I bought the holy grail compact camera, the Sony RX1R II – and I regretted it

While there's no doubt that my Canon EOS R5 and EOS R6 II are some of the best full-frame mirrorless cameras money can buy, and I love them dearly and use them extensively for my work as a professional photographer, they aren’t the most pocketable.

Don’t get me wrong, as far as full-frame mirrorless models go they aren’t huge by any stretch – but they’re just too big to be my ‘daily driver’, as I’m really looking for something truly pocketable.

I want something that fits in a coat pocket, so I’m more inclined to bring it with me even on mundane trips to the grocery store or post office. You just never know when that perfect photo opportunity is going to present itself, and I want to have a portable camera with me to be able to capture it when that moment of genius strikes.

While the Sony RX1R II is the company's most recent full-frame compact camera, it released nearly a decade ago in November 2015! But it had a lot of promise and I had high hopes for it, with its huge 42.4MP sensor and beautiful fixed 35mm Zeiss Sonnar T* lens with a superb wide f/2 aperture and leaf blade shutter.

It also just looks beautiful and I’ve never felt cooler owning and using a camera. I could never get bored of popping up the electronic viewfinder, which feels like it’s been pulled straight out of a cyberpunk manga, and I’m so, so glad it exists!

However, for everything I love about the camera, there are drawbacks – from the rather dated, sluggish, contrast-detect autofocus to the omission of dust and water resistance and the lack of a tilting screen, which would really come in handy for the street photography I'd planned to use it for.

It also uses a tiny cell, and therefore has a pitifully poor battery performance – though I could look past this at least by carrying plenty of spares.

Of all the cameras on the market today, I could think of no other camera more deserving of an update. Honestly, a full-frame Sony compact with the same high-quality Zeiss lens, updated autofocus and a tilting display would fly off the shelves – and I’m crossing my fingers and toes that Sony comes to its senses soon.

Although I really wanted to love the Sony RX1R II, its limitations were too much for me to overcome and I sold it within six months. My search for a portable compact daily driver continues… come on, Sony, make a boy’s dream come true!

You may also like

Before you add a Sony RX1R II to your cart, compare the best full-frame compacts, or browse the best compact cameras.