Top 10 cameras released in 2020 | Articles | Photo, video, optics

Pho­to: pixabay.com

This year, not only updat­ed devices from pop­u­lar cam­era lines came out, but also com­plete­ly new orig­i­nal mod­els. Not sur­pris­ing­ly, mir­ror­less and full-frame cam­eras ruled the roost, a com­bi­na­tion that has become wild­ly pop­u­lar in 2020. There are also a lot of hybrid mod­els and sys­tem cam­eras aimed at video shoot­ing. Let’s not delay and tell you about the 10 (in fact — 11) best cam­eras of the year accord­ing to dpreview.com experts.

Best Full Frame Cam­eras

The best crop cam­eras

Best Full Frame Cameras

Canon EOS R5

Per­haps the most advanced mir­ror­less cam­era for pho­tog­ra­phy in 2020. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 329 thou­sand rubles.

Canon EOS R5 is one of the most pow­er­ful cam­eras on the mar­ket, suit­able for any genre of pho­tog­ra­phy. A 45MP sen­sor, 20fps burst shoot­ing with track­ing aut­o­fo­cus, built-in sta­bi­liza­tion, 8K video and a dual mem­o­ry card slot are just some of the high­lights of this full-frame mir­ror­less cam­era. She has already man­aged to gain huge pop­u­lar­i­ty among pro­fes­sion­al and advanced pho­tog­ra­phers, despite the high price.

But with video, the Canon EOS R5 has a clear prob­lem asso­ci­at­ed with over­heat­ing when work­ing at advanced set­tings (8K, 4K / 120p or 4K HQ). Any use of the cam­era before film­ing reduces the over­all record­ing time, mak­ing the whole process unpre­dictable. At low­er set­tings, there is no such prob­lem, but the video qual­i­ty in this case dif­fers lit­tle from that offered by com­pet­ing cam­eras.

In gen­er­al, this mod­el can be rec­om­mend­ed to advanced pho­tog­ra­phers for work in any genre, as well as to those who some­times make videos as an addi­tion to pho­tog­ra­phy. You can read more about the Canon EOS R5 in our review.

Canon EOS R6

The ver­sa­tile Canon EOS R6 quick­ly gained pop­u­lar­i­ty among pho­tog­ra­phers. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 196 thou­sand rubles.

A more bud­get-friend­ly ver­sion of Canon’s full-frame mir­ror­less is the EOS R6. This is a very easy to use cam­era with excel­lent aut­o­fo­cus, built-in sta­bi­liza­tion and fast con­tin­u­ous shoot­ing. Like the old­er (fifth) mod­el, R6 pro­vides excel­lent pho­to qual­i­ty, despite the matrix with half the res­o­lu­tion. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, this full-frame mir­ror­less cam­era inher­it­ed the R5’s over­heat­ing issue, although its video detail and aut­o­fo­cus are top notch. But there is anoth­er prob­lem that many users note — a pro­nounced rolling shut­ter effect.

The EOS R6 will suit all advanced pho­tog­ra­phers who don’t want to over­pay for a high res­o­lu­tion sen­sor. But it’s too ear­ly to rec­om­mend this mod­el as a hybrid pho­to and video cam­era: Canon must first solve the prob­lem with over­heat­ing. Read more about this mir­ror­less cam­era in our review.

Nikon Z6 II / Nikon Z7 II

Nikon Z6 II is equal­ly well suit­ed for both pho­tos and videos. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 160 thou­sand rubles. / from 239 thou­sand rubles

We decid­ed to arrange the sec­ond gen­er­a­tion of Nikon mir­ror­less cam­eras as a duo — the Z6 II and Z7 II were a rel­a­tive­ly small update to the already good mod­els of 2018. The Z7 II, with its 45.7‑megapixel sen­sor, costs between $500 and $900 less than oth­er full-frame, high-res­o­lu­tion mir­ror­less cam­eras, but it does­n’t come close. This is a great cam­era for land­scape, archi­tec­ture, pro­fes­sion­al food and adver­tis­ing pho­tog­ra­phy. Due to the fact that con­tin­u­ous 10 fps is avail­able on this mod­el only with spot aut­o­fo­cus, it is slight­ly less suit­ed for pro­fes­sion­al sports pho­tog­ra­phy, but it is impos­si­ble to say unequiv­o­cal­ly that the Z7 II will not be suit­able for shoot­ing fast-mov­ing objects.

The Z6 II is a hybrid cam­era that can han­dle just about any­thing with­out being specif­i­cal­ly tar­get­ed for high res­o­lu­tion or video. The Z6 II has effec­tive aut­o­fo­cus, though not as easy to use as the Sony or Canon mod­els. All in all, this is a ver­sa­tile hybrid cam­era for shoot­ing enthu­si­asts.

Read more about these cam­eras in our reviews: Nikon Z6 II and Nikon Z7 II.

Nikon Z5

In terms of price-qual­i­ty ratio, the Nikon Z5 has no com­peti­tors. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 98 thou­sand rubles.

The Nikon Z5’s 24-megapix­el image is only slight­ly behind those of the class lead­ers, while the design, build qual­i­ty and user-friend­ly con­trols are bor­rowed from the high-end Z‑series mod­els men­tioned above. The aut­o­fo­cus sys­tem is also top notch, with the cam­era reli­ably detect­ing and track­ing eyes and faces, which is handy for por­trait, street and social pho­tog­ra­phy.

In terms of video shoot­ing, the cam­era is not out­stand­ing: 4K res­o­lu­tion is only avail­able with a seri­ous 1.7x crop. On the oth­er hand, in Full HD, it shoots with­out crop and with excel­lent detail. Like many oth­er mod­els in this line, Z5 is equipped with built-in sta­bi­liza­tion, which is con­ve­nient for video shoot­ing.

If you’re look­ing for a rel­a­tive­ly afford­able full-frame still cam­era, the Z5, which you can read more about in our review, is a great option. How­ev­er, it should not be tak­en to work with fast-mov­ing objects: the max­i­mum burst speed is only 4.5 fps.

Panasonic Lumix DC-S5

Pana­son­ic Lumix DC-S5 is a direct com­peti­tor to Nikon Z6 II not only in terms of per­for­mance, but also in terms of cost. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 179 thou­sand rubles.

Anoth­er ver­sa­tile hybrid, equal­ly suit­able for both pho­to and video, was released in 2020 by Pana­son­ic — Lumix DC-S5.

This is a com­pact cam­era with built-in sta­bi­liza­tion, an opti­mal set of video tools and a spe­cial 96-megapix­el mode for cap­tur­ing super-detailed pho­tos. Among the short­com­ings of the mod­el: not very reli­able oper­a­tion of con­trast aut­o­fo­cus in video and a some­what out­dat­ed viewfind­er res­o­lu­tion of 2.36 mil­lion dots (com­pare with 3.69 mil­lion for Nikon Z5).

More about the pros and cons of the Pana­son­ic Lumix DC-S5 in our review.

Sony a7S III

Sony has released one of the best cam­eras for video­g­ra­phers in 2020. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 329 thou­sand rubles.

If you choose the main cam­era of the year for video­g­ra­phers, then one of the con­tenders for the title of the best will be the a7S III. In gen­er­al, it looks like a sort of “anti-R5”: instead of try­ing to do every­thing well, the cam­era from Sony shoots video very (!) Well. And even in this regard, she stakes on reli­a­bil­i­ty, not chas­ing 8K res­o­lu­tion or super-detailed 4K with over­sam­pling.

We talked about all the strengths and weak­ness­es of this cam­era in the FAQ and in com­par­i­son with oth­er mod­els. Although the Sony a7S III was con­ceived as a hybrid cam­era, it is unlike­ly that any of the pho­tog­ra­phers will be ready to pay more than 300 thou­sand rubles for a 12-megapix­el matrix (ide­al for video shoot­ing and low-light work). There­fore, the mod­el can be rec­om­mend­ed only to advanced video­g­ra­phers.

Sony a7C

The super-com­pact Sony a7C claims to be the best full-frame mir­ror­less cam­era for trav­el­ers. Pho­to: bhphotovideo.com

Price: from 149 thou­sand rubles.

The Sony a7C is a full-frame cam­era that man­ages not to sac­ri­fice func­tion­al­i­ty for the sake of size and weight. This mod­el not only has a pro­pri­etary tena­cious and con­ve­nient aut­o­fo­cus sys­tem, but also has built-in 5‑axis sta­bi­liza­tion. And the cam­era can take 740 shots on a sin­gle charge (accord­ing to the CIPA rat­ing), which makes it a class leader in this indi­ca­tor.

How­ev­er, the nov­el­ty also lacks short­com­ings. For pho­tog­ra­phers, such a minus will be, first of all, a small viewfind­er, through which it is not very con­ve­nient to frame pic­tures. In addi­tion, RAW files are either very large or lossy com­pressed. In video shoot­ing, the cam­era is some­what infe­ri­or to oth­er com­peti­tors from the new gen­er­a­tion of full-frame mir­ror­less (although its 4K video is quite sat­is­fac­to­ry for most users). And final­ly, unlike the lat­est Sony cam­eras, the a7C does­n’t have a very user-friend­ly con­fus­ing menu. You can read about oth­er char­ac­ter­is­tics of this mod­el in our review.

With­out a doubt, Sony a7C is suit­able for trav­el pho­tog­ra­phers, as well as every­one else — as an every­day cam­era that you can always take with you.

The best crop cameras

Fujifilm X‑T4

Fuji­film X‑T4 is the most advanced crop cam­era on the mar­ket in 2020. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 122 thou­sand rubles.

Round­ing out the streak of full-frame mir­ror­less cam­eras (yes, 2020 was tru­ly their year!) are a few excel­lent APS‑C mod­els from Fuji­film. The X‑T4 is one of the most expen­sive APS‑C cam­eras on the mar­ket, but also one of the most advanced. On the oth­er hand, it costs 70 thou­sand less than the same Canon EOS R6, although it pro­vides ample oppor­tu­ni­ties for pho­to and video shoot­ing. Of course, in some sit­u­a­tions (low light, for exam­ple) the X‑T4’s full-frame com­peti­tors will pro­vide bet­ter pic­ture qual­i­ty, but few can match this mod­el in terms of video shoot­ing and over­all ver­sa­til­i­ty.

Fuji­film cam­eras have very beau­ti­ful JPEG col­ors and the X‑T4 is no excep­tion. She shoots video in excel­lent qual­i­ty (4K / 60p) and has a built-in sta­bi­liza­tion sys­tem. The aut­o­fo­cus of the mod­el is at a very good lev­el, although it is infe­ri­or to its com­peti­tors from Sony.

Despite some short­com­ings (read more in the review), the Fuji­film X‑T4 is one of the best hybrid cam­eras to date, suit­able for any­one who shoots pho­tos and videos.

Fujifilm X100V

The Fuji­film X100V is a styl­ish retro cam­era with a clas­sic set of con­trols. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 105 thou­sand rubles.

This is def­i­nite­ly the best mod­el in its class — we recent­ly wrote about it in the top com­pact cam­eras. The built-in fixed focal length lens makes the X100V a niche mod­el. How­ev­er, the pic­ture qual­i­ty, which is obtained due to the ide­al com­bi­na­tion of “matrix — lens”, will not leave any­one indif­fer­ent. In addi­tion, the X100V fea­tures best-in-class video record­ing fea­tures such as 4K over­sam­pling (more details). The cam­era is equipped with micro­phone and head­phone jacks, but, unfor­tu­nate­ly, it does not have sta­bi­liza­tion.

This is a very handy “com­pact” for doc­u­men­tary, street pho­tog­ra­phy and videog­ra­phy, shoot­ing por­traits in the envi­ron­ment and trav­el. On the oth­er hand, fixed focal length impos­es its lim­i­ta­tions on shoot­ing sports, wildlife, and high-res­o­lu­tion land­scapes. Exam­ples of shots tak­en with the Fuji­film X100V can be seen in the review.

Fujifilm X‑S10

With the X‑S10, Fuji­film man­aged to com­bine the com­pact­ness of the X‑T30 with a com­fort­able grip. Pho­to: fotosklad.ru

Price: from 79 thou­sand rubles.

With the X‑S10, Fuji­film decid­ed not to rein­vent the wheel, but to com­bine com­po­nents that have proven to be reli­able and effec­tive, copy­ing them from their oth­er cam­eras. The result is a uni­ver­sal mid-bud­get mod­el in a com­pact body and with a com­fort­able grip.

Good pho­to qual­i­ty, strong video per­for­mance (com­bined with built-in sta­bi­liza­tion) and fast burst shoot­ing for action scenes make this mod­el suit­able for almost any task. The only con­di­tion­al weak­ness of the cam­era is not as advanced as com­pared to Sony devices, track­ing aut­o­fo­cus. This some­what lim­its the use of the X‑S10 in sports pho­tog­ra­phy. In gen­er­al, this cam­era is suit­able for pho­tog­ra­phy in a wide vari­ety of gen­res, includ­ing land­scapes and por­traits, as well as for reportage video.

You can read more about the X‑S10 in our review.