AskMaddiLenses for Portraits
On the criteria portraits leans on — Bokeh, Optical Performance, Color Rendition, Chromatic Aberration, af_performance and Handling — here is how the reviewed lenses compare, with the sourced evidence behind each position. We don't crown a winner; we show the fit and let you decide.
Ranked on the evidence
Strongest reviewer support on Bokeh and Color Rendition.
- Bokeh+83%15▲ / 0▼ of 18 · low
- Optical Performance+62%64▲ / 9▼ of 89 · low
- Color Rendition+100%2▲ / 0▼ of 2 · low (thin evidence)
- Chromatic Aberration+40%2▲ / 0▼ of 5 · low (thin evidence)
- Handling+47%11▲ / 3▼ of 17 · low
"Really nice background blur, I really like it." — Grays Of Westminster Dx
Strongest reviewer support on Bokeh and Color Rendition.
- Bokeh+73%47▲ / 6▼ of 56 · low
- Optical Performance+72%87▲ / 8▼ of 109 · low
- Color Rendition+77%27▲ / 0▼ of 35 · low
- Chromatic Aberration+45%6▲ / 1▼ of 11 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Handling+79%34▲ / 1▼ of 42 · low
"the sharpness difference is very noticeable the background blur the bokeh is pretty close to identical so let's look at one more image and then we'll wrap up our thoughts now this image here is pretty boring but I did it…" — Alex Barrera Leica Summicron
Strongest reviewer support on Color Rendition and Bokeh.
- Bokeh+56%24▲ / 4▼ of 36 · low
- Optical Performance+54%65▲ / 16▼ of 91 · low
- Color Rendition+86%6▲ / 0▼ of 7 · low (thin evidence)
- Chromatic Aberration+37%12▲ / 5▼ of 19 · low (contested)
- Handling+68%13▲ / 0▼ of 19 · low
"I wanted to see how these two lenses stack up against each other when it comes to sharpness, image quality, bokeh, lens flare, all of that good stuff, and to hopefully answer the question for you guys on which lens you s…" — David Zhou The New
Strongest reviewer support on Bokeh and Color Rendition.
- Bokeh+65%25▲ / 3▼ of 34 · low
- Optical Performance+59%70▲ / 10▼ of 101 · low
- Color Rendition+75%13▲ / 1▼ of 16 · low
- Chromatic Aberration-12%3▲ / 4▼ of 8 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Handling+48%31▲ / 8▼ of 48 · low
"you an easy ride in this department but with this RF lens your outer Focus backgrounds will virtually always look beautifully smooth what they did in my tests anyway that really is wonderful to see and related to Baka is…" — Christopher Frost
Strongest reviewer support on Bokeh and Color Rendition.
- Bokeh+60%13▲ / 1▼ of 20 · low
- Optical Performance+55%22▲ / 5▼ of 31 · low
- Color Rendition+67%2▲ / 0▼ of 3 · low (thin evidence)
- Chromatic Aberration+0%2▲ / 2▼ of 12 · low (thin evidence)
- Handling+53%10▲ / 1▼ of 17 · low
"and super-fast f/1.2 aperture potentially serves as the holy grail for dreamy portraits with creamy bokeh." — Digitalcameraworld Cameras Lenses
Strongest reviewer support on Bokeh and Color Rendition.
- Bokeh+86%6▲ / 0▼ of 7 · low (thin evidence)
- Optical Performance+21%11▲ / 7▼ of 19 · low
- Color Rendition+100%2▲ / 0▼ of 2 · low (thin evidence)
- Chromatic Aberration-100%0▲ / 1▼ of 1 · low (thin evidence)
- Handling+67%4▲ / 0▼ of 6 · low (thin evidence)
"lens this lens provides plenty of depth to play with two thanks to that fast 1.8 aperture you can blur out busy distracting background or foreground elements and at 50 mm thanks to the tighter angle of view over say a 35…" — James Reader The Cheapest
Strongest reviewer support on Bokeh and Optical Performance.
- Bokeh+41%10▲ / 3▼ of 17 · low
- Optical Performance+59%31▲ / 7▼ of 41 · low
- Color Rendition+50%1▲ / 0▼ of 2 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Chromatic Aberration+0%1▲ / 1▼ of 3 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Handling+48%14▲ / 3▼ of 23 · low
"rendering a beautiful soft background you can use this for all kinds of Photography and I really like that about it as well furthermore the image quality that you get out of this lens is really good it's really super sha…" — Bart Jan Verhoef The
Strongest reviewer support on Color Rendition and Bokeh.
- Bokeh+24%10▲ / 4▼ of 25 · low (contested)
- Optical Performance+30%27▲ / 11▼ of 53 · low
- Color Rendition+50%4▲ / 1▼ of 6 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Chromatic Aberration-25%0▲ / 1▼ of 4 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Handling+15%5▲ / 3▼ of 13 · low (thin evidence)
"using before only has I believe it's 5 aperture blades so the bokeh is a lot rounder with this 100 millimeter lens there is some slight been getting when the lens is wide open at F 2.8 but this is easily corrected in Lig…" — Stewart Wood
Strongest reviewer support on Color Rendition and Optical Performance.
- Bokeh+13%18▲ / 13▼ of 39 · low
- Optical Performance+31%49▲ / 24▼ of 81 · low
- Color Rendition+33%4▲ / 2▼ of 6 · low (thin evidence)
- Chromatic Aberration+17%8▲ / 5▼ of 18 · low (contested)
- Handling+33%11▲ / 4▼ of 21 · low (contested)
"11 bladed aperture which is really nice if you're going to be stopping down for things like groups or anything like that you're not going to get that hexagonal or I mean whatever pattern you end up getting you're going t…" — Benj Haisch
Strongest reviewer support on Bokeh and Optical Performance.
- Bokeh+31%26▲ / 12▼ of 45 · low
- Optical Performance+25%35▲ / 18▼ of 68 · low (contested)
- Color Rendition+6%7▲ / 6▼ of 16 · low (contested)
- Chromatic Aberration+33%1▲ / 0▼ of 3 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Handling+15%10▲ / 6▼ of 26 · low (contested)
"But I still love the rendering coming out of this lens." — Bobby Anwar The Leica
Strongest reviewer support on Optical Performance and Bokeh.
- Bokeh+29%2▲ / 0▼ of 7 · low (thin evidence)
- Optical Performance+44%5▲ / 1▼ of 9 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Chromatic Aberration+0%0▲ / 0▼ of 2 · low (thin evidence)
"the focusing speed, bokeh and colour." — Admiringlight Blog
Strongest reviewer support on Handling and Bokeh.
- Bokeh+9%15▲ / 12▼ of 32 · low (contested)
- Optical Performance-20%26▲ / 43▼ of 83 · low (contested)
- Color Rendition+0%2▲ / 2▼ of 10 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Chromatic Aberration-9%2▲ / 3▼ of 11 · low (thin evidence)
- Handling+41%9▲ / 2▼ of 17 · low (contested)
"cameras let's see the aperture now what surprised me at this lens was the small number of aperture blades only five and they are not rounded we will see later how the bokeh looks like the lens can close its aperture at a…" — Aperture Atlas
Strongest reviewer support on Optical Performance and Bokeh.
- Bokeh+9%7▲ / 5▼ of 23 · low (contested)
- Optical Performance+22%38▲ / 22▼ of 74 · low
- Color Rendition-33%2▲ / 4▼ of 6 · low (thin evidence)
- Chromatic Aberration-25%3▲ / 6▼ of 12 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Handling+14%9▲ / 6▼ of 21 · low (contested)
"any in the other shots I took [Music] either even though this is an f2.8 zooms we have some nice background to foreground separation where Yasmin really stands out from the location especially espcially at the 35 to 50 m…" — Julia Trotti
Strongest reviewer support on Optical Performance.
- Bokeh+0%1▲ / 1▼ of 2 · low (thin evidence, contested)
- Optical Performance+30%5▲ / 2▼ of 10 · low (thin evidence)
- Color Rendition+0%0▲ / 0▼ of 2 · low (thin evidence)
- Chromatic Aberration-50%0▲ / 2▼ of 4 · low (thin evidence)
- Handling-33%1▲ / 2▼ of 3 · low (thin evidence)
"with a much wider lens the 1.8 aperture also helps this lens to work effortlessly in low light situations giving you more light faster shutter speed and impressive blurry background I as you can see from these sample sho…" — Theyo Larbi Nikkor
Side by side
| Camera | Bokeh | Optical Performance | Color Rendition | Chromatic Aberration | af_performance | Handling |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Nikon 16 50mm f2.8 | +83% | +62% | +100% | +40% | — | +47% |
| 2. Leica 50mm f2 | +73% | +72% | +77% | +45% | — | +79% |
| 3. Sony 100mm f2.8 | +56% | +54% | +86% | +37% | — | +68% |
| 4. Canon 70 200mm f2.8 | +65% | +59% | +75% | -12% | — | +48% |
| 5. Sigma 85mm f1.2 | +60% | +55% | +67% | +0% | — | +53% |
| 6. Canon 50mm f2.5 | +86% | +21% | +100% | -100% | — | +67% |
| 7. Olympus 60mm f2.8 | +41% | +59% | +50% | +0% | — | +48% |
| 8. Canon 100mm f2.8 | +24% | +30% | +50% | -25% | — | +15% |
| 9. Sony 85mm f1.4 | +13% | +31% | +33% | +17% | — | +33% |
| 10. Leica 50mm f1.4 | +31% | +25% | +6% | +33% | — | +15% |
| 11. Sigma 56mm f1.4 | +29% | +44% | — | +0% | — | — |
| 12. Canon 50mm f1.8 | +9% | -20% | +0% | -9% | — | +41% |
| 13. Sony 50mm f2.8 | +9% | +22% | -33% | -25% | — | +14% |
| 14. Nikon 85mm f1.8 | +0% | +30% | +0% | -50% | — | -33% |
Net reviewer sentiment per criterion (share positive minus share negative). A blank means no reviewer evidence on that axis for that camera — a gap, not a zero.
Not ranked — outside the criteria
- OM SYSTEM 12 40mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 40
- Sony 35mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Canon 35mm f1.4 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Canon 28 105mm f3.5 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 3.5
- Sigma 35mm F1.2 DG DN Art — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Canon 45mm f1.2 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 45
- Sony FE 35mm F1.4 GM — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Sony 20 70mm f4 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 4
- Zeiss 35mm f1.4 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Olympus 12mm f2 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 12
- Sigma 14 24mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 24
- Sony 16 25mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 25
- Sony 12 24mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 24
- Canon 18 200mm f3.5 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 3.5
- Canon 100 400mm f5.6 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 5.6
- Sony 100 400mm f4.5 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 4.5
- Canon 200 400mm f4 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 4
- Nikon 28mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 28
- Panasonic lumix s 35mm — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Sigma 16 300mm f3.5 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 3.5
- Panasonic 70 200mm f4 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 4
- Sigma 35mm f1.4 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Canon 16mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 16
- Sony 28 70mm f3.5 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 3.5
- Fujifilm 16mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 16
- Rokinon 35mm — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Sony 70 350mm f4.5 — require max_aperture <= 2.8: got 4.5
- Tamron 12 20mm f2.8 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 20
- Sigma 35mm f/1.4 DG DN Art II — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 35
- Sigma 23mm f1.4 — require focal_length_mm >= 50: got 23
Pending — a spec we're still sourcing
These earned a review card but are held out until we confirm a spec the criteria gate on. That is a data gap on our side, not a mark against the camera.
- GoPro hero11 — max_aperture: max_aperture not present on card; focal_length_mm: focal_length_mm not present on card
- DJI DJI Air 2S DA2SUE1 — max_aperture: max_aperture not present on card; focal_length_mm: focal_length_mm not present on card
Every position above traces to the reviewer claims on each product's card. We don't write opinions — we synthesize theirs, and we present fit rather than a verdict.