Laowa 8-16mm f/3.5-5 Zoom CF Lens

The Laowa 8-16mm f/3.5-5 Zoom CF is an ultra-wide-angle zoom lens designed for APS-C mirrorless cameras, combining an expansive focal-length range with a compact and lightweight design. Its 8–16mm range provides a 120.9° to 82.8° angle of view, making it well suited to landscape, architecture, interiors, travel photography, and other applications requiring broad scene coverage. The lens weighs approximately 463 g, offering a practical balance between wide-angle capability and portability.

The lens features a variable maximum aperture of f/3.5–5 and a minimum aperture of f/16, with a five-blade diaphragm. Its optical construction uses 16 elements in 12 groups, including two aspherical elements and two extra-low dispersion elements, helping the lens maintain image quality across its ultra-wide zoom range. The dedicated aperture ring can also be switched between clicked and de-clicked operation, providing smoother aperture adjustments for video recording.

Manual focusing and a 20 cm minimum focusing distance give the lens flexibility for both expansive scenes and close foreground compositions. Its maximum magnification is 0.125x, while the 86mm filter thread allows compatible filters to be used for creative and exposure-control applications. The lens is available in several mirrorless mounts, including Sony E, Fujifilm X, Nikon Z, Canon RF, and Canon EF-M.

The compact approximately 88.4 × 88.53mm body makes the Laowa 8-16mm f/3.5-5 Zoom CF a convenient option for photographers who need an ultra-wide zoom without carrying multiple lenses. Its combination of broad perspective control, close-focusing capability, manual operation, filter compatibility, and lightweight construction makes it suitable for both still photography and video-oriented workflows.