The winners of the BCN Award 2025 have been announced. The awards, from the Japanese electronics industry retailers' association BCN Retail, are based on sales data from January to December 2024 and are awarded to the manufacturer with the highest sales volume in each category. There are dozens of awards dished out, as BCN Retail is the umbrella organization for the entire electronics retailers industry, but we're zeroing in on the awards for the Cameras and Optical Equipment categories.
Without further ado, here are the top three for each camera-related category (note that the images are for illustrative purposes – the awards don't go into detail of how well individual products sold).
Digital mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras
- Sony: 35.8%
- Canon: 26%
- Nikon: 14.5%
Sony claimed the crown as the top seller in the mirrorless camera category, as it did last year, and for the fifth time in total. Sony and Canon have been vying for top place for the past few years, and this year Nikon made it into third place, after being outside the top three for several years.
Digital SLR cameras
- Canon: 69.4%
- Nikon: 20.4%
- Ricoh Imaging (Pentax): 9.7%
Canon took first place in the DSLR category for the 19th time in a row and Nikon came in second, but with all the big manufacturers focusing their efforts on mirrorless cameras, it will be interesting to see how the SLR market shapes up in the future.
Digital compact cameras
- Canon: 23.4%
- Kodak: 21.2%
- Fujifilm: 15.8%
The fixed-lens camera category is mainly focused on compact digital cameras, and Canon has taken first place for the 19th time in a row, with Kodak closely behind. Fujifilm came in third, with its Instax Hybrid Instant Camera considered a digital camera for the awards.
Interchangeable lenses
- Tamron: 17.5%
- Sigma: 16.8%
- Sony: 15%
Tamron took first place for the first time, overtaking Sigma, who won the previous BCN Award 2024 and came second this time around. It is perhaps no surprise to see that both first and second spots were claimed by third-party lens makers, with Sony ranked third.
Action camera
- GoPro: 34.3%
- DJI: 32.1%
- Shenzhen Arashi Vision: 26.9%
GoPro has taken first place for the 10th time in a row. In Japan, GoPro has a strong brand presence as an action camera, but DJI is rapidly catching up.
Digital video cameras
- DJI: 48.1%
- Panasonic: 23.8%
- Sony: 23.4%
Dedicated video cameras include drones, and so it's no surprise to see DJI take the top spot.
Binoculars
- Kenko-Tokina: 31.2%
- Vixen: 23.5%
- Nikon Vision: 18.5%
And finally, Kenko-Tokina took first place in the binoculars category.
One caveat is that the data is only compiled from retailers that are signed-up members of the BCN Retail organization, and while this includes the majority of general electronics retailers, it does exclude some of Japan's most prominent specialist camera stores, including Yodobashi, Kitamura, and Map Camera.
