Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 STM Review

The Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 is a flawed lens in many ways. The build quality and optical quality are both suboptimal. Even though it’s a pretty inexpensive lens, we’ve tested other sub-$300 lenses before that don’t have the same compromises as this one.

Yet at the same time, what I said near the start of this review is still completely true: I enjoyed using the Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 in the field and bringing it with me on some long hikes. It’s ultralight and so portable that it’s easy to forget you’re even carrying it. And, considering the price, it’s a great lens to bring to an environment where damage or theft are higher possibilities – even as a simple backup option to keep in your hotel room in case something happens to your primary kit.

None of that cancels out the lens’s issues, though. Here’s how I’d sum up the pros and cons.

Pros:

• Lightweight and portable design – more so than almost any other ultra-wide lens
• Good flare and sunstar performance
• The worst optical issues are confined to the extreme corners and can be cropped out
• Excellent price of $300, sometimes even on sale for $250

Cons:

• Extreme distortion, almost fisheye level
• Until you correct distortion, the tips of the corners are almost black at f/2.8
• Even after distortion correction, vignetting is still high
• Weak corner sharpness throughout the aperture range
• High levels of chromatic aberration
• No weather sealing + externally-focusing design is a bad combination in harsh weather
• Lens hood is not included

Unfortunately, the cons here definitely outweigh the pros. This makes the Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 a pretty specialized choice: great if you need the utmost in portability or low price, but substantially flawed if you need solid build quality or optical performance.

However, at least keep in mind what the coma tests on the previous page of this review revealed. The Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 is actually not bad if you crop your images to match a roughly 18mm lens. You’ll still find that most lenses are better, but cropping even by that much is enough to change this from “bad” to “okay” in my book. As I said on the previous page, maybe think of this as an 18mm lens that can be used as a 16mm in a pinch, and you won’t be so disappointed with it.

Given all that, I still think there’s a market for the Canon RF 16mm f/2.8. I’d probably get one myself as a Canon shooter if I felt the need to keep a backup ultra-wide in my bag, or if I needed the utmost light weight for a long-distance hike. However, in almost all of the usual ways to rate a lens, there is no way to sugar-coat the fact that the RF 16mm f/2.8 falls short.

I hope that you found this review of the Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 to be useful! If you want to buy the lens, you can thank us at Photography Life for the work that went into this review by using the links below:

• Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 at B&H – Check Current Price and Sales
• Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 at Amazon
• Used/International: Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 on eBay

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