As I was updating one of the pages deeper in this site, and I updated a table:
This table is for full frame lenses in the three primary mirrorless mounts. A long perusal of the table tells us that each of the makers has a bit different priority. If I had to characterize this, I'd say that Canon has emphasized telephoto offerings, while Sony has not (Nikon is somewhere in between).
Sony is very strong in the 14-135mm prime range, often with multiple offerings at a focal length, and a lot of those lenses with G and GM ratings (their top lens lines). Curiously, Canon seems weak in that range, with Nikon being the second strongest.
But the headline on this article is "where is Nikon still weak with full frame?" It seems to me that we can call out several key weak points:
- Wide primes. No 14mm, no 16mm, no 18mm. Both Canon and Sony have an offering below 20mm, Nikon doesn't.
- Moderate telephoto primes. 85mm seems to be the top of the Nikkor prime line, at least outside of the specialty 105mm Micro-Nikkor. A fast 105mm (f/1.2) and 135mm (f/1.8) seem to be missing, and Sony already has one such offering.
- Wide angle zoom options. The Nikon line has 14-24mm or 14-30mm options only. 14mm is a little on long side, while 24mm and 30mm are a little on the short side. A 10-24mm and 16-35mm seem to be missing. The former is more landscape/architectural, the latter is more event focused. And the 8-15mm is still just an F-mount lens that has nothing close to equivalent on the Z-mount.
- Slower telephoto options. The key missing telephotos for Nikon are a 70-200mm f/4 and a 70-300mm f/4-5.6. The 200-600mm is also overdue and absolutely necessary to compete against Sony, who has a really good option there.
Beyond that we get into very narrow speciality lenses that are missing:
- Tilt/Shift. The rumors of an automated Canon T/S lens for the RF mount (autofocus, auto compensating) are intriguing. Can Nikon get to the same point?
- Long macro. Nikon used to own the macro business, and particularly the long macro business. Today, not so much. Personally, I'd love to see the return of the long macro zoom (the old 70-180mm f/4.5-5.6 rethought out). But anything greater than 150mm would be welcome.
- The Z-conversion of a few exotics. The 120-300mm f/2.8 and 180-400mm f/4 are the two F-mount lenses that are conspicuously missing in the mirrorless world. Both are exceptionally good, and both are reasonable fits with everything else Nikon has been doing in the Z mount.
