Sony sold the most full-frame cameras in Japan this year, as the Canon EOS R and Nikon Z7 can't keep pace with Alpha
(Image credit: Digital Camera World)
While the western world was tying itself in knots buying all the Black Friday bargains, something very important happened in Japan: it was revealed that Sony sold more full-frame cameras than anyone else in 2019, overtaking Canon for market share.
In short, this means that Sony has won the full-frame mirrorless race in 2019; despite their best efforts, the Canon EOS R and Nikon Z7 simply couldn't keep paces with the awesome sales of Sony's Alpha cameras.
The news comes courtesy of BCN+R, the Japanese retail analysis service that monitors point of sale data in the nation. In its report, BCN+R announced that Sony now holds dominant market share of 38% in the full-frame arena, followed by Canon at 36% and Nikon at 24%.
This is in stark contrast to 2018, which saw Canon hold a 37.8% share, Sony 31.6% and Nikon 29.1%.
"In September last year, Nikon launched the Z7, Nikon entered the market with Z mount, Canon entered RF mount, Panasonic, Sigma and Leica with L mount," said the report (machine translated).
The BCN+R data shows Sony (blue) in first, Canon (peach) in second, Nikon (grey) third for full-frame sales (Image credit: BCN+R)
"However, Canon and Nikon have already been brilliantly defeated, partly because they have been wary of fighting against the full-size model that is being developed with a single-lens reflex camera. Even if the full size model of mirrorless and single-lens reflex camera is added up, the result is that only Sony is growing after all."
So, despite Canon and Nikon launching their own full-frame mirrorless systems AND combining those sales with sales of their full-frame DSLRs (which Sony does not make), Sony still beat them with mirrorless alone.
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What is interesting, however, is that between the 'big three', full-frame cameras are an incredibly small part of the puzzle (albeit the most profitable). According to BCN+R, full-frame only accounts for 10.4% of sales (6.4% of that being mirrorless, 4% DSLR); APS-C cameras account for 89.6% (55.7% mirrorless, 33.9% DSLR).
Still, the fact that Canon is no longer the king of full-frame imaging is a pretty significant milestone. Christmas has come early for Sony!
What do you think – did Sony only win because its mirrorless cameras had a head start? Will canon and Nikon turn it around next year, now that the RF and Z mounts have matured? Or is APS-C the real battleground worth fighting for? Have your say on the DCW forums!
James has 22 years experience as a journalist, serving as editor of Digital Camera World for 6 of them. He started working in the photography industry in 2014, product testing and shooting ad campaigns for Olympus, as well as clients like Aston Martin Racing, Elinchrom and L'Oréal. An Olympus, Canon and Hasselblad shooter, he has a wealth of knowledge on cameras of all makes.
