the Winner is... tamron sp 85mm f/1.8 Di VC usd

Tamron tops our most wanted list of portrait lenses

for sheer excellence in image quality, the Sigma 85mm f/1.4 Art lens is the best in the group. However, it’s big, heavy and expensive. We actually prefer the Tamron 85mm f/1.8 lens. Despite being 1/3 of an f/stop slower, it still delivers exquisite bokeh and nearly matches the Sigma for sharpness, contrast and other attributes of image quality. Better still, it boasts a highly effective optical stabilizer, which is massively helpful in capturing consistently sharp portraits in dull light. All in all, it’s our favourite portrait prime for full-frame cameras.

The choice is similarly tricky when it comes to choosing a 50mm lens for portraiture with an APS-C format DSLR. Here, however, the Sigma 50mm f/1.4 Art lens’s noticeably superior image quality enables it to win out against the slower but stabilized Tamron 45mm. And if you’re on a tight budget, the Canon 50mm f/1.8 STM lens is absolutely unbeatable value for money.