LensTip.com

Faithful Readers of our website most likely know very well that taking landscape photos and shooting northern lights are two of my passions. If you want to indulge in such activities you have to use a lens that is aperture fast and, at the same time, provides you an angle of view on a level of 100 deg. It should also allow you to attach polarizers and ND filters. Accordingly, in the reflex camera times I took with me e.g. The Nikkor AF-S 20 mm f/1.8G ED, and in the era of mirrorless systems the Sigma A 20 mm f/1.4 DG DN and the Sony FE 20 mm f/1.8 G were my companions. All of these models performed exceedingly well because every one of them is a really well-put-together instrument.

Sony A7 IV + Sony FE 20 mm f/1.8G + Marumi ND1000. Photo by. A. Olech

Still, I found out that in some situation the angle of view, provided by different 20 mm devices, amounting to 94.5 deg, is simply a bit too narrow. I started to think that an instrument, providing an angle of a level of 105-110 deg, so a 16-17 mm lens, would fit my personal preferences far better.

Here I hit a snag. Many producers can jump from the 20 mm focal length straight to the 14 mm focal length, where you get an excellent angle of view, amounting to 114 deg, but almost all such constructions feature a big, convex front element that makes it impossible to use ordinary filters. In my case it means a disqualification – I hate carrying around, using, and then cleaning these rectangular filters.

Please Support Us If you enjoy our reviews and articles, and you want us to continue our work please, support our website by donating through PayPal. The funds are going to be used for paying our editorial team, renting servers, and equipping our testing studio; only that way we will be able to continue providing you interesting content for free.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - advertisement - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

That's why I was waiting for a launch of a model with a focal length ranging from 15 to 17 mm and as fast as f/1.8-2.0 with physical dimensions so moderate that you can take it along on longer trips and attach to it 67-77 mm class filters that don't ruin your wallet.

Viltrox was the first producer that managed to meet my expectations when it comes to autofocus lenses. In 2023 they launched the Viltrox AF 16 mm f/1.8 equipped with the Sony FE mount. In February 2025 Sony presented the Sony FE 16 mm f/1.8 G, filling in quite nicely a gap between the Sony FE 14 mm f/1.8 GM and the Sony FE 20 mm f/1.8 G, two lenses that had been present on the market for several years.

Still the weight and physical dimensions of the new model proved to be a huge surprise. I expected it to be bigger and heavier than the 20 mm device and I got a real midget instead – just compare it to other lenses in the following chart. I admit I got really keen on testing such a device and courtesy of the Sony company I got one specimen of this lens very quick for testing purposes – thank you very much!

You are also invited to get acquainted with our test procedure, described in the article "How do we test lenses?" If you feel it’s still not enough, please go to our FAQ section where you can find some further explanation.