InfiTac FMP13 Review: Thermal Offset for a Night Vision Rifle

The InfiTac FMP13 is a thermal sight shrunk to the size of a pistol red dot. A 256x192, 12-micron sensor with a 13mm F1.0 lens feeds a 1.4-inch display, and the reticle is drawn on that display: a 6 MOA dot, or the dot with a 65 MOA or 130 MOA circle. It sits on the standard RMR footprint, weighs 4 ounces or less, and ships with an RMR adapter plate. InfiTac sells it as a thermal pistol sight, and the case says so.

What it is not is a red dot. There is no daylight mode and no see-through window: everything you look at is the thermal image on the screen. That single fact decides where the FMP13 belongs on a gun, and it is why we ran ours as an offset rather than a primary optic.

In the box: the sight, the RMR plate, two CR2 batteries, a USB-C cable, two heated zeroing targets, a user manual, some InfiTac swag, and a hard case. It is larger than a Holosun 509T but still small enough to fit on a pistol. The FMP13 comes in black or FDE.

The InfiTac FMP13 is at its best as the thermal half of a lightweight night rifle. We mounted it on a Vector Optics 45-degree offset mount on a Noveske Gen 4 Ghetto Blaster, a 7.94 inch .300 Blackout SBR, alongside a Holosun red dot on a Unity FAST Micro mount. Each sight does one job. The tall 2.26-inch FAST puts the red dot where you can aim through it with night vision goggles on, so it handles movement and shooting under nods. The FMP13 handles scanning: roll the rifle 45 degrees and use thermal to pick up heat signatures while night vision handles movement.

That pairing is close to the ideal night vision setup on a short rifle. Our red dot is a Holosun HS503G with the ACSS CQB reticle; the current 503 pick in the same tube form factor is the Holosun HE503CU-GR, which fits the Aimpoint Micro footprint the Unity FAST takes. For how mount height and aiming lasers fit into a night vision rifle, see our AR-15 night vision setup guide, and the offset red dot mount guide ranks the 45-degree options that take an RMR-footprint sight like this one. You can also lay the same combination out in the rifle builder.

The best surprise was that we could see the red dot and the FMP13 screen from the same head position. The FMP13 display does not really have an eye box: it is a screen you look at, not an optic you look through, so you do not need to line your eye up behind it. With the sight canted on the offset, the screen stays readable from behind the red dot, and you can check the thermal picture without breaking your position on the primary sight.

The InfiTac FMP13 has a touchscreen, and it is the best part of using it. Menus are intuitive, and you zoom by swiping on the screen instead of cycling through button presses. Digital zoom runs from the 0.5x base to 1x and 2x, which is a little zoom, but enough to take a closer look at a heat signature. Two physical buttons back up the touchscreen.

The menu covers brightness with an auto brightness option, contrast, calibration, shake awake, power off, factory reset, and zeroing. Auto brightness is genuinely useful on a sight you look at in the dark, and shake awake (InfiTac calls the feature InstaWake) brings the unit up when the rifle moves. The four palettes are White Hot, Black Hot, Red Hot, and Rainbow.

You zero the InfiTac FMP13 on the screen, not with turrets. The zeroing menu moves the reticle in one-pixel steps on the X and Y axes, and the screen labels the step size as 1px@2MOA. InfiTac includes two heated zeroing targets, but we did not need them: a standard cardboard target showed up clearly enough in thermal to zero on.

A 256x192 sensor is low resolution by thermal standards, and on the FMP13 it does not matter much. The limiting factor is the 1.4-inch screen, and at that size a higher-resolution core would show you little extra. Given the form factor, the resolution is fine for what this sight does: find a heat signature at close to medium range and put a reticle on it. InfiTac lists detection at 740 yards and recognition at 110 yards.

For a sense of where a 256 core sits against larger thermals, the best thermal scope guide ranks full-size scopes by detection range, and the budget thermal and night vision guide covers the fused thermal red dots that take a different route to the same problem.

Battery life is the FMP13's biggest weakness. InfiTac rates it at up to 5 hours on a single CR2, and ours ran somewhat short of that. It is not unexpected from a thermal sensor and display packed into a pistol optic sized housing, and swapping the CR2 is quick. InfiTac includes two disposable CR2s, and the sight also takes rechargeable CR2 cells.

For longer sessions, a USB-C port runs the sight from an external battery pack. The pack powers the unit directly; it does not charge the internal CR2. On a rifle, the practical answer is simply carrying spare CR2s.

The FMP13 fits a pistol, but we would not put it on one. A pistol red dot that fails is still a window: you can look through it and use your iron sights. A dead FMP13 is an opaque box, so you cannot co-witness irons through it, and with a CR2 rated at up to 5 hours, a dead battery is a real possibility over a long night.

The same logic applies to using it as a rifle's primary optic. You could, but given the battery life we recommend it on an offset, where losing the thermal channel still leaves you a working red dot on top of the gun.

The InfiTac FMP13 does not compete with a full-size clip-on thermal like the SIG Echo CV25, and it is not meant to. The CV25 runs a 640x512 core behind a 25mm lens and clips on in front of your day optic, which gives it much more effective range. It is also a far bulkier unit and costs $4,499.99 against $699 for the FMP13.

Controls are where the FMP13 wins outright. Navigating the CV25 menu means a clunky dial and touchpad setup; on the FMP13 you tap and swipe to zoom, and it is far more intuitive. If you want to identify targets well past 100 yards, buy the clip-on. If you want a light, simple thermal on a short night rifle, the FMP13 is the better fit. Our clip-on thermal guide compares the CV25 with the rest of the clip-on field, and clip-on vs dedicated thermal scope walks through which format fits which rifle. If scanning matters more than aiming, a handheld from our thermal monocular guide is the other route.