Last updated October 2022

Introduction

Voigtlander has been on a spree releasing impressive new lenses for M-mount, and one of these is an updated version of their 50mm f/1.5. The 50/1.5 II promises to deliver higher performance than its predecessor despite losing both size and weight, partly thanks to a double aspherical element. In this review we’ll see just how well the new 50/1.5 performs, and we’ll be comparing it against its closest Leica equivalent: the legendary Leica 50/1.4 Summilux ASPH (review). One might assume that the Voigtlander can’t possibly be as good. The Voigtlander is significantly cheaper, smaller, and lighter than the Leica. It also doesn’t have a floating group like the Leica does, which helps to control spherical aberration at close distances. But keep in mind, the Summilux’s design is 16 years older, and this new Voigtlander lens has a double aspherical element. Let’s see how they compare!

Size and feel

The Summilux is a slightly long and heavy lens but still handles well, and easily fits into any camera bag. Yet the Voigtlander is still roughly half the size, and less than half the weight. For travel, this is a clear advantage to the Voigtlander. I also enjoyed how the camera feels in hand slightly better with the Voigtlander. Do note that the other versions of the Summilux (black, black chrome) are lighter. Also, the Leica has built-in hood, which the Voigtlander lacks.

To emphasize just how compact the Voigtlander is, here it is compared to the Zeiss 50mm f/2 Planar ZM:

Build quality and mechanics

With all-metal construction, the Voigtlander feels just as solid as any Leica lens.

The Voigtlander focus ring has no tab, and is perfectly smooth but with heavy resistance, which is not my preference. The focus ring on my Summilux is stiff and slightly sticky, which I’ve read is a common problem and makes it difficult to focus using the tab. So neither lens is perfect for me (I like using a focus tab that moves easily like butter) but the Voigtlander’s focus ring feels better than the Summilux.

The aperture rings feel perfect on both lenses.

Image quality

Distortion: The Voigtlander appears to have some slight pincushion distortion in the corners. This amount of distortion doesn’t bother me.

Vignetting: Both the Voigtlander 50/1.5 and Leica 50/1.4 have significant vignetting wide-open, which is expected. But the Voigtlander has extra vignetting when used uncoded, so I recommend selecting an in-camera profile or correcting for vignetting with Lightroom.

Lateral chromatic aberration: Minimal/none.

Bokeh: Out-of-focus regions with the Voigtlander 50/1.5 look great wide-open:

Transition zones (areas just in front/behind the focus plane) are a different story. The Voigtlander’s transition zones often look hazy, as seen in this sample at f/1.5:

Longitudinal chromatic aberration (AKA spherochromatism): The Voigtlander also has a lot of green/magenta longitudinal CA. In this example with the Voigtlander at 0.7m, we can see both the haziness of the background transition zone as well as significant chromatic aberration, which causes areas of contrast to have a green glow:

For comparison, here’s a picture taken with the Summilux ASPH at f/1.4:

The Leica’s transition zones don’t have the haziness that the Voigtlander creates, and there’s also obviously better control of longitudinal chromatic aberration. This is unsurprising given that Peter Karbe describes the 50 Summilux ASPH as an apochromatic design.

Sharpness: infinity

Both lenses are sharp wide-open in the center and midframe (not shown). They also both get soft in the edges/corners wide-open, but the Voigtlander looks slightly worse to my eyes.

Given that the Voigtlander isn’t sharp across the frame at f/1.5, let’s take a closer look at another example at various apertures:

For distant subjects, the Voigtlander 50/1.5 really needs to be stopped down to f/4 for edge-to-edge sharpness. The Summilux also sharpens up edge-to-edge right at f/4.

Sharpness: 2 meters

Both lenses look great in the center wide-open. In the mid-frame, the Leica actually has quite poor performance at close distances, and isn’t even sharp by f/2.8. This is disappointing as the mid-frame is where your subject is placed when using the rule of thirds. The Voigtlander on the other hand has no trouble here with consistent sharpness across the frame even at f/1.5. I did more testing and found that at intermediate distances, the Voigtlander is sharp at f/1.5 all the way into the corners. Here’s an example at 3 meters:

And here are some crops to show how details look in real-world use:

Image quality comparison: 0.7m

The result at 0.7m is exactly as expected: the Leica’s floating group allows perfect correction for spherical aberration, which in the Voigtlander causes some contrast loss. As a result, the Leica is slightly sharper wide open at 0.7m. The Voigtlander’s spherical aberration also causes a slight rearward focus shift here, though it’s not significant enough to really bother me.

Despite the Voigtlander being worse than the Leica at 0.7m, it’s still completely usable even at f/1.5:

Focus shift:

The Voigtlander has more focus shift than the Leica at 0.7m but it’s not really enough to cause any problems in real-world use.

Summary and recommendations

So how good is the new Voigtlander 50/1.5 II compared to the legendary 50 Summilux? Optically, they each have their strengths and weaknesses. The Voigtlander excels at mid-distances, where the image stays sharp corner-to-corner even at f/1.5. Interestingly, performance is very different at far distances, where the periphery isn’t sharp until f/4. And at 0.7m, some spherical aberration is apparent at f/1.5. With the Summilux, although the center is always tack-sharp, there’s never much resolution to speak of in the outer half of the frame without stopping down to f/4. Where the Leica excels is in its rendering. Transition zones look nicer with the Summilux, and longitudinal chromatic aberration is better controlled. Overall, I’d say I slightly prefer the image quality of the Leica, but it’s close. And neither has the consistent image quality of a 50mm f/2 lens such as the Zeiss Planar or Leica Summicron.

When aspects outside of image quality are considered, the comparison becomes much more favorable for the Voigtlander. It’s drastically smaller, lighter, and cheaper than the Leica. Taking this into account, it’s highly impressive that the Voigtlander’s image quality is neck and neck with the 50 Summilux.

So who is the Voigtlander for, and who should opt for the 50 Summilux? I would choose the Summilux for things like portraits and weddings, where its clean focus falloff and floating element will really shine. For a more general-purpose 50mm, it’s difficult to recommend the Summilux when the Voigtlander delivers image quality that is at least as good in a majority of situations. In my opinion, the strongest reason to opt for the Summilux is the Voigtlander’s hazy transition zones, and it ultimately comes down to personal preference whether this is a big enough deal to justify the Summilux’s added size, weight, and cost.

An important question to ask is whether you actually need f/1.5, or if you’re just lusting after wide apertures. For my photography, a 50mm f/2 lens provides plenty of light and subject separation. Here’s a test comparison between the 50/1.5 II and a 50/2 lens:

There is a difference in the amount of blur, and some people will care about this. But to me a 50/2 lens is plenty effective at isolating my subject. The Zeiss 50/2 Planar (review) and the Leica 50/2 Summicron (review) are two fantastic options for 50mm that deliver fantastic image quality in a compact package. They have more consistent sharpness than either the Voigtlander 50/1.5 or the Leica 50/1.4 and are a very practical choice if you don’t need the extra f-stop. The Voigtlander 50/2 APO (review) is a little less compact but offers extreme image quality at a reasonable price.

Personally, I will stick to using a 50/2 lens in the long term, but this 50/1.5 is so small and fun that I’ll miss it when it’s gone.

Good
Amazingly compact
Corner-to-corner sharpness at f/1.5 at most distances
Build quality
Price

Bad
Soft periphery at infinity until f/4
Messy transition zones
More longitudinal chromatic aberration than Leica

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Other alternatives (not recommended)

Leica 50mm f/2 APO-Summicron ASPH
This lens offers similar performance to the Voigtlander 50/2 APO and is slightly better in terms of size and ergonomics. But that’s not enough to overcome its price tag of over $8000.

Voigtlander 50mm f/3.5 Heliar
This lens offers optical perfection with a fairly limited f/3.5 aperture in a tiny but odd-looking package. For a similar price you can just get the Zeiss 50/2 Planar, so I’m not sure who this lens is for.

Zeiss 50mm f/1.5 Sonnar
Voigtlander 50mm f/1.5 Heliar
These lenses use vintage optical designs and should only be used by those who intentionally want soft, dreamy images with lots of aberrations. They also have very strong focus shift, which makes them a pain to use on rangefinders.

Additional reading

Review by Bastian K
Fred Miranda’s review
Review by 47 Degrees
Massive 50mm comparison by 47 Degrees