I’ve finally done it. I’ve had people asking me to cover Nikon for more than a decade, but initially I wasn’t interested in adding the time and expense of yet another system and I couldn’t set up a reliable partner to get review loaners from. Unfortunately that is still the case, as Nikon Canada doesn’t seem to really have a loaner department and even some of my retail partners that get loaners haven’t had much. Add to this that until recently Nikon’s Z-mount platform was closed to third party development, which meant that I couldn’t get Z-mount lenses directly from third party lensmakers, either. But Nikon has eased their restrictions on third party development, and I began to get more and more requests from lensmakers to cover Nikon Z-mount lenses, so I began to seriously consider the idea of adding a Nikon body to my personal kit so that I could cover these lenses and the system itself. Here’s hoping for better opportunities to get first party Nikon loaners in the future, as that remains the big challenge for me at the moment.

I did a lot of research as to which Nikon body would best suit my needs, which are somewhat unique as a reviewer. I typically need the highest available resolution on any given platform so that I can thoroughly test lenses (the reason I currently own a Canon EOS R5, Sony a7RV, and Fujifilm X-H2) along with a camera that has one of the best autofocus systems on a platform so that I can give lenses a fair evaluation there as well. I decided on the Nikon Z8, as it seemed to check all the boxes. The Z9 does as well, but I’m personally not a fan of cameras with integrated vertical grips. I purchased the Z8 in late April 2024, and have spent the last six months getting familiar with the camera and using it on a daily basis. I’ve already done eight different lens reviews on it, including primes, normal and telephoto zooms, and even a high end manual focus lens. I didn’t want to jump into a review too quickly, as I like to be as expert as possible when I report on a product, and in this case I was having to learn a whole new system and get familiar with the way that Nikon does things. I’ve become much more comfortable with the system over these months, already, and I’m now ready to share my findings. You can find my full thoughts in the video review below or by reading on.

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This review is of a retail Z8 that I purchased from Camera Canada.   As always, this is a completely independent review.  All opinions and conclusions are my own.

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The Nikon Z8 is in essence a condensed version of the Nikon Z9 flagship camera. The Z9 is the larger “pro body” with an integrated vertical grip, while the Z8 has roughly the same feature set, sensor, and autofocus system in a more standard sized body. The Z8 is still easily the chunkiest of the four full frame cameras I own, which also include the Sony Alpha 1 and a7RV along with the Canon EOS R5. The overall grip size may be a little big for those with smaller hands, but it is comfortable enough for me. You can see that it is easily the biggest of the bunch.

In fact, I noted when doing my Fujifilm GFX100S II review that the medium format body was actually a bit smaller and lighter than the Z8, so don’t choose a different camera if you want to travel light!

But it isn’t wasted space, as Nikon has packed a lot of controls into this body.

Key Features

• 45.7MP FX-Format Stacked CMOS Sensor
• Lightweight Design, 30% Smaller than Z9
• 8.3K 60p N-RAW, 4.1K 60p ProRes RAW
• 8K30p and 4K120p Video, 10-Bit Internal
• Up to 20 fps Raw, 30 fps JPEG Shooting
• 493-Point AF, AI-Based Subject Detection
• Blackout-Free Real Live Viewfinder
• 5.5 stops of 5-axis image stabilization
• 3.2″ 4-Axis Tilting Touchscreen LCD
• CFx Type B & SD Memory Card Slots
• 5 GHz Wi-Fi and Bluetooth

My first six months with the Z8 have been great, and I’ve come to appreciate the deep versatility baked into the camera and the reliable performance I’ve had with a variety of lenses. My favorite thing about the Z8 is somewhat ironic, however. For the first several years of Z-mount existence the chief complaint was the same as Canon RF mount: it was a closed platform, with only first party (Nikkor) autofocus lenses available for the platform. While Canon has unfortunately continued that policy to date (at least on full frame), Nikon has opened the floodgates to third party development. I’ve reviewed several lenses that I had previously tested on Sony, and I’ve found that in every case I preferred the overall performance on Nikon.

There are two primary reasons that spring to mind. The first is that there are no artificial limitations on burst speed (Sony limits third party lenses to 15FPS, which is half what the Z8 or my Sony Alpha 1 are capable of). Nikon has no such limitation, so I’ve thoroughly enjoyed getting the full potential out of lenses like Tamron’s telephotos for sports or wildlife.

The second thing that I’ve found is that Nikon’s VR (in camera vibration reduction) just works better than the Sony equivalent. More and more lenses (including some telephotos like the Tamron 70-300mm RXD that the photo below comes from) don’t have lens-based stabilization and instead rely solely on camera based stabilization, so that means that the stability of the lens is going to widely vary from camera to camera and from platform to platform. I’ve noticed a significant difference between the stability of lenses on the Z8 as compared to what I’ve seen from identical lenses on Sony. This 300mm shot was taken at 1/8th of a second (over 5 stops of stabilization), and I found that a result like that was very repeatable on Nikon.

In short, I’ve enjoyed the Nikon Z8 a lot thus far. Let’s explore why in a little more depth.

Build and Handling

As noted, the Nikon Z8 is a BIG camera. It’s the largest full frame camera I’ve used to date (excluding body styles with a vertical grip integrated like the Canon EOS R3). It weighs a full 2 pounds (910g) with battery and memory cards inserted, which is a half pound (240g) heavier than the Canon EOS R5 MKII, and 173g heavier than the Sony Alpha 1. I use these as a point of reference, as they are the flagship standard body (no integrated vertical grip) cameras of these respective brands. The Z8 is taller (4.7″/118.5mm – nearly an inch taller), wider (5.7″/144mm – 1/2″ to 3/4″ wider), and is deeper than the Sony (3.3″/83mm) by 13mm while being very slightly less deep than the Canon (5mm shallower). You can see that the Z8’s center stack housing the viewfinder really sticks up.

That makes the Z8 very beefy in the hands, which is fine (even desirable) if you have larger hands, but will be less appealing to those with smaller hands. The ergonomics are good, however, and when I asked my wife to handle and use the camera, she noted that it was big but was fine in her hands. She didn’t mind using it. A large body is great for balancing larger, heavier lenses, but will dwarf small lenses like the Viltrox AF 40mm F2.5 that I reviewed on it.

Part of this weight comes from the fact that this a pro-level camera with a very tough build. Its shell is a combination of carbon fiber and magnesium alloy, and Nikon states that the professional grade weather sealing is to the same standard as the flagship Z9.

I have definitely gotten this thing wet while shooting in the rain on a number of occasions, and have had zero issues.

I do have one complaint that is more of a general Nikon complaint and not Z8 specific. I own five different camera platforms, and have tested a variety of other ones, including a few quirky Sigma models, a lot of Fujifilm medium format cameras, and then the host of full frame and APS-C mirrorless models that have come in the past six years. Nikon persists in their lens mounting process being backwards from literally everyone else (at least in my experience.) Whereas all other cameras involve rotation a lens to the right to mount it, and then to the left to release it.

Now, I understand that this has been the Nikon standard all along, and that a change at this point would be very difficult (it would affect F-mount lenses being adapted as well), but there is one practical consideration. The direction of mounting lenses on Nikon also happens to be the direction that unlocks lens hoods from their bayonet mount. When mounting a smaller lens, I have found it quite easy to inadvertently rotate the lens hood as well, particularly if that lens hood does not have a great lock. There’s also the reality that for those of us who use multiple systems, you are forever rotating lenses and lens caps the wrong direction because everything else rotates the opposite direction. Minor rant aside, let’s move on.

I’ve used big cameras that seem to have a lot of wasted space, but that’s not the case here. Nikon has loaded this body with physical controls. The Z8 might in fact be a little intimidating to less experienced photographers, as there are a lot of controls. But more experienced photographers will appreciate the ability to really assign a lot of important values to dedicated buttons to allow for faster control on the fly. This is a camera that you need to spend some quality time with and really get comfortable using it…and then it will pay dividends for you!

There are two Function (custom) buttons located to the right of the lens mount. Each of these can be assigned a function from a huge range of choices. There is also an accessory port on the front where things like a remote release can be attached (amongst other things). Lower down on the front/left side is an AF mode button that will allow you select between various focus modes (including MF). Most of Nikon’s custom buttons that have multiple options (like the AF mode button) work through that particular option being highlight in yellow on the screen or viewfinder while you hold the button down, and you use a wheel (rear control wheel by default) to scroll through the options. It’s not immediately obvious until you become familiar with the process, but then it works fine.

Nikon has implemented a sensor shield that covers the sensor and helps prevent dust from reaching it when the camera is powered off. I have found that this is a useful addition to modern cameras that does help keep the sensor cleaner.

The top of the camera is definitely rich with controls along with a very useful LCD screen.

We will start by looking at the cluster of controls near the shutter button.

There is an ON-OFF switch there surrounds the shutter button itself, allowing for quick one handed operation. You can further rock that switch past ON to light up many of the controls for use in the dark, which is a handy feature altogether lacking from Sony bodies. Beneath the shutter button is the front control wheel. There is also a exposure compensation button along with a dedicated ISO button. Both of those functions work in the fashion that you hold the button down while rotation the rear wheel to change the value. The final button is a video recording button.

The rear wheel at the upper right corner of the camera in the back is the default means of scrolling through different values.

The rest of the top plate on the right of the viewfinder stack is devoted to an LCD screen that shows a variety of information while also retaining a passive display when the camera is powered off. It is fairly reminiscent to a similar screen on the Canon EOS R5, and I find it useful for getting info on the fly.

The viewfinder stack has the standard hotshoe on the top, but, as of yet, Nikon has not matched Sony’s multi-interface shoe that can also record digital audio through appropriate microphones.

There is another cluster of buttons to the left of the viewfinder stack, including a button dedicated to bracketing. This would allow for multiple shots to be taken at different exposure values for the purpose of combining them at a later date or just experimenting with different lighting approaches to a particular scene. The right button is a dedicated White Balance button, there is a mode button to the right that will run you through the P-S-A-M modes (i.e. manual, shutter priority, etc…). The final button to the left gives you your burst or release mode options. You have a lot of versatility with how many frames per second you capture, with multiple options for each mode (including self timer options).

The viewfinder itself reminds me of a general philosophy with the Nikon Z8 – it tends to underpromise and overdeliver. The viewfinder specs are unimpressive – just 3.69m dots. This is vastly outclassed on paper by a number of competitors. But the viewfinder is actually quite good. It is a high quality OLED display, so very clear and bright (Nikon even says it is capable of reviewing HLG footage, which would suggest that it is capable of HDR). It runs at 60Hz but can run as high as 120Hz. The display typically looks great and reminds me more of the good display in the Canon R5 and less of the higher specced but often disappointing displays in my high end Sony cameras. I’ve enjoyed using the lifelike viewfinder for everything from sports capture to using manual focus lenses.

One other positive for Nikon’s approach to lenses without electronics (I’m doing a review of an upcoming lens on the platform right now) is that it allows you to set up a number of “non-CPU lenses” (lenses without electronics) and assign a name to those lenses along with a focal length so that the camera can set the proper VR setting and also provide at least a lens designation for EXIF data. That’s very helpful to someone like me who reviews many lenses every year, as lenses without electronics are harder to search for in Lightroom.

The back of the camera should seem pretty familiar to those who have used Nikon before. On the upper left side there is a third Fn button (custom button) and then a delete button with the garbage can logo on it. The right side has a Display button surrounded by a toggle for switching between stills and video control setups. And yes, you can assign unique control assignments for both (different functions for buttons, for example). There is an AF-ON button next to that, and below that is first the control joystick (can be clicked for a secondary function) and the “i” button to access the quick menu.

Underneath that is a D-pad for navigation with the OK/Select button in the center. Another cluster of buttons include the Menu button along with the Playback button and the ability to either zoom in or zoom out via a final pair of buttons.

The rear LCD screen is a 3.2″, 2.1m dot TFT panel that is fairly average. Touch responsiveness is pretty good, however, and it gets the job done. The rear LCD can be tilted on two axis, but I don’t like this approach nearly as well as a fully articulating LCD screen. I also recognize that this tends to be a point of division for many photographers, so perhaps this is your preferred arrangement.

Like the screen itself, the tilt function is fairly average. My favorite configuration at the moment is Sony’s a7RV, which allows you to do both tilt along with full articulation.

The right side of the camera has a nicely executed compartment for the memory cards. Like the Canon EOS R5, it has both a CFexpress Type B slot along with a UHS-II rated SD card slot. People have different preferences, but I personally like to have RAW and movies written to the faster card and use the SD card slot for JPEG/HEIC backups. This is helpful if I need to quickly deliver an image to someone.

The majority of the connection ports are found on the left side of the camera. These are found under two rubberized port covers that unfortunately don’t open like doors and instead just sort of hang around. The top area includes a full size HDMI port and has both a 3.5mm mic input along with a 3.5mm headphone monitoring output. The bottom area has (uniquely) two USB-C ports. One is used for charging the camera or even powering it, while the second is used for data transfer. That would allow for an excellent setup for someone who shoots tethered for long periods of time, as you can have data coming out and power coming in simultaneously.

The battery compartment is on the bottom of the camera, and houses a single Nikon EN-EL15c battery pack. It is a 2280mAh (16Wh) battery that is similar to that found in rival cameras from Sony or Canon. It is, however, considerably smaller than the much larger 3300mAh battery found in the Z9. The battery pack is rated for just 340 shots in the power hungry Z8, so buying a spare or two is worth doing. This is similar to the rating in the Canon EOS R5, and, frankly, I haven’t noticed a big difference in ordinary use even when compared to my Sony Alpha 1, which is rated for a much higher 530 shots when using the rear screen. For some reason the Sony drops quite a bit when using the viewfinder (430 shots), which is my preferred method, which is why I may not notice a big difference, as the rating for the Z8 is almost the same when using the viewfinder or screen (330 for viewfinder).

Nikon’s in camera VR (Vibration Reduction) is rated up to 5 stops, though with Nikon lenses equipped with in-lens VR the two systems will work in harmony and provide up to 6 stops of stabilization. But, as noted in the intro, I actually find the VR to be more stable than what I see many times on Sony, particularly when working with third party lenses. There are always limits to these type of systems, however, and if you want to walk and shoot, a motorized gimbal is always a better idea. The great thing about in-body-image stabilization is that you can use it with all lenses, including those without lens-based stabilization.

If you have a lens that doesn’t have electronics, be sure to manually set the focal length to help get better stabilization results.

The MSRP for the Z8 in the US is $3996, though it currently selling for $3796 at the time of this review. That undercuts the current main competitors like the Canon EOS R5 MKII and Sony Alpha 1, though it is more expensive than the original EOS R5.

Shutter and Buffer Depth

Like the Sony Alpha 1, the Nikon Z8 is designed around a fully electronic shutter. This works due to having a stacked sensor with extremely fast readout rate. It’s 1/270th rate even slightly bests the 1/260th readout speed of the Alpha 1, and is much, much faster than the 1/60th of a second readout of the Canon EOS R5. This kind of readout speed allows for rolling shutter to be largely eliminated (a distortion caused when the action being captured moves too quickly for the sensor to properly record it). My Fujifilm X-H2 really suffers from this, but that’s because the readout speed is nearly ten times slower. Look at this very odd looking basketball in this shot from the X-H2 (*not the Z8!)

With the Z8, however, even fast moving little bees right near the edge of the frame are well captured.

Another previous issue with electronic shutters was flash sync speeds. The X-sync speed of the Z8 is 1/200th of a second. That’s fast enough to be useful, but doesn’t quite compare to the exceptional 1/400th of a second possible with the Alpha 1. If you need faster sync speed, move into HSS mode, which gives you a bit less power output from your flashes but allows for much faster sync speeds.

Those are the primary downsides to electronic shutters, but there are also a host of advantages. The first is shutter speed itself. The maximum shutter speed is 1/32,000th of a second, which far exceeds the typical 1/8000th second limit attached to mechanical shutters. There is no wear to a mechanical part, and, if desired, you can operate completely silently (a shutter “click” will be activated by default).

You also can eliminate blackout between shots, as no mechanical shutter is opening and closing. That really helps when tracking action, as you are able to be more reactive with following the movement as you aren’t have split seconds blackouts all the time. Keeping a flying bird properly centered in the frame is much easier without blackout.

This also unlocks a lot of burst speed, as you’ve eliminated the mechanical movement of the shutter from the equation. The Z8 is capable of shooting up to 20FPS when capturing RAW images, but can shoot up to 30FPS when shooting full frame JPEGs. There are expanded modes where shooting is possible up to 60FPS and even 120FPS, but with serious compromises, including increasingly smaller JPEG sizes and without active autofocus or metering. In other words, consider 30FPS the practical limit for any kind of useful application.

Nikon is a little less forthcoming with buffer depth than other brands, and the results seem to vary widely. The worst case scenario for buffer depth will be shooting at 20FPS and with the lossless compressed format, which takes the most processing, where the buffer depth will only be around 80 shots on a CFexpress Type B card. Switch to High Efficiency★ and you will get hundreds of RAW images (600+) before the buffer fills, and if you move on to the standard High Efficiency format or JPEG, the buffer pretty much becomes the size of your storage card. You can also drop the frame rate to 15FPS and get virtually unlimited shots even with the Lossless Compressed format.

Remember also, however, that if you are using an SD card for backup and using a RAW format, you could potentially run into buffer issues there, as the write speed for the SD card (even a very good UHS-II card) is never going to match the write speed of the CFexpress.

On a practical level, I’ve found buffer depth sufficient for my work personally, and knowing the potential workarounds to increasing buffer depth helps.

I’m personally very comfortable with purely electronic shutter based cameras after having own the Sony a9 and Alpha 1 cameras, and the Z8’s overall performance easily bests that of the original A9.

Autofocus for Stills

*A caveat for those who read this review and wonder why the results seem more favorable than earlier reviews. I’ve had the benefit of reviewing after the significant fimware 2.0 update that improved AF performance and added new features like Bird Eye Detect, Auto subject mode (which I love!), and Pixel Shift. The end result is a more capable camera, so kudos to Nikon for sticking by their customers.

The Z8 largely inherits uses the flagship 493-point phase-detection AF system from the Z9. The stacked sensor and fast readout speed enable AF readings to occur at up to 120 fps, making sure that autofocus is running ahead rather than behind burst speed. This is the typical hybrid AF system we see in modern mirrorless cameras, where the Phase Detect system is backed by a Contrast AF system. I can attest that bird eye detect works well:

As per usual, you have a wide range of options for how large of an area that you want autofocus to focus on, but most of the time I just leave it the widest area or with 3D tracking enabled, and the AF generally does a great job.

One of the most challenging situations I threw at the lens was a middle school graduation. Their theme was “Under the Sea”, which meant that the gym lighting was extremely low. I had to shoot the whole thing at very high ISO settings (minimum 12,800), which means that the focus system of the camera/lens combo was being challenged (the Tamron 35-150mm VXD, in this case). While it was difficult to maintain the kind of shutter speed that I would prefer in that setting when people were moving around, I was very satisfied with the quality of focus on my various shots.

We shared my photos far and wide with parents of graduates because few of their photos turned out in those lighting conditions. When things slowed down after the ceremony, I was able to get some surprisingly good photos even though I was shooting at ISO 12,800 (and only a shutter speed of 1/60th of a second here, which shows you how dim the lighting was.

The combination of a great focus system in the Z8 and an effective focus motor in the 35-150mm made this challenging situation relatively easy. I shot a high school graduation as well, and while the lighting was slightly better there, I lived at ISO 12,800 there as well. I shot hundreds of well focused photos throughout the evening.

All of this means that shooting in better lit situations was a piece of cake. Even the typical event lighting (1600-3200) produced essentially instant focus results.

I’ve now shot the Z8 with about 8 different lens options, and I haven’t really been disappointed with anything for stills. I shot a long burst of my son jumping off a wall while I tracked his face throughout the sequence (using the Viltrox AF 16mm F1.8), and not only did I get the 30FPS but also got consistently well focused results throughout…at F1.8:

I’ve really enjoyed the Z8 for shooting BIF, finding it to be fairly effortless. Whenever the eye becomes visible from behind the wing as the wings pump up and down, it is clear that focus has been accurate all along.

I’m loving not have third-party speed restrictions that Sony imposes. Some of these excellent lenses no longer feel like second class citizens, and it’s a delight to fire well focused bursts.

Focus on eyes is precise and delivers great looking results.

Portraits have also been pretty effortless, allowing me to consistently get well focused results.

I was able to focus precisely on other subjects as well, even when depth of field was paper thin.

All in all, I’ve found the Z8 to be a very competent autofocusing camera that is right up there among the best I’ve used from Canon and Sony.

Manual Focus on Nikon Z8

Mnaul focus was not a primary consideration in my purchase of the Z8, but has been one of my pleasant surprises. I’ve actually really enjoyed the various Nikon focus aids and the overall focus experience on Nikon. Here’s a few reasons why:

1. Clear, useful EVF. On paper, the EVF of the Z8 is nothing special, but, in practice, it works very well. I’ve got much higher resolution viewfinders on Sony cameras, but Sony viewfinders do some weird things when the shutter is half depressed. And I typically want the shutter half depressed when manually focusing, as this helps stabilize the viewfinder while I focus. Nikon’s viewfinder is clear and makes it easy to see focus moving as I turn the manual focus ring.
2. Effective IBIS (VR). I’ve been impressed with the real world stability of Nikon’s in camera VR. It works effectively and allows for both a stable viewfinder experience as a I focus and also stable results when I take the shot. To my knowledge, no manual focus lens to this point has included lens-based image stabilization, so having effective in-camera stabilization is very important.
3. Useful manual focus aids. There are three primary manual focus aids that I’ve utilized when manually focusing, including the onscreen focus confirmation box (put it where you want focus to be, and it will turn green when proper focus has been achieved), magnification of the image to visually confirm focus, and focus overlays (peaking). With some lenses Nikon includes a directional arrow that points you the direction you need to turn the focus ring to focus in the right direction, but that isn’t always the case. I’ve found that the focus box is quite accurate, though, and it makes manual focus fairly easy.

My one complaint is that it feels like magnification out of the box could be handled a little more effectively. Some camera brands allow for an automatic magnification of the focus area when you start to turn the focus ring (Sony, for example, and this is true with Voigtländer lenses that are true manual focus lenses but have electronic contacts). My Z8 doesn’t do that out of the box, but I discovered a menu setting (D18 in the custom setting) which does allow that change. I was able to consistently get pinpoint accuracy during my review of the beautiful Voigtländer Nokton 75mm F1.5:

Video Autofocus

In general I would say that while video autofocus is good on Nikon, it is here where I see a little more daylight between the Z8 and the best from Canon and Sony. I do a lot of different tests with each lens I review, and in some of those standard tests (sometimes with a Z-mount version of a lens I’ve already tested on Sony), I find that the video AF is a little poorer. That’s not to say that it is bad, as it isn’t. There’s much more separation between Fuji video AF (worse) and Nikon video AF (better) than what there is between Nikon and Canon or Sony (best).

In my “hand test” where I alternately block and then remove my hand, I’ve found that the Z8 is more reluctant to switch to my hand even when my eye is not visible and the hand is the obvious subject to focus on.

I will sometimes see a few more pulses, and just a slightly less amount of confidence in focusing…particularly when a trackable subject isn’t in frame. I have had good results with things like vlogging, however (here’s a screenshot from one of my vlogging outings).

Sony remains my brand of choice for filming for my YouTube channel, but if I only had the Z8, I would have no problems. I find that I perhaps need to tune AF speed in the settings a little more frequently, but that’s not the end of the world.

Video Performance

The Nikon V8 is just loaded with video options. Here’s a look of the various resolution options from the Z8 product page.

Headline features are the 8K30 and 4K120 specs. These rival the very best, and you can even record in a 8K60 N-Raw format that is a slightly different FX 8256 x 4644 resolution. Nikon says, “Internal 12-bit raw recording at up to 8.3K 60p in the N-RAW format is supported along with internal ProRES RAW HQ. Raw recording offers greater tonal and color latitude and can improve dynamic range, benefitting color grading needs and post-production flexibility.”

Just to give you an idea of the difference between 8 bit and 12 bit video, while 8 bit video can produce 16.77 million colors (that’s a lot!), 12 bit video can produce up to 68 billion different color variations!! That results in richer video with more tonality and subtle details.

As would be expected at this point, you can shoot in N-Log and HLG color profiles to give you more control over editing/grading the footage or producing high dynamic range footage. When shooting in N-Raw and with N-Log enabled, you can get as much as 14 stops of dynamic range. That’s not at the top of the heap, but is very competitive with other brands.

Another strength for the Z8 is the very fast readout of the sensor and the vast reduction of rolling shutter. That makes the Z8 an excellent camera for capturing action.

A potential negative for video use is the lack of an articulating screen. That not only eliminates the potential for front monitoring but also can be limiting when putting the camera on a gimbal. Sometimes the motor assembly of gimbals can block the rear of the camera in certain positions, so getting that image off to the side is preferable. An articulating screen allows for this, but obviously a screen limited to tilting function cannot.

Nikon does have a function similar to Sony’s Clear Image Zoom, which they call Hi-Res Zoom. Essentially this takes advantage of the high resolution of the camera by allowing some digital zoom without much (if any) quality loss. I’ve periodically used this function and it can be useful to assure you get the framing you want.

There are a number of factors that will impact recording time, though there is no artificial limit imposed. This could include the size of your memory card (or how much room is left on it!), battery life, and, in rarer situations, overheating. I haven’t personally seen an issue, but if you are trying to do long format recording in, say, 8K, you could potentially see an issue.

One personal critique I will add is that sometimes I don’t love Nikon’s skintones in video out of the box. The magentas are a little oversaturated for my tastes, though I do know that color science is subjective and others may feel differently.

Image Quality Breakdown

The Nikon Z8 employs the same 45.7MP Stacked CMOS sensor found in the flagship Z9 camera, meaning that imaging performance should be roughly identical between the two. We’ve already discussed the advantages of a stacked sensor in terms of readout speed, but there are also some advantages for image quality as well. Nikon’s most revered sensor from the DSLR era was found in the D850, which happened to be the only Nikon camera that I tested from that era. That also had a 45.7MP sensor, but that was a more traditional back-illuminated non-stacked sensor. The key advantage of the Z8’s sensor is of course speed, as we’ve already discussed the very powerful burst speeds of the Z8 whereas the D850 capped out at 9FPS burst speed.

The sensor found in the Z8 has a base ISO of 64, which makes it unique from most other full frame cameras that use a base ISO of 100. It does make the mental math a little more complicated, but it does provide some advantage in certain situations because there is less gain/amplification being digitally applied to the sensor. In theory this can produce more color depth and greater dynamic range, though sometimes at the cost of poorer low light performance at high ISOs. Of course each camera is going to do different things with both strengths and weaknesses based on the performance of the individual sensor, so this section will explore different areas of strength and weakness. At its best, the Z8 is very capable of producing beautiful images with rich color and strong dynamic range.

Modern sensors in these flagship cameras are very, very good, and my experience is often that the difference in performance from one brand to another is fairly marginal. I make this statement not only as a person who has had a chance to review cameras from different brands, but also one with the very good fortune to own a top camera from four major brands as a part of my work. There isn’t a big difference in editing images from any of them, so these days I would choose which brand offers the whole ecosystem that you prefer the most.

With that caveat aside, let’s explore the details of the Z8’s sensor.

Dynamic Range

Dynamic range has become one those topics that was really debated ad nauseum on photography forums, particularly when there was more of a difference between certain brands. It was an area where photographers could brag, “my camera is better than yours!” That’s become less common in recent years, however, as there really isn’t much of a difference between brands any longer. 

Dynamic range is the ratio between the darkest point and the brightest point possible on a sensor. The more “stops” there are between those two points mean that more and more information can be recorded in a single frame. I can definitely say that there are a number of situations where improved dynamic range gives the photographer (and particularly the post-processor) more latitude to fulfill their vision. This could be in the ability to recover a blown-out sky or shadowed area as a landscape photographer or the ability to balance a foreground subject with a background or sky for portrait photographers.  I frequently use good dynamic range in portrait photography to bring up exposure on the faces of subjects when shooting with only available light. Lightroom/ACR has great tools for detecting subjects and creating masks for them, and good dynamic ranges makes it easy to add exposure to the subjects cleanly. It allowed me to balance the lighting between my wife and the brighter forest beyond her on this hike, fore example.

I like to use Photons to Photos as an additional frame of reference to the more real world tests that I run, as it gives some raw numbers and how those compare to other cameras. In the previous generation, the D850 mopped the floor with the Canon EOS 5DSr in these metrics, though the Canon had a bit more resolution (50MP). The 5DSr was rated at 9.8 stops of tested dynamic range, while the D850 tested at a whopping 11.63 stops. A nearly stop two stop advantage is huge in this kinds of comparisons. But Canon has flipped the script in the mirrorless conversation, as the EOS R5 has a nearly identical 45MP sensor but boasts a rated 11.85 stops compared to 11.32 stops for the Z8. As another point of comparison, the Sony Alpha 1 has a similar stacked sensor to the Z8, 50MP of resolution, and is rated at a near identical 11.36 stops. It’s worth noting that Canon has moved to a stacked sensor in the R5 MKII to allow for more similar burst speeds to the Z8, and Photons to Photos actually rates that sensor a bit lower than the R5 at 11.45 stops of dynamic range. That’s still excellent, obviously, and slightly bests both the Z8 and the Alpha 1, but it does show that there are perhaps some tradeoffs for having a sensor designed for speed.

This is at base ISO, however (ISO 64 for the Z8, ISO 100 for Canon and Nikon), but we see that the Canon advantage does remain throughout the ISO range.

So how does the Z8’s sensor hold up in my tests?

We will start with shadow recovery. In my tests I start with an established base exposure shot of a photography themed still life setup that I use. It looks like this:

This is what I’m calling the proper exposure for the scene, the baseline. In a subsequent series of images I progressively underexposed the image by 1-4 stops so that I could measure how cleanly the shadows could be recovered. The goal is to avoid color shifts, additional noise, or other artifacts from this process. Our goal should be to see a recovered result that looks as similar to the baseline result above as possible.

Modern cameras are often very good with shadow recovery, and that’s the case with the Z8. There isn’t much to see at 1-3 stops, so I’ll skip right to the 4 stop recovery. Below you can see the captured result (four stops underexposure) and then the result after I’ve add those 4 stops back in.

On a global level we can see in fact that yes, the recovered result on the right does look quite similar to the baseline result. If I put them side by side, I can see that the recovered underexposed result has a slightly different white balance, but ironically I personally prefer the recovered result’s white balance.

Looking in at a pixel level, we can see that the results are mostly similar, with the tiniest bit of additional noise for the recovered result. The biggest negative I can find is some faint striations in the solid shadow area, shown here:

It’s not significant, however, so I would consider this to be a very successful result. I’ve not had any issues that spring to mind with shadow recovery on the Z8.

Modern cameras also tend towards being less sufficient at recovering highlights than shadows. Overexposure causes texture to be lost in bright highlight areas, and it will also result in certain colors starting to disappear (which is why I include the color swatch board in the scene). In this series I progressively overexposure the image by 1-4 stops and then try to recover the highlights by reducing the exposure in post. At two stops of exposure you can see the loss of details in the image on the left. Colors and texture information have been lost in overexposed areas, but the right side shows a successful recovery of that information.

We can see that colors have reemerged in the swatches, and, if we look closely, we can see that lost textures in the metal of the camera have been recovered successfully.

The recovery looks very natural, so that’s what I define as a successful recovery. Somewhere between 2 and 3 stops we start to find the limit, however.

You’ll note that some of the colors aren’t completely recovered, resulting in an uneven color result on the timer face between the areas more in shadow and those with more full light. Some of the textures on the SLR face have been lost, and the saturation levels on a number of colors aren’t as good. The result is no longer completely natural looking. I won’t show the 4 stop recovery result (you can see it in the video review), but suffice it to say that it doesn’t look natural at all.

This result is pretty consistent with what I’m seeing from other similar cameras, as the numbers from Photons to Photos suggests. There’s enough real world dynamic range to take difficult landscape scenes and get a more compelling image out of them.

You can see the limits in this image. I essentially could raise the shadows as much as I want, but not all of the blown highlights in the sky were recoverable. In a scene like this, you might want to bias exposure towards the highlights (underexpose) to allow for more information in the sky, as the shadows are more easily recoverable.

ISO Performance

High resolution cameras are often disadvantaged relative to lower resolution cameras due to having more pixels packed into the same area. When viewed at a pixel level, far more flaws are in evidence. Modern cameras are pretty good at mitigating these issues, however, and that’s mostly true of the Z8, though this is one area where having a lower base ISO can potentially have a negative impact. As you raise the ISO, dynamic range drops, which means that you have less latitude for editing images. If you are shooting at high ISOs, be sure to nail your exposure, and you won’t be doing the huge shadow or highlight recoveries that I showed above. The dynamic range of the Z8 at ISO 12,800 is under 5 stops! The native ISO range of the Z8 is 64-25,600, though it is expandable in both directions.

As you raise the ISO, the goal is to have as little additional noise as possible, no obvious colors shifts, and to avoid patterns in areas of the image that should be uniform (like blank walls, for example). Through ISO 1600 there is no problem. All I can see is some very faint pattern noise in the color swatches as compared to the base ISO on the left:

The pattern at ISO 3200 is largely the same, though with just a bit more noise. It’s still clean, overall, but I can see the shadows lifting just a bit due to the noise (black levels aren’t as deep). The results on a global level still look large the same.

At ISO 6400 this has become more obvious, and we can see that if we look at what should be a uniformly dark area (on the right), that the shadows are more irregular compared to ISO 1600.

I’ve shot a lot at ISO 6400 when doing events, and for the most part I’ve been happy with the results.

The detail and skin tones are still fine, but a closer look at the background shows that some grid patterning is emerging in the background.

Noise reduction software can help with this, though often at the cost of a bit of detail. I consider that to be usable, however.

I feel the same about ISO 12,800, which is largely the same but with a bit rougher noise. Things start to fall apart by the upper limit of ISO 25,600, however, as the rough noise in the pixels starts to really negatively impact black levels.

I would only use ISO 25,600 if absolutely necessary. I’ve used ISO 12,800 when necessary and found the results acceptable:

I don’t feel the same about ISO 25,600.

You’ll definitely want to avoid the expanded modes like 51,200, as the pattern banding becomes unacceptably noticeable. What I don’t notice is any kind of significant color shift at high ISOs, meaning that colors stay accurate.

The Z8 lags a bit behind either the Alpha 1 or the EOS R5 in ISO performance, but not by much. I haven’t hesitated to reach for the Z8 as an event recording camera, as I don’t feel I’ve been let down by either the autofocus or imaging performance.

Resolution

As noted, the 45.7MP resolution of the slightly bests the 45MP sensor of the EOS R5 (8192 x 5464 pixels compared to 8256 x 5504 for the Z8). This is actually a sweet spot for resolution, in my opinion, as it enough to provide for deep cropping options while not being overly compromised in other areas. That being said, the newfound ability of cameras like the Sony a7RV to shoot RAW at lower resolution options has (in my mind) really offset any significant penalty for the higher 61MP resolution of a camera like that.

The Z8 essentially gives you 3 options when shooting RAWs: Lossless Compressed (which averages roughly 60MB in file size), High Efficiency* (roughly 30MB), and High Efficiency (roughly 20MB). There isn’t really other full frame resolution options to choose, though you can of course switch to a DX (APS-C) crop at 1.5x which remains at a still useful 19MP. This is actually more useful than the Canon EOS R5’s APS-C mode, as Canon’s larger 1.6x crop results in a lower 17MP resolution despite the two cameras having very similar resolution. I shot for years with a Canon T1i (15MP), then a Canon 60D (18MP), and got a lot of great photos with both. The APS-C mode of the Z8 has more resolution than either of those.

You have a lot of cropping options with any shot:

I’ve been perfectly satisfied with the resolution point of the Nikon Z8.

Color Science

Every company has a slightly different approach to color science. Of the four major brands that I regularly use, I would probably rank Canon and Fuji in my top bracket with Sony and Nikon on the lower bracket, but with the recognition that there isn’t much of a difference. I can get beautiful portrait results with great skintones out of the Z8:

Images with a variety of colors look great, with nice saturation levels.

I would say that the optical glass in the lenses probably has more of an impact for me than the sensors in modern cameras. Put a Voigtländer on the Z8, and the colors just sing:

In fact, thanks to adapters like the Megadap ETZ21 Pro or the Neewer NW-ETZ, I can even shoot my Sony FE lenses (with autofocus) on the Z8. Want Sony G-Master quality on Nikon? No problem:

While Nikon can’t really match Fuji in the film simulation department, it does have a number of color profiles/”looks” in camera, and a number of those are interesting. There’s a wide variety of options, including a number of good monochrome options that filter certain colors for different looks.

All in all, this is a good sensor that isn’t class leading in any particular level, but competitive in them all.

You can check out a variety of images from different lenses in the image gallery here.

Conclusion

I had long been resistant to adding yet another camera brand to my kit, as I really don’t have enough time to cover the vast amount of new products that are continually making their way to the market, but when Nikon began to allow for more and more third party development, I knew that it was probably time to take the plunge. When I personally began to research their current offerings, I found that the Nikon Z8 was the camera that ticked the right boxes for me. It’s the kind of versatile, high performing camera that is a perfect match for the other cameras I use as tools for my business and for for my personal enjoyment.

I’m not personally a big fan of the integrated vertical grip style cameras, so discovering that the Z8 was essentially the flagship Z9 (vertical grip) in a more compact body told me all that I needed to know. The Z8 is not a small camera, obviously, and that was immediately apparent after I unboxed it, but I’ve also found the body to be tough and reasonably well laid out. After nearly seven months of use, I’m not convinced that I love all of Nikon’s ergonomic decisions, but I don’t hate them, either. It also feels like Nikon has largely caught up with the top competition in autofocus, as well, leaving me with a camera that I feel like I can use in basically all situations.

The Nikon Z8 currently retails for about $3800 USD, which isn’t cheap by any metric, but is certainly competitive with the other cameras in its class. This is a jack-of-all-trades camera that can be used effectively for everything from sports to portraits to landscapes to cinematography, so it is easy to justify the price…particularly if you make some money from your work. But even if you don’t the Nikon Z8 might be worth saving up for…particularly now that there are so many great lenses becoming available at reasonable prices. Put simply, after my first half year of ownership, I have no regrets.

Pros:

• A Nikon Z9 in a more compact body (essentially)
• Extremely versatile camera is pretty good at everything
• Tough, durable body with a professional level of controls
• Outperforms its specs in several areas
• VR feels more effective than higher specced Sony systems
• Excellent autofocus after firmware 2.0
• Excellent tracking capabilities
• No viewfinder blackout
• Good viewfinder performance
• Fantastic burst rates and (mostly) excellent buffer
• Does not penalize third party lenses
• Excellent video specs
• Strong sensor performance in all tested areas
• Solid price to performance ratio

Cons:

• Rotations are opposite to all other camera systems I’ve tested
• Some may find the body too large and heavy
• Reliance on rear wheel for adjustments isn’t as ergonomic as it could be
• Relatively little tilt options in the screen
• Video AF feels a little less confident than the best from Canon and Sony
• Video skin tones can skew a little magenta

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