the Nite D70R carries a 1,200m rangefinder too, for £200 less
• weight is their priority, at around 980g
• they expect an illuminator in the box, as none is supplied, which is the add-on sale to raise before they leave

Nocpix NITE Pro D50R strengths and weaknesses

Strengths

• Excellent build quality
• Crisp 8K daytime image and a beautifully clear reticle for a precise zero
• Laser rangefinder can be aligned with the reticle after zeroing
• Central, ambidextrous focus and a traditional zoom ring
• Superb low-light performance
• Wide field of view at 3x, and focuses down to around 1m
• Battery goes in either way round

Weaknesses

• Screw-on battery cap makes battery changes a bit of a fiddle
• No spring-loaded objective cover
• Zoom is a touch slow to respond
• Zeroing profiles cannot be permanently named in the app
• At around 980g, heavier than some rivals
• No IR illuminator supplied

Verdict: more resolution and more control, at a higher price point

Nocpix has clearly thrown everything it has at the NITE Pro. Build quality is excellent, the 8K detector packs in all the resolution the format allows, and the company appears to have listened to shooters, with central, ambidextrous focus, a traditional zoom collar and a built-in rangefinder that let it handle like a conventional scope. Regular software updates suggest it is still listening, which matters to a dealer standing behind the sale. After five hours of continuous use I have no doubt the battery will meet most customers’ needs. The app did its job, with a few quirks, and above all it is a thoroughly enjoyable scope to use, which is what brings a customer back for the next one.

The niggles are minor. I am not sure why Nocpix swapped the Ace 2’s quick push-button battery lid for a screw-on cap, which is more secure, perhaps, but turns a battery change into a bit of a fiddle. On the plus side, the battery goes in either way round, a real bonus in the pitch black. A spring-loaded objective cover would speed things up in the field, and the zoom is a touch slow to respond, though that is common to digital scopes. I also could not permanently name my zeroing profiles in the app, which a future update will hopefully fix.

So, where does it sit in the cabinet? Nocpix has made it simple: the customer gets more, but pays more, and the counter’s job is to find out which of the two Nocpix scopes their shooting actually needs. For me, any digital scope that brings the daylight image closer to a traditional riflescope’s is the direction the category is heading, and the one worth stocking.

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