It has been more than 60 years since Nikon introduced the Nikon F mount on its first SLR film camera, the “Nikon F“. Since then, Nikon has made over 100 million lenses for this mount without changing any of the physical dimensions, primarily for the purpose of keeping lenses compatible between different cameras, whether film or digital. With its full-frame mirrorless system, Nikon introduced a brand new “Nikon Z” mount, which is quite different when compared to the Nikon F mount. First, it is larger in its diameter, which offers a number of important benefits pointed out below. Second, due to a much shorter flange distance (thanks to lack of the mirror mechanism), it has opened up many more opportunities for new types of lenses that we have never seen before.
Let’s take a look at the benefits of the new Nikon Z mount in detail and compare it to other popular mounts, sorted by throat diameter:
| Description | Throat Diameter | Inner Diameter | Flange Distance | Format |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leica M | 40.0mm | 44.0mm | 27.8mm | Full Frame |
| Fujifilm X | 41.5mm | 44.0mm | 17.7mm | APS-C |
| Minolta SR | 42.0mm | 45.0mm | 43.5mm | Full Frame |
| Sony E | 43.6mm | 46.1mm | 18.0mm | Full Frame |
| Nikon F | 44.0mm | 47.0mm | 46.5mm | Full Frame |
| Pentax K | 44.0mm | 48.0mm | 45.5mm | Full Frame |
| Leica L | 48.8mm | 51.0mm | 20.0mm | Full Frame |
| Canon EF | 50.6mm | 54.0mm | 44.0mm | Full Frame |
| Canon RF | 50.6mm | 54.0mm | 20.0mm | Full Frame |
| Nikon Z | 52.0mm | 55.0mm | 16.0mm | Full Frame |
| Fujifilm G | 62.5mm | 65.0mm | 26.7mm | Medium Format |
As you can see, the new Nikon Z is larger in diameter than all other current 35mm mounts, whether DSLR or mirrorless. The Fujifilm G is the only medium format system in the above table, provided purely for comparison. While some rumors indicated that the Nikon Z mount is almost as large as the Fujifilm G, just looking at the size of the image sensor itself compared to the mount size shows that the Nikon Z mount is only designed to accommodate full-frame sensors – it will not be able to physically fit a medium format sensor.
Nikon Z Mount Benefits
If we take a look at the size differences between the new Nikon Z mount and the Nikon F mount, we can clearly see the size differences between the two. Nikon increased the throat size from 44mm on the Nikon F to 52mm on the Nikon Z. To visualize this, take a look at the comparison of the Nikon Z7 camera vs the Nikon D850:
As you can see, while the Nikon Z7 mirrorless camera is smaller in physical size when compared to the Nikon D850, its mount diameter is visibly larger. Nikon changed quite a few things with the new Z mount. There are now 4 screws to hold the mount instead of 5, and the number of lens contacts has increased from 8 to 11 as well. Interestingly, there are now a total of 4 metal ridges that hold the lens, which means that attached lenses should stay more securely on the Nikon Z compared to Nikon F. This is probably why Nikon also moved the mounting white dot up as well.
So what are the benefits of the new Nikon Z mount? The larger mount opens up more opportunities when compared to the Nikon F. First of all, it provides more space for the sensor to move around when manufacturers add in-body image stabilization (IBIS).
Since most mirrorless systems feature IBIS, it is good that Nikon future-proofed its mirrorless mount by making it larger. If there is more space for the sensor to move to, Nikon can implement a very complex IBIS system that not only compensates for camera shake, but also allows to implement such features as pixel shift and star tracking (something Pentax has already done on the K1 / K1 II).
Second, a larger mount gives more flexibility to camera manufacturers when it comes to designing lenses, sometimes allowing simpler lenses to be designed at lower costs. At the same time, mount / throat diameter is not the only variable that impacts lens design – flange distance is also equally important. Shorter flange distance allows lenses to be placed closer to the sensor, which in itself allows lens manufacturers to start building simpler, smaller, lighter and less expensive short focus lenses instead of the retrofocus types. In addition, the throat diameter combined with flange distance determines the maximum possible angle of incidence of the marginal rays from the lens, which is important in designing lenses – generally, the larger the angle of incidence, the easier it is to make high-performance lenses.
In the case of Nikon Z mount, that maximum angle of incidence is around 44.09°, which is a lot when compared to the Nikon F that is limited to 12.1°, or the Canon EF that is limited to 18.8°. Even Sony’s mirrorless E mount has a smaller angle of incidence at 31.6°. All this means that the Nikon Z mount, thanks to its large 52mm throat diameter, along with a very short flange distance of 16mm makes it the most versatile lens mount on the market today. We can see these benefits in the excellent Z-series lenses that have been released so far, almost all of which have been clearly better than their F-mount equivalent (whether in image quality, size, or both).
One downside of a larger lens mount throat diameter, though, is lens size and weight issues. The larger the throat diameter, the larger the lens has to be at its mount point, which obviously does impact its overall thickness and weight of the lens. Also, the shorter flange distance can lead to increased vignetting or discoloration in the corners of an image (although this can be mitigated by making the lens design longer to simulate a longer flange distance). Either way, Nikon made the right choice by going with a large enough mount that is not too taxing on lenses, but also is not so large as to increase the size and weight of each lens by too much. Considering that Nikon is aiming its mirrorless cameras to be compact and lightweight, it would not make sense to go for a much larger lens mount.
Third, considering that the Nikon Z mount has the shortest flange distance, as well as a large 52mm throat diameter, it means that the Nikon Z system is able to adapt lenses from almost any other DSLR or mirrorless system, while no other camera can adapt Nikon Z lenses! This means it was both a good decision for lens design, and for business reasons, that Nikon went with such extreme dimensions for their lens mount.
Lastly, if Nikon ever decides to go with a slightly larger sensor than 35mm, it will be able to do it with the current mount diameter. It will not be able to accommodate a medium format sensor, but perhaps a slightly larger sensor that will provide better low-light performance or increased resolution could be an option.
In short, the Nikon Z mount is clearly superior to the Nikon F in a number of ways.
Nikon Z Mount Drawbacks
The only significant drawback of the Nikon Z mount is that there aren’t as many native Z lenses as F-mount lenses at the moment. You can check the current progress in our Nikon Z lens roadmap article, but considering that there are literally hundreds of F-mount lenses on the market (maybe even more than a thousand taking all the third-party lenses into account), it will take a long time before the Nikon Z system has as many.
The good news is that you can adapt almost any F-mount lens to the Z system at the moment using Nikon’s FTZ or FTZII adapter, so it’s easy to supplement the Z system in areas where Nikon has not yet released native lenses. However, the FTZ adapter isn’t a perfect solution, and in the long run, it’s best to go with native lenses whenever possible. If you have a huge collection of F-mount lenses, it may be better for you to stick with a DSLR for the time being, even though Nikon is has moved in the direction of mirrorless.
The Future of the F Mount
Now that Nikon is focusing all its attention on the Z series and its brand new mount, should current Nikon DSLR owners be concerned about the future of the Nikon F Mount? I would say “yes and no.”
On one hand, Nikon has ceased development of new DLSR cameras and lenses. Going forward, we will only see development in the Z-mount realm. Although users can still get service and repairs for more recent DSLRs, it makes more sense to get a mirrorless camera if you are building up a camera system.
On the other hand, DSLR cameras are going to be around for many years since cameras last so long (and even then, there will probably be photographers who will always prefer OVF to EVF and a larger camera to handle). With over 100 million lenses out there and many F-mount cameras, it can still make sense to use a DSLR especially if your existing gear serves all your needs. And used DSLR prices are better than they ever were before.
I have yet to see any mirrorless digital camera that in reality makes any revolutionary difference to what the object of the exercise is…taking photographs.
Last time I looked the physics haven’t changed from the 1800s.
The press obsession with auto focus etc
rather than the picture make you wonder how anyone managed to take photographs at all with a Nikon FE or before.
The problem here is any competent snapper spends half the time persuading most modern cameras to give up control and do what the photographer wants.
There is also the question that batteries do not have the capability to make a camera a genuine holiday walkabout item.
The same applies to the absurd references to the phone, it does not last a day either, never mind a two week holiday.
I think we are getting caught up with features over purpose… To the point where Auto is creating very expensive point and shoot tech that is not truly a revolution over a carefully used 24 shot wedding freebie.
We have allowed the manufacturers to blind side us with stuff that was never needed by Addams or Besson
If auto focus is bad, turn it off, radical I know, and FOCUS IT YOURSELF.
First let me say, although I visit this and many other similar sites i very rarely engage but on this topic I would like to give my twopenneth worth.
I held off from The Z for a while, although I could see as an owner of a fair few older lenses in various mounts including a shed load of old Nikon lenses it had some attraction, I have about 20 older Pentax K mount lenses and have been restricted to using them in cropped mode on K30/K70 and had almost bought a K1 on a couple of occasions, So the Z body would save me the cost of the K1 and allow IBS on all my old nikkors,
It should have been a no-brainer, so I sold my old out of date 24-70 AFs as a show of intent and to raise some money and got myself a very nice Z6 with FTZ adapter and waited in anticipation for the brave new world.
First impressions were good my 300mm F4 afs could be used stopped down a bit and with cloudy skies and lower shutter speeds and still do well, I liked that I could program one of the function buttons for full magnification for good focus checking, but there was a niggle that the view through the viewfinder was not that “nice”, When I started playing with my MF primes the viewfinder became not very nice at all, that lovely clear view of the area of sharpness moving in and out as you turned the focus that makes me grin seemed to turn a bit vague and dare I say it similar to looking through a D3xxx series viewfinder, best in class maybe but all my FF DSLRs and even Pentax cropped bodies are much more pleasant to look through, Inside a room the experience was better and with the viewfinder adjusting its brightness to a nice level but out in the world I did not like it much.
After a bit I thought I should try it with a Z lens, logical choice as a starter was the 24-70 f4 so into my pocket again and nice lens arrives a week later, First impressions very good, lovely AF, fast and accurate and as the reviews said sharp across the frame, But dare I say it a bit bland?, I still had a 28-70 AFS (truth be told I used this much more than the now sold 24-70 and that may indicate to many what sort of sad person you are dealing with here) and unlike the previous poster did a fairly unscientific test, In sharpness the Z was the winner no problem although at some focal lengths the old Nikkor centre sharpness was doing OK, but to my eyes the older lens looked “Nicer” there was something almost sterile about the Z, Sharp, No purple fringes but rendering a rather uniform perfect image and it was a good job the AF could be relied upon as the viewfinder was OK for composition but did not bring much pleasure to the act of making an image,
The z has now sat with its lens and adapter happily on the shelf for a couple of months as I swap happily from D610/D800/D700, I will keep it and try and use it more on my non Nikon mount lenses but I cannot see me paying shed loads of money out on more lenses when there are still so many lenses of character out there to be tried and played with,
I was very glad to hear the view of someone I sold a lens to recently who had sold his DSLRs to buy a Z6, He said he noticed he was doing a lot more videos and very little stills photography and the looking through some old images realised that his old D700 images looked so much better than what he was now making with his Z6/24-70 f4 so he went out and got a D700 and another body he had sold and was now enjoying himself again, he summed up the 24-70 f4 as sharp but boring.
This is a very minority view and I do not need shooting down in flames for it, If you like the experience and all the advantages that the Z gives you then I am very happy for you but for me as a hobby snapper it leaves me a little cold and I lack the ability to take advantage of its new advanced features that should make it the logical choice
I’ve been using the Z7II since it came out along-side the D850, D810 & D800.
At first look the Z lenses astound. On the surface. After a while, felt the look was a bit cartoonish. Digital, if I may, comparted to F mount lenses. Ultimately, do not like the look of the Z output compared to the Fs,
So I ran some tests to confirm. Very scientific IMHO. Pitting a 50mm F/1.4 AF-S vs the F/1.8 Z version. Shooting from F/2.0 to F/11, at 1/3 stop increments. Then the same for the Z35mm, 85mm, and the 24-120mm to start with.
First thing I noticed was what I causally observed when shooting generally. The Z lenses initially present as more vivid and colorful. The F mount, more liquid, luminous and rich.
Second, the Z lenses appear to have more saturated and deeper color than the F mounts. But it is just that they are darker, perhaps you could call it deeper, but not richer color. It gives an imposing impression at first.
In comparison, the better F mount lenses have more luminosity and are more colorful and alive and subtle, with greater accuracy, separation and variations to the colors. Also, what I found shocking as I thought it was the reverse, was that the F mount lenses have more contrast that the Z mount lenses. This kinda was strange as it appeared it would be the reverse. We calculated that the F mount lenses actually had anywhere from 1/2 to at least one stop more contrast. We test this with spot meters on the subject and the difference in zones when review on screen. One could say that the Z lenses were less characteristically Nikon than the F mounts.
All of this was slight, but still very noticeable. And though slight, the first person outside of the testers we asked regarding their thoughts on the matter were clients. Both instantly and immediately favored the F mount output. We felt compelled to ask another dozen or so people just to make sure we weren’t insane. All responded likewise. I’m afraid that perhaps I was a victim of one of the most intense and maybe successful marketing campaigns ever – the Nikon Z onslaught. I bought into it, And bought! Bought! Bought!
Thought I was impervious. Eh,,,
I will say that one thing the Z lenses do better than the F mounts and indeed from what I can tell better than anybody is to remove most, if not all of the blue and blue violet color casts and color fringing. That is rather startling in and of itself. If you have ever shot with the F mount 35 F/1.4 AFS or the 105mm F/2.8 Micro AFS you know about blue violet fringing. Still two of my favorite lenses. But the color fringing. Urgh. The Z mount equals have none or slight.
So am on the fence. Overall way prefer the F Mount Glass. I would describe the F Mount glass as sexy, like a hot date and the Copa, the Z mount robotic, like the Jestons’s robot.
And with the absence of blue color issues, the Z mount lenses remain attractive to me. Despite the cartoon like color.
Keeping them both for now.
The F mount is dead.
Nikon is not big enough to support Z and F. They will not completely discontinue the F for a couple of years but there will be no further development as Nikon needs to focus on the Z in order to stay relevant.
Contrary to claims of high Z9 sales the high is relative to Nikon but very small and low for Sony and Canon.
What is the difference between throat diameter and inner diameter in the comparison table?
See Camera Lens Mounts Explained by Nasim Mansurov:
photographylife.com/what-…-diameters
sometimes allowing simpler lenses to be designed at lower costs.
When is that going to happen?
I’m in two minds I can see the advantage of mirrorless cameras but I think there are always going to be people who already have invested heavily in the Nikon F Mount system and are extremely happy with it using AF-D and AF-S and now the newer AF-P lenses so that being said I personally think that Nikon would be crazy to stop production of the F Mount that would alienate almost all of their customers almost overnight! If you were starting from out and didn’t have any camera equipment at all the mirrorless would be very attractive over DSLRs but millions of people all over the world have Nikon F Mount lenses and a DSLR of one sort or another yes you can use the F Mount lenses on the Z series mirrorless cameras but you will need the FTZ Mount Adapter so in that respect I would make more sense to stick with what you already have wouldn’t it instead of replacing a complete system camera and lenses which could quite possibly not be around for as long as the F Mount lenses have been and in itself become obsolete unlike even the first F Mount lenses produced back in 1959 they will fit on any F Mount based Nikon camera yes even the D6 ok you will have to set the shutter speed and aperture and focus manually but they will work.
Nikon has a very aged demographic. They will be very smart to drop the F.
Most of F users are in their 70s and 80s.
That group will cling to their old extremely outdated D850 and af-d lenses until they die and not be purchasing any new products.
In the 1990s computer industry there used to be a famous strip cartoon of 2 young users leaving a building because the computer stopped, in the last picture they walked out in despair not knowing how to put the plug back in the wall
It seems the iPod generation who think it was hi fi are being followed by the Facebook generation who genuinely believe that an iPhone is a brilliant camera.
We’ll all I can say is when your shiny electric car runs to the shops and back twice then annoyingly needs 18 hours to be ready again, look at those whose reality of digital is only the sensor has replaced film, skill cannot be replaced or automated.
Ageism works both ways.
There are two other disadvantages with today’s mirrorless vs. F mount DSLRs: battery life, and a sensor exposed to the enviroment.
Very true.
Also, mirror less is attempting to compete with a simpler “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” product .
Would any digital camera have been trusted or sent to the moon? …unlikely.(the batteries would only have made first orbit of earth)
sometimes allowing simpler lenses to be designed at lower costs.
I wonder when that will happen…
From an optical designer POV, the larger diameter and shorter flange distance allows less complicated designs for short focal length and field curvature is most often controlled with lenses (usually negative) closer to the image plane. It obviously helps vignetting too. It was an obvious change if they were going to remove the mirror and had to change the flange distance. Would be nice to see those advantages realized in actual optical performance but I haven’t seen that yet.