There are two great budget-friendly options on the market right now if you want to get into high-quality digital night vision without spending thousands of dollars — and both come in under $300.

The NVG10 has dominated the low end of the digital night vision monocular market for the past year, while the (Amazon affiliate link) Nightfox Prowl was Nightfox's first-ever digital night vision monocular. Both deliver genuinely solid performance in low-light environments, as you can see in the footage below.

The Prowl is better suited for close-quarters situations thanks to its wider field of view, while the NVG10 clearly outperforms at mid-to-long range — making it the better choice for outdoor applications where detecting and observing at distance matters most.

The original Prowl's biggest weakness: noticeable lag, which was the main reason we hesitated to recommend it.

That's since been fixed. If you're deciding between these two, the Nightfox Prowl 2 ($249.99) is worth strong consideration over the original Prowl. It's built around a newer 60FPS IMX662 sensor that directly addresses the lag problem — the exact issue that held the original back — while keeping the Prowl's strength in close-quarters field of view (55° standard, up to 105° with the included fisheye lens). At roughly the same price as the original Prowl, there's little reason to choose the older model now that the Prowl 2 exists.

So the updated recommendation: if you want the widest field of view for close-quarters use without the lag issues that plagued the original, go with the Prowl 2. If mid-to-long range detection is your priority, the NVG10 remains the stronger pick.

There's another post with video comparing the Nightfox Prowl with the NVG30 and the NVG10 together, if you want to see how all three stack up side by side.