Z 14-30 Review
Anthony Small
I hope that you found this review of the Nikon Z 14-30mm f/4 S to be helpful in making your decision! If you want to purchase the lens, you can thank Photography Life for all the work that went into this review by using any of our affiliate links below:
The next page of this review has some more sample photos from the Nikon Z 14-30mm f/4 S, followed by reader comments on the final page. Use the Table of Contents below the star rating to jump to the section you want.
As the second F4 zoom in the S series, it also has a retractable design like the Nikkor Z 24-70mm F4 S (announced along with the Nikon Z 7 and Z 6). It features 14 elements in 12 groups, four of which are extra-low dispersion (ED) glass and four have aspherical surfaces. Unlike the wildly convex front elements that are typical of ultra-wides, the Nikkor Z 14-30mm F4 S has a relatively flat front and is the first 14mm to accept standard screw-in filters (82mm). It also has Nano Crystal and Nikon Integrated coatings to help reduce flare and ghosting, while the front element has a fluorine coating to aid cleaning.
Given its compact size and ultra-wide focal length, the Nikon Nikkor Z 14-30mm F4 S achieves a good balance in optical quality, with high and consistent sharpness across the image field except when wide-open at F4.
When fitted to the high-resolution 45.7MP Nikon Z 7 body, it scores 24 Overall in our image quality rankings, putting the lens-camera combination on par optically with the larger, made-for-DSLR Nikon AF-S Nikkor 16-35mm F4G ED VR mounted on the Nikon D800E. (Although no longer made, the D800E is the best-performing Nikon reflex camera in our database.)
One metric for which this lens excelled is light transmission, measuring an average of 4.1TStop, which is an outstanding result for a lens like this, as well as a good indicator of its potential for well-controlled flare and ghosting.
With its expansive angle of view from 14mm to a moderately wide 30mm, this new model has wide-ranging appeal. It overlaps with a number of existing models, including some ultra-wide, high-speed lenses, as well as moderate-speed zooms with more conservative focal length ranges.
Designing a compact zoom lens with a 14mm focal length is pushing the technical boundaries to the limit, so the new Nikon is at a disadvantage when comparing its optical quality with that of the 16-35mm F4 models. Nevertheless, the benefits derived from such a wide angle of view from this new lens is likely to appeal to the same group that would otherwise purchase a 16-35mm zoom.
With its ultra-wide angle of view and truly compact dimensions, the Nikkor Z 14-30mm F4 S is without doubt a highly appealing solution. Couple that with a flat front and the ability to add 82mm screw-in filters, and the new Nikkor seems ideally suited to landscape and travel photography. While open -perture performance is a bit lacking, the lens performs pretty well only one stop down at all focal lengths, including at the vaunted 14mm focal length.
In this review, we have compared the Nikkor Z 14-30mm F4S to its closest rivals from other brands. Remember that the lenses are intended to be used on different camera systems and mounts, so the comparisons are not strictly applicable.
The 14-30mm f/4 S is the first wide-angle zoom for the Z series bodies (a 14-24mm f/2.8 S will follow in 2020). Unlike most wide-angle zooms, the Nikkor 14-30mm f/4 S is smallish and doesn't have a bulbous front element that precludes filters. So it's immediately intriguing to the Nikon Z6 and Z7 owner looking for wide angle options.
Again there's that "S" in the lens designation. Nikon's been saying that stands for "superior," or a high end lens specification (as opposed to a lesser consumer specification like the 18-35mm f/3.5-4.5G has). We'll get to whether the lens performs up to that "S" marketing claim in the performance section towards the end of this review, but it's interesting that Nikon is making a mirrorless full frame zoom they claim as high quality that's basically as small as the most consumer option the company made for DSLRs.
Overall the lens is 14 elements in 12 groups. The element positioning, shape, and size looks a bit different in this S lens than we typically see, though. There are four aspherical elements, plus four ED elements. Compared to that 18-35mm in the F-mount, the S lens seems to have slightly bigger inner elements (the ones that move for focus) and a larger and simpler rear element design (which is also very close to the image sensor).
Nano coating is on at least one element (along with the usual Super Integrated Coatings), and the front element is fluorine coated to reject water and dust. The lens has a 82mm filter thread and a fairly flat front element, which was a surprise to many. You can use filters on this lens, but at 14mm you're probably going to want thin filters so as not to vignette.
Nikon claims "extensively sealed against dust and moisture," and this seems to be accurate. The supplied HB-86 lens hood is a bayonet type, and not very deep, so it doesn't do a lot of shading of the front element. Inside we have 7 rounded aperture blades. The lens stops down to f/22.
The focus ring is narrow, unmarked, and closest to the camera. As with almost all mirrorless camera lenses, the focus ring is "fly-by-wire" and isn't mechanically linked to lens element movement. The focus ring can be repurposed on Nikon Z bodies to other functions (aperture, exposure compensation, etc.).
One issue I contended with over and over: the lens hood is easy to dislodge from the proper position on my sample. Given how tight the edges of that hood are to the coverage area, you'll end up with two opposite corners completely shaded when this happens. The lens hood on my 24-70mm f/4, which also doesn't have the lock button, is much more secure on that lens than the one that came with my 14-30mm.
When you're working fast at events (particularly in low light), you may not notice the askew lens hood right away. Nikon is literally saving pennies not putting the retainer on these hoods and requiring us to press a release button to unlock them.
I don't particularly like the "rotate to use" aspect of the lens, though I appreciate the bit of extra space it saves when traveling. Still, there's the potential for missing a shot if you don't immediately put the lens at the 14mm position after you take it out of your bag.
Both rings are smooth on my sample, and the build quality feels solid, a bit above that of the f/1.8G primes Nikon has made for the F-mount. The lens balances very nicely on the smallish Z bodies; it's hardly noticeable.
Nikon tries to market the lens as suitable for video. I'm not sure I agree with that, unless you're using the lens solely in autofocus mode. You're certainly not going to manually focus by wire in your video given the lack of good hysteresis in the fly-by-wire mechanism. Nikon seems to think that videographers will use the focus ring for aperture control in video, but it's difficult to be precise, in my experience.
Sharpness: Based upon Nikon's published MTF charts, I was expecting better. Those charts suggest at 14mm that we'd have very high sagittal sharpness across the frame, falling off with perhaps a bit of coma or spherical aberration out past the DX frame mark.
Those Nikon published charts also suggest the center is excellent wide open at 14mm, with high contrast, and that's very true on my sample. The center of frame is probably best at f/5.6, but f/4 is close. Both are what I'd call excellent. 30mm, however, has a completely different pattern: There's strong improvement from f/4 to f/5.6 in the center. Very strong improvement. I'd consider f/4 only very good at 30mm in the center, and the center only reaches excellence at f/5.6. This lens seems to perform best at 16-20mm, slightly less well at 14mm and 20-30mm.
Corners are not quite as good as I'd hoped (with a caveat). They're not at all terrible wide open, but they're distinctly different than the center at 14mm. Indeed, the extreme corners never really get close enough to the center performance, and that's true of both corrected and uncorrected lens distortions. So at 14mm and f/4, if I say the center is excellent, the corners would be fair to good. And at 14mm and f/8 if the center is very good then the corners are just good. Things improve at 16-20mm, where I'd say the corners are one "notch" higher (e.g. good becomes very good, very good becomes excellent). Again, once you get past 20mm, things tend to break down in my sample. The extreme corners never get out of the optical doldrums until f/11, by which time diffraction is stealing acuity on the Z7.
We're at f/4 here, and the sensor is as close to parallel to the barn as I could get it. What we're looking at below is the left side window and right side window on the vertical center line blown up. Both are sharp with lots of detail. That's what I mean when I say that the lens redeems itself in the side-to-side tests. It's really only the extreme corners where I start to have issues with the lens.
This lens, unlike the other S lenses I've tested, also seems to be a little different in character at different focus distances. Infinity is actually probably its worst distance in the extreme corners, but minimum focus distance also shows something similar. It's in the range most people would be using the lens that it does best.
These results aren't quite what I was expecting, though for a wide angle zoom they're not at all bad. Many would say they're quite good. Where I'd tend to be using the lens in landscapes or cityscapes or interiors (14mm and f/8) it actually does a very credible job, and without the field curvature and focus shift issues we often see in the wide zooms.
Note: a couple of people I trust have gotten 14-30mm f/4 S lenses that clearly have a lens element alignment (appears to be tilting) issue, as one or two corners show differing results, and the sharpness results appear to "wobble" a bit with zoom and focus. I'm basing my judgement on the sample I bought.
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