Nikon D700 Lenses
© 2008 KenRockwell.com. All rights reserved.

Nikon D700 with 50 mm f/1.4. enlarge. You can order it now at Adorama, Ritz or Amazon. I just ordered one for myself. It also comes kitted with the 24-120mm VR lens at Adorama, Ritz and Amazon. It helps me keep adding to this site if you use these links to get yours. Thanks! Ken.

July 2008     Also see my Nikon D3 Lens Suggestions  and  More Nikon Reviews

Click any of the pictures to get to individual reviews.

How Much to Spend?

Only you know that, but let me suggest that it's far better to spend money on lenses than on camera bodies. Whatever lenses you buy today will last you for many new cameras to come. For instance, I bought my 17-35mm back for use on my F100 film camera in April 2000, and it's still the best wide lens for most people today for the D700.

See Lens or Camera? and Is It Worth It? for much more.

Out of money? see Nikon Cheapskate Lenses.

DX Lenses

If you own DX lenses, they'll work on the D700, but don't buy DX lenses for the D700.

DX lenses use only the central 5MP portion of the FX sensor and viewfinder. That's not why you bought a D700. Even the D40 has 6MP in DX mode, and the D300 has 12MP in DX mode.

You'll get much sharper results and save $1,200 by using them on a D300 instead! See crop factor if this isn't making sense.

Normal Lens

50mm f/1.4 AF-D (about $290)

For photos of family and friends in any light without flash, the 50mm f/1.4 AF-D is unbeaten. It's what on my D3 most of the time. If you want to make the most of the D700's low-light ability, this $290 f/1.4 lens will smoke the $1,700 24-70mm f/2.8 you thought you wanted.

Cheaper

If you're buying a $3,000 camera and want the cheapest possible lens, the 50mm f/1.8D is also excellent. In all but the crummiest light, few people will have any reason not to love the 50mm f/1.8D, which costs less than half as much.

For about $120, the 50mm f/1.8D is among Nikon's sharpest and fastest focusing lenses, as well as their least expensive and lightest.

50mm f/1.8D (about $120)

Either of these 50mm lenses will give you the sharpness and low-light performance for which you're buying a D700. The only reason not to get the f/1.8 is because the f/1.4 is even better in low light, and if you're buying a $3,000 camera, you really ought to get the lens you really want.

Nikon no longer makes any good, reasonably priced midrange FX zooms. Nikon discontinued them all, whoops! I'll cover this below.

Tele

Nikon 70-200mm VR (about $1,700)

Nikon 70-300mm VR (About $500)

For a tele, pros use the 70-200mm VR, and you might prefer the much lighter (and one-third as expensive) 70-300mm VR.

Personally, I most often use my 80-400mm VR because of its extra reach, but its autofocus is too slow for action. If I was shooting sports, it would be the 70-300 VR in daylight and the 70-200 VR in dim light.

Wide

Nikon 17-35mm f/2.8 AF-S

Normal people want the professional 17-35mm AFS. Just get it.

Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8 AFS (about $1,600)

Personally, for landscapes and weird stuff, the 14-24mm is what I use all day, but I'm a weirdo. I use it because I usually shoot at 14mm.

The 14-24mm is huge, expensive and can't use any filters, even for protection, but it also happens to be the world's sharpest ultrawide fixed or zoom lens — by a huge margin. The 14-24mm is in a class by itself, so if you're going to worry about lens sharpness, you will only be happy with the incomparable Nikon 14-24mm. The 17-35mm, fixed 20mm f/2.8AF and 18-35mm get softer in the corners.

Cheaper Wides

It makes no sense to buy a $3,000 digital camera like the D700, which will be worth only $1,400 in three years, and cheap-out on lenses, which retain their value. Any lens you buy today ought to work great on your next camera, and the next. I bought my 17-35mm back in 2000 when it came out for use on film, and it's still the best lens going for the D700. Money spent on lenses is a much better than spending it on cameras.

That said, you can pay less and get great ultrawide shots.

If you don't have a grand, try the excellent fixed 20mm f/2.8AF for about $500 brand new. It's your best deal for an ultrawide for the D700..

Nikon 20-35mm f/2.8D (about $600 used)

The 20-35mm was Nikon's first ultra-wide zoom, made from 1993-2001 before the 17-35mm. It is an excellent. professional lens which sold for about $1,800 in 1993. Today, for about $600 used, it's a steal. I sometimes use one when I don't feel like lugging around the larger 17-35mm or behemoth 14-24mm. Of course the fixed 20mm f/2.8AF still weighs less and costs less, brand new, and is at least as good optically.

Nikon 18-35mm f/3.5-4.5 (discontinued; was about $500 new, and now about $350 used.)

The plastic 18-35mm is a fine lens. It was discontinued in 2006. I'd skip it simply because it's pretty plasticy compared to the others. It just doesn't feel right on a solid camera like the 20-35mm does. The 18-35mm was intended for lightweight film cameras, and works swell on the D700.

Caveat: the 14-24mm is the only ultrawide lens that's completely sharp in the corners at large apertures. All these other ultrawides, as well as the ultrawides of other brands, get fuzzy in the corners wide open if you worry about these things. Many people thought they got defective lenses, while this simply was state-of-the-art before the 14-24mm. The reasons I suggest the 17-35mm over the 14-24mm are not for optical performance, but for smaller size, more practical zoom range and the ability to use both protective (UV) and creative (polarizer and grad) filters. The 14-24mm is spectacular optically, but still a special-purpose lens not for the timid.

Midrange Zooms

Yikes: I just looked, and Nikon no longer makes any good midrange, midprice zooms! Nikon discontinued all the good ones while amateurs were off shooting nothing but DX digital cameras for the past few years.

Nikon 24-120mm VR (about $510)

The 24-120mm VR is as close as Nikon gets. The only other midrange, midprice zoom still made today is the sucky $500 24-85/2.8 AF, which was replaced by the superior and less expensive 24-85mm AFS in 2002. Nikon oddly discontinued the newer 24-85mm AFS, and still sells the older, softer 24-85 AF today!

Nikon kits the D700 with the 24-120mm VR, since it's Nikon's closest to a do-everything FX zoom, but it's among Nikon's least sharp lenses. The 24-120 VR is the best thing in Nikon's depleted catalog today, but it's not the lens I'd get. The 24-120mm VR isn't likely to get you the sharpness and low-light sensitivity for which most people want a D700. VR is nice, but no replacement for the slow f/5.6 aperture at 120mm. Forget stopping motion with the 24-120mm VR. Also, there is a teeny-tiny bit of shutter lag when VR is turned on, something nice not to have when shooting moving targets.

When I got my D3, the first lens I pulled out for general walking around was the 24-120 VR, since it looks great on paper. I didn't like it. The vignetting is obvious at 120mm (unknown if the correction of the D700 fixes this), and it's soft in the corners at 24mm, even stopped down. Look at Nikon's MTF curves: it's supposed to be awfully soft in the corners; it's not just my sample.

Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 AFS (about $1,700)

Nikon's only good midrange zoom still made today is the superior professional 24-70mm f/2.8 AFS, but that sells for $1,700. Nikon dropped out of making inexpensive midrange zooms in 2006. Too bad, because some of them were great.

Hint 1: Get over buying a midrange zoom today. This isn't as bad as you think. Few, if any, pros use mid-range zooms like the 24-120 VR or 24-70mm f/2.8. Most use a wide zoom and a tele zoom, and maybe drop a 50mm in their pocket for low light.

Even at f/2.8, the $1,700 24-70mm AFS is nowhere near as good in low light as the $120 50mm f/1.8D. Try it and see.

I never use a midrange zoom. For almost all my walking around and family photos, I use the 50mm f/1.4 D. The fast f/stop lets me stop action in any sort of darkness, all with clean, creamy and sharp images at the high ISOs so easy for Nikon's FX cameras.

Hint 2: When I use a midrange zoom with my D3, I kid you not, I use the cheap plastic 28-80 G if I want sharp results, great macro and instant autofocus (faster than the 24-120 VR). I use the 28-200 G if I want to cover all focal lengths very sharply and have decent macro, but the AF of the 28-200 G isn't all that fast.

Neither of the 28-80 G and 28-200 G are made anymore, which is why Nikon isn't pushing them. Each is a cheap plastic lens likely to break off the D700, but with stellar performance. Worse, if I grab a pro body by one of these plastic cheapies, I fear I could drop the camera if I crack the plastic lens mount!

Hint 3: For a good midrange zoom that won't fall apart, try a used 24-85mm AFS or 28-105mm AF-D. Adorama often has these used.

Manual Focus Lenses

Any AI, AI-converted or AI-s lens works great on the D700, if you don't mind focusing by hand and losing program and shutter-priority exposure modes. You still get full color Matrix metering, Aperture-priority automation and full EXIF data with old manual lenses if you enter the lens data via the menus.

Some manual lenses are sharper than their AF counterparts, for instance, the 80-200mm f/4.5n AI is the sharpest tele zoom I've tested, if you worry about lens sharpness. I paid $150 for mine used.

See Nikon Lens Compatibility for what does what on the D700.

PLUG

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