Windowed Magazine Collection

The first time I saw Ding Chavez on the cover of Rainbow Six 3, I was intrigued by his gun. He's holding an H&K G36 C, with dual translucent magazines. Those mags caught my eye, and looked so far and beyond the metal STANAG mags in most black rifles.

Over the years I have only grown in my obsession with clear mags, and, when I got into black rifles around 2010, I found something else to be obsessed with. The windowed magazine.

By this time I had become a total Magpul fanboy, and I was watching their Dynamics Dvds on a consistent basis. There was so much new stuff in those videos, from the BAD lever, ASAP sling mount, PMAGs, grips and so on, but when I saw the windowed PMAGs, I knew I needed some.


After watching ammo get sucked up into Chris and Travis' rifles, I bought everything my local store had, these two 30 round M2 windowed mags and a standard 20 round PMAG. These are my oldest mags, and have seen a lot of use and even years of storage with no issues. I'm still impressed by their durability and ingenuity, with the spring being marked to give the shooter an actual round count.

I've always been into different things, having everything the same as other people bores me. Yes, I've got stacks of GI and PMAGs, and other mfgrs, but I love seeing a different mag in my gun. Something with style, personality.


I managed to snag a pair of Magpul EMAGs recently, and I love them. They are an almost GEN 2.5, in the sense that they keep a lot of the M2's characteristics, but they have over insertion stops like the newer M3 mags. Their defining feature is that there are no features, no ribs like on normal PMAGs. Subtle and sexy.

Even with the panic buying of 2020, I still found a decent price on this Hera Arms H3 Gen2 mag, $10 at a local store. I love the way the mag looks different and cool. The polymer window has ridges that look a little thick and syrupy up close, and there are drain holes in the spine. It looks cool, not sure how it'll hold up. Might just be a Gucci photo mag. We'll see.

Lastly, a good old M3 windowed PMAG in FDE. I have quite a few M3's, but none windowed, so when I found this in a nearby store for $15 during the panic, I had to get it. Windows are sexy. FDE is sexy, it just looks good all around.

Do you guys use windows or clear mags? Why or why not?  Let us know in the comments and I'll see you next time.

Until then, stay accurate.