CanonNews / Wednesday, January 2, 2019

Rumor: Canon to release up to 7 RF lenses next year

A new rumor suggests that Canon will release up to 7 new RF lenses in the coming year.

This really is no great surprise, if we look into the past when the EF mount was released, we see that during the first 4 years, Canon released 33 lenses, nearly half of their current portfolio. The first full year, Canon released a dizzying amount of lenses, 12 with a good mix between primes and zoom. Canon also created a good mix between consumer lenses and L grade lenses over the first 4 years, something in which we fully expect Canon to do with the RF mount. Canon has made it pretty clear that IS STM lenses are the consumer lenses going forward for both the EF-M lineup and the EF / RF lineup. Expect many more RF IS STM lenses.

Canon will move quickly to move lenses from the EF mount to the RF mount. Some of them, such as the original 1987 EF lenses, may not be fully optimized for the mount, however, any design over 70-80mm will see hardly any benefit to a redesign from EF to RF mount. So those lenses may be very quick to re-do for the RF mount, adding new electronics for the control ring and RF required DLO data, but same optical formulae.

Canon rumors suggests:

Canon’s 2019 roadmap is not yet clear for us on the camera side of things, but the lens side of things seems to be coming into focus (I see what I did there).

Canon has said themselves that no new EF lenses would be coming in 2019, but we do expect at least one EF-M lens and a few new RF lenses. Canon mentioned at the EOS R announcement that they’re working a series of f/2.8 zoom lenses, which is likely the “holy trinity”.

We’re told that we can expect up to 7 new RF lenses being announced in 2019, though a few may not begin shipping until early 2020.

It should be a very interesting year coming up - and before we forget Happy New Year!