Comparison: Zoom vs Prime lens

The quality of your lens will also impact on the sharpness of your shots. With a fixed focal length and a constant aperture, prime lenses are optically superb, but can be expensive. For more versatility, look at using a zoom lens instead. These are generally more affordable than prime lenses, with image quality being the trade-off. Lowercost zoom lenses have variable apertures, which means reduced image quality when shooting at the longer end of the focal range.

ZOOM LENS

PROS

• Flexible: one zoom lens can do the job of two primes.

• Economical: two or more zooms can be all you need.

CONS

• Zoom lenses are not as ‘fast’ as primes, which have wider apertures.

• Performance falls off at the long end of the focal range.

PRIME LENS PROS

• Superb optical performance, especially with fast apertures.

• Less bulky than a zoom covering a similar focal range.

CONS

• You can only zoom in or out by moving your feet.

• Prime lenses with fast apertures will be expensive.