Best Lenses for Sony A7 +, 2017 Edition

I love my Sony A7. The A7r, A7II, A7IIr, and the upcoming A7III looks great, but the A7 it still hitting on all cylinders for me.

My love of this camera, quickly extends into love of lenses. With such a high-resolution camera, underperforming lenses really stick out like a sore thumb. This list is not about the best lenses money can buy, though it's not a budget list either. These are all solid performing lenses—ones that are worth the investment, that you'll want to grab every time.

General Purpose Lenses

Sony FE 35mm F2.8, $698

My favorite lens hands-down, and one of the smallest E-mount lens available. This makes it a great general purpose, travel, or street photography lens. It's compact and still relatively fast at F2.8, not to mention some of the best optics you can get at this focal length.

Sony FE 55mm F1.8, $898

This is one of the first lenses released, and still one of the sharpest. And the 55mm focal length makes it quite flexible for general use, street, and even some types of portrait photography. There's a new 50mm F1.8, $200 that has okay performance, but I wouldn't recommend it.

Sony FE 24-70mm F2.8 G Master, $2,198

This is probably the best all-around lens for the A7 series of cameras. The build quality and optics are perfect for the A7+ image quality. But, this lens is pretty heavy—it's 1.95lbs, where the Canon 24-70mm F2.8L is only 1.75lbs.

Now, there is the F4 version, and the variable F3.5-5.6 version, but neither have the performance to do justice for the A7+.

Landscapes

Sony FE 16-35mm F4, $1,248

This lens is a bit on the bulky side, but quite versatile at the wide end.

There are a few other great lenses ideal for landscape photography, such as the Zeiss Batis 18mm F2.8 and the Zeiss Batis 25mm F2. But, I've often found that a prime lens for landscape photography can be a bit limiting.

Action

Sony FE 70-200mm F4, $1,398

If you can deal with the F4 aperture, this is an okay lens. You have good reach with pretty good glass. However, F4 is still pretty slow if you're shooting moving objects. Using this lens for hummingbird photography in the middle of day still needed a pretty high ISO.

Sony FE 70-200mm F2.8, $2,598

This is big, heavy, and expensive; but it's the size of any other like DSLR lens. If you want performance and optics, you have to pay for it. But you won't regret having this lens.

Sony FE 400mm F4, TBD

The rumor-mill is buzzing about this upcoming lens. It promises to be solid optics at a crazy-high price.

Portraits

The traditional portrait focal length is a well traveled path in the industry. That means you have a lot of great options.

Zeiss Batis 85mm F1.8, $1,199

The entire Batis line is amazing, and this lens is no different. This lens has amazing optics and great bokeh. The one downside is the autofocus is a bit slow and sometime hunts in low-light while trying to focus, something that might not mater too much if using it for traditional portraits.

Sony FE 85mm F1.4 GM, $1,798

This lens is currently the highest rated lens on DxOMark for optical quality. It's likely the best portrait lens you can buy for the A7+ line.

Sony FE 90mm F2.8 Macro G, $998

Another heavy (literally) hitter from Sony. Heavy but solidly built, and great optics, this lens will likely be the top portrait lens for the A7+ line. This lens is #3 on DxOMark and the 2nd highest ranked portrait-length lens... for $800 less than #1. Oh, and the added bonus of 1:1 macro magnification. This lens is a must-have in your camera bag.

Sony FE 85mm F1.8, $598

I haven't tested this one, but a lot of the early previews say this is a great budget portrait lens. Right now it's only available for preorder, but should be shipping any time now.

Manual Lenses

I separated manual lenses out because I have a love/hate relationship with them. I love using them, but so often I miss the shot due to timing or focus. I know 'practice-makes-perfect'... but the A7+ series has a good autofocus engine, so I might as well use it.

I'd recommend any of the Rokinon/Samyang lenses if you're looking or manual focus fun. Good optics, modern quality, but affordable price. Best of all, you don't have to fight for vintage glass on eBay, worry about lens fog or mechanicals issues... just shoot.