Which telephoto for Nikon Z

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Charles B

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The lenses I have for my Z6ii are the 14-30mm f/4 S and the 24-120mm f/4 S. I'm now looking for a lens to increase my range up to 200 or 300mm but the lens needs to be reasonably light to take on trips. The subject will be mainly landscapes. Any advice gratefully received.
 
Thank you for the reply, Peter. A nice sounding lens. I suppose the only issue with this would be the 180mm maximum reach giving me a significant enough extension from the 24-120mm I have.
 
The Nikon Z 100-400 is a good pair for your existing lenses and will give you 400mm (or 600mm in APC-C crop mode), and can even take the Nikon Z teleconverters. I use mine quite a bit and it's tack sharp and super quick focussing. The only downsides is that a) it's not the cheapest as it is a S lens, and b) it's not particularly light or small (at just over 1400g).

The other option (and I've never tried this), is the Tamron 70-300mm f4.5-6.3 Di III RXD unit for Nikon Z. Seems to be a really lightweight and small unit.
 
Do you have the FTZ adapter Charles? If so, maybe the last iteration of the AF-S 70-300 4-5.6. I guess the 100-400 options have been ruled out because of the weight?
 
Charles B said:
The lenses I have for my Z6ii are the 14-30mm f/4 S and the 24-120mm f/4 S. I'm now looking for a lens to increase my range up to 200 or 300mm but the lens needs to be reasonably light to take on trips. The subject will be mainly landscapes. Any advice gratefully received.
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Tamron do a 70-300mm No VR, but you have IBIS in the Z6II, and it's only 545g.


But as you already have the 24-120, I would also consider, the Nikon 28-400 for occasional long lens use with the bonus that for days when you didn't want to change lenses, or you really needed minimal bulk and weight with maximum flexibility, you have an all in one lens available.

But, Peter's suggestion of the 70-180 is also a good choice, it really depends on your exact requirements. As I am also interested in wildlife, so I would go with the 28-400, but for more general photography I would go with the 70-180, but with the 70-300 Tamron possibly a good low weight/low cost compromise.
 
I had the FTZ when I moved over to the Z but then sold it along with the FX lenses, thinking I would only need to invest in Z lenses. As you say, the 100-400 weight rules it out for travel for me. I’ll check out the cost and weight of an adapter and the 70-300. Thanks again.
 
I'd also recommend the 100-400mm, It's got a greater focal range than you asked for, but it's quite compact, reasonably light and very versatile.
With your other two lenses, you would have a comprehensive set with adding the 100-400mm.
 
Yes, part of the issue there is that the cheapest I can find is £1700.
 
Charles B said:
Yes, part of the issue there is that the cheapest I can find is £1700.
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I thought you were looking for small and light.. If you are happy to consider the weight and size of the 100-400, then there are other options worth considering beyond those in my last post., and the 100-400 .e.g the 80mm to 200mm f2.8 would be an excellent general purpose lens, with excellent performance, which also works well with the 1.4TC. It's 1275g compared to the 1475g of the 100-400.

Or, for a lot less money, the Tamron 50-400 is also worth looking at, It's meant to be a step up in performance over the Nikon 28-400 and closer in performance to the Nikon 100 - 400, It's also a bit lighter than than the 100-400 at 1155g.
 
Thank you. For some reason I wasn’t notified of your first post, so have only just read it. I do think the weight is a bit of an issue but maybe not so important as most of my travelling around nowadays is on my mobility scooter as long as the IS of the Z6ii can cope with the weight of the lens. I wonder if the 70-180 would extend my range enough beyond the 24-120 to warrant it. Thank you for all the suggestions; I’ll look into them.
 
Both the 70-180 and the 100-400 will take tc's.
As others have said, the 100-400 takes some beating - it also has a very good mfd at all focal lengths.
 
Peter123 said:
Both the 70-180 and the 100-400 will take tc's.
As others have said, the 100-400 takes some beating - it also has a very good mfd at all focal lengths.
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I think the big advantage of the 70-180 or the 80-200 with TCs (over the 100-400) is that you are starting out with a fixed f2.8 aperture, so even with TCs, you still end up with an f4 or f5.6 maximum apertures.

For people, travel and landscape, I would prefer the 80-200 + 1.4TC, but for wildlife, especially dragonflies, and landscape, I would prefer the 100-400.
 
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