Updated December 2022

Introduction

Since switching to Leica about seven years ago, I’ve almost never used focal lengths beyond 50mm. The only M mount telephoto lens I had used prior to this review was the wonderful Zeiss 85/4 (review), which I bought almost entirely for landscapes. I don’t shoot a lot of subjects that benefit from long focal lengths, and I’ve instead been drawn to wide lenses like 21mm, 28mm, and 35mm.

One of the most common uses for a medium telephoto lens is portraits, but even for this role I prefer the look of a 50mm. Here’s a side-by-side of the same portrait, taken with a 50/2 and 90/2:

Many photographers prefer the greater degree of subject isolation that the telephoto lens creates, but I personally find 50mm portraits more interesting. I also think that the perspective of 50mm portraits looks more natural, whereas telephoto portraits look too flat. And even if I liked the images from the 50mm and 90mm equally, the 50mm is easier to use both in terms of focusing and motion blur.

I bought the Leica 90mm Summicron APO for two reasons. First, to try a new Leica lens and write a review of it. Second, I wanted to force myself to use a telephoto lens more and see how it expanded my photography.

About the lens

The 90 APO-Summicron-M ASPH was introduced in 1998. It uses five elements with block focusing. It’s similar in design to its non-ASPH predecessor but adds a single aspheric element as well as special glass. This was actually the first Leica lens to use a polished asphere (as opposed to pressed) which allowed the use of special glass needed for the apochromatic design.

Build quality

As expected for Leica, the build is all-metal and perfect. The slide-out hood feels nice as well.

Size and feel

The 90 Summicron is definitely a large and heavy lens by M standards. I frequently regretted having the weight of this lens in my bag after carrying it for a full day. It also feels quite front-heavy on my M10. But for a 90mm f/2 lens, it’s impressively compact, especially considering it has a built-in hood. I don’t think it’s physically possible for a 90/2 to be much smaller. For comparison, look at how large the rare Zeiss 85mm f/2 ZM is, or the 1950-1980s version of the 90 Summicron.

The 90 Summicron is a good example of how thoughtfully Leica positions focus and aperture rings. Other lens makers would have the aperture ring towards the front of the lens, which is awkward to use on a lens this long. The 90 Summicron is instead engineered so that the focus and aperture rings are close to the camera body, which is nicely ergonomic.

The focus ring feels perfectly smooth with relatively heavy resistance. The focus throw is much longer than my other lenses: most lenses have about 90º, whereas the 90 Summicron turns about 140º from 1m to infinity. The long focus throw combined with the heavy resistance make it a lot less quick and instinctive to focus than my other M lenses. However, the long focus throw is probably necessary given how razor thin the depth of field is at f/2.

Focusing

One of the first things I noticed with the 90 Summicron is how difficult it is to achieve perfect focus with the rangefinder. Depth of field at f/2 is extremely thin. By my math, it’s as thin as the depth of field for a 50mm f/1.1 lens. Even though my eyesight is better than 20/20, I found myself missing critical focus at f/2 at least 20% of the time. With all of my other M lenses, that number is 0%. If I were to keep using the 90 Summicron long term, I would probably invest in either a viewfinder magnifier or EVF.

Viewfinder blockage

There isn’t significant blockage at infinity with the hood retracted. If you extend the hood or focus closer, you start to lose a little bit of the bottom right corner.

Minimum focus distance

The 90 summicron focuses to 1m. This may seem pretty far, but for 90mm this isn’t bad. I never felt a need to get closer. Here’s what 1m looks like:

Image quality

Distortion: Minimal/none.

Vignetting: Minimal/none.

Bokeh: Foregrounds and backgrounds look great with this lens. Here are some samples at f/2:

The only complaint I have is that bokeh from point sources of light shows significant “onion rings” due to imperfections of the asphere. I suspect this is related to the fact that the 90 Summicron’s aspherical element is made with a process from 20+ years ago. This rarely matters but here are two pictures where I noticed this issue:

Flare: With sunlight hitting the front element, the 90 Summicron can generate significant flare which can be used to add character to images. I can’t imagine flare being an issue with this lens, since the built-in hood is always there when you need it.

Longitudinal chromatic aberration: As expected for an apochromatic lens, spherochromatism is well controlled. This is probably the most special aspect of this lens’s performance compared with 85mm lenses from Canon, Sony, etc.

Just for comparison, here’s a side-by-side crop with the Voigtlander 50 APO-Lanthar:

Purple fringing: Very well-controlled. It’s basically undetectable in the following waterfall photo, which is a challenging test for purple fringing.

The only time I saw significant purple fringing was around the lightbulbs in the following photo. It disappears at f/2.8:

Lateral chromatic aberration: This is already a non-issue on digital since Lightroom automatically corrects for lateral CA, but I see absolutely none even with correction turned off.

Sharpness, infinity:

Sharpness is consistently excellent from center to corner at f/2. Sharpness does improve at f/4 but not much improvement is needed. This is an impressive performance but not unheard of for a medium telephoto prime.

Sharpness, 2.5m:

Sharpness is more or less the same at 2.5m, except that I noticed a slight amount of decentering with my copy. This means that at f/2, some of the corners were sharper than others. I’ve shown samples from the best and worst sides to illustrate the range. I have a theory that the process for centering the lens elements only takes measurements at infinity, which is why my copy looks perfect at infinity but not 2.5m.

Sharpness, 1m & focus shift:

Center sharpness remains excellent at f/2 at 1m. At this distance, there is a detectable amount of focus shift from f/2 to f/4 but I doubt this would ever be significant for most photographers.

Summary and recommendations

The 90 Summicron APO is a great lens. The image quality is excellent, especially when it comes to controlling chromatic aberrations. The size and weight are significant but this is as good as it gets for a 90mm f/2 lens. Ergonomics and design are fantastic. It’s particularly impressive how good this lens is considering Leica released it back in 1998. In terms of cost, the retail price of $5195 is quite absurd, but used copies sell in the $2000-$3000 range which is reasonable for a Leica lens. If you’re looking for a 90mm f/2 lens for M mount, the APO Summicron is a great choice. (It’s also the only choice currently in production.)

I enjoyed forcing myself to shoot more telephoto images with the 90 Summicron. The subject isolation that a telephoto provides caused me to examine subjects that I don’t normally photograph, and I think my skillset has benefitted as a result. I enjoyed using 90mm enough that I’m considering permanently adding one to my bag. But the 90 Summicron isn’t the right 90 for me. This has nothing to do with the lens itself, and is all because of the downsides inherent to a 90mm f/2 rangefinder lens. It’s too large and heavy for me, and I wasn’t comfortable using the rangefinder to focus at f/2. And while I occasionally benefitted from the f/2 aperture, most of the time it was unnecessary. A 90mm f/2.8 lens, such as the new APO-Skopar from Voigtlander, would make much more sense for me.

Would I recommend this lens to others? Personally, I don’t think it makes a ton of sense to opt for the 90mm f/2 unless you’re willing to use a viewfinder magnifier or EVF. A magnifier means limiting yourself to 50mm lenses and longer, or frequently having to attach/detach it. For most people, it probably makes more sense to opt for a slower 90. The Voigtlander 90mm f/2.8 APO (review) is my personal favorite because of its beautiful image quality in a remarkably compact and lightweight package. The Zeiss 85mm f/4 (review) is another excellent alternative, if you don’t mind being limited to f/4 and catching a little bit more than the 90mm framelines. There are also several alternatives from Leica. The discontinued 90 Summarit is significantly smaller and lighter than the Summicron but almost as fast at f/2.4. The 90mm f/2.8 Elmarit-M (also discontinued) is essentially a slimmed down version of the Summicron, and is loved by many for its balance of image quality, speed, and ergonomics.

For those who really want a 90mm faster than f/2.8, another alternative is to simply accept that rangefinders aren’t optimal for this role, and cover it with a different camera system. Lenses such as the Canon RF 85mm f/2 and Sony 85mm f/1.8 have similar performance to the 90 Summicron APO, with the exception of apochromatic correction. One of these lenses and a matching body would cost less than the Summicron, and the autofocus and image stabilization would make it much easier to reliably get sharp, in-focus images. And for those who want apochromatic correction, an SL body with the SL APO-Summicron 90 would be the ultimate solution, although pricey.

Good
Fantastic image quality, especially chromatic aberration correction
Build quality
Size and feel (for a 90mm f/2 lens)
Price (used)

Bad
Price (new)

Buy here

Making this website is my hobby and hosting it costs $200/year. If you decide to buy this lens and want me to get paid a commission, please complete your purchase using one of my links. Alternatively, you can buy something from my accessories page or buy me a coffee!

Additional reading

PC Mag review
Review by Joeri van der Kloet
Review by Simon King
Review by Pebble Place

Other alternatives

Leica Summilux 90mm f/1.5 ASPH
I have no doubt this lens is amazing, but it sounds incredibly awkward to use on an M body. It’s also $13,695 retail. For those who truly need such a fast telephoto lens, it would make vastly more sense to get a Canon body and the RF 85mm f/1.2.

Leica Macro-Elmar-M 90mm f/4
From what I hear, this lens offers the same image quality as the Zeiss 85mm f/4, in an even more compact collapsible package. I’m sure it would be amazing to carry this lens around for landscapes and travel. But I’ll never know, since it costs almost four THOUSAND dollars retail despite having only four elements, no aspheres, and no special glass.

Voigtlander 90mm f/3.5 LTM
Leica Elmar-C 90mm f/4
Minolta 90mm f/4
There are a lot of vintage, compact, modest-aperture telephoto lenses for M mount or LTM such as the three listed above. I would have a hard time recommending any of them over the Zeiss 85mm f/4, since they have worse image quality and no real advantage other than a slight edge in price. These older lenses also tend to have lots of issues with haze and fungus.

More sample images