My buddy at the LGS has one set of each for sale at basically half price. He rearranged his inventory and had these as display units. Both are 10x42's.

If it weren't for Nikon's sales and customer service/warranty "waffling" the HG's would be a no brainer for me, as I really like this binocular. I'm not sure I can trust Nikon though, and that's the only issue. The Razor is not worth the retail price, but since these are $499 they seem like a best buy all of the sudden.

Which one would you choose and why? Thanks for your thoughts.

I would ask, do the Nikons have a bad rep ? Seems Vortex folks have to use their warranty's pretty often, or judging from what gets posted.

You might ask the mods to move this to the Optics section, it may? get more views over there.

I haven't heard anything bad about Nikon Monarch binos, most people have good things to say. I'm sure the Vortex are pretty nice as well and the Razor is high-level. But at stated you may need the Vortex warranty if you use these hard. I would worry that Nikon is dropping some of their sport optics and if that includes binos your Nikon warranty may be worthless if you ever need it.

Sounds like you like the HG more. None of us likes to lose money, but for the $ involved, if they died in 4-6-8 years would you be that upset that you had to replace them on your dime? If yes, buy the Vortex.

Be hard pressed to find a better bino and warranty at $499 then Razor

I’d take warranty over ergonomics.

Unless you step into the world Of ziess is swavrosvski I think vortex is hard to beat

This is totally unsolicited advice, but I bought the vortex viper 5000 HD with the rangefinder binoculars and have been very impress with them. May see if they have a demo model available for a better price.

If your a western hunter they really come in handy. I enjoy not having to switch between my 4x-6x rangefinder and my binos.

Real clear glass, very accurate ranges. It’s a winner in my book

They arent the Monarchs, but i have the Nikon Prostaff 7s binos i bought several years ago. I beat the ever living carp out of them, and they keep going strong. I keep hoping one of these days they'll finally bite the dust so i can upgrade, but they just flat out wont break. I've even dropped them a couple of times climbing out of tripod stands. Dust them off and they are good to go again.

I’d buy the razors first