The Sony RX1R III ($5,099.99) is an exotically priced compact camera aimed squarely at professional photographers, serious hobbyists, artists, and well-heeled tech enthusiasts who don't mind paying a premium for miniaturization. It puts a 60MP full-frame sensor into a camera body that's small enough to slip into oversized pockets, and features a 35mm F2 prime lens for snapshots with beautifully defocused backgrounds. I like its redesigned EVF, but am less enamored with the fixed rear display and underpowered battery, so I continue to recommend the Fujifilm X100VI as our Editors' Choice among premium compact cameras. The X100VI ($1,799.95) isn't full-frame, and you might need to wait to get one (or be willing to pay above list price), but it tickles the same fancies, includes weather sealing, and features a hybrid optical-electronic viewfinder, all for about a third of the cost of the RX1R III.

Design: The Smallest, Lightest Full-Frame Compact

Sony took nearly a full decade to update the RX1R II to the point where I questioned if we'd ever see a sequel. It's common for a few years to pass between camera models, but eventually you just have to give up hope. But the RX1R II is a camera with a devoted following. I even spotted Sony's US President and COO, Neal Manowitz, using an old RX1R II at the a9 III launch event in late 2023. I asked Neal about it, and he told me that the RX1R II was his everyday camera for a decade, but it has been replaced by an RX1R III. Clearly, the series has fans in high places.

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The RX1R III features a redesigned body; it's not simply a repackaging with a newer image sensor and processor, although both are upgraded. The RX1R II used the 42MP BSI CMOS chip and processing engine from one of its contemporary ILCs, the a7R II. The RX1R III also borrows from existing cameras, using the 60MP BSI CMOS imager and Bionz XR engine from the full-size a7R V and compact a7CR. The RX1R III drops the tilting display from the previous edition, but comes with an improved EVF, and uses the same lens, a 35mm F2 Zeiss Sonnar that dates back to the original RX1. All and all, the latest edition is faithful to the series' core concept, and should feel familiar enough for RX1 devotees.

That concept involves packing as large a sensor as possible into a reasonably small camera. It's been copied by others, but full-frame competitors like the Leica Q3 and Q3 43 (3.2 by 5.1 by 3.7 inches, 1.7 pounds) are noticeably larger and heavier than the RX1R III (2.7 by 4.5 by 3.4 inches, 1.1 pounds). Its protruding 35mm F2 prime lens means that it's not quite pocketable (winter coats and cargo pants aside), so look to the recent APS-C format sensor Ricoh GR IV (2.4 by 4.3 by 1.3 inches, 9.2 ounces) if you want a camera you can slip into your jeans.

Like similar cameras, the RX1R III uses a prime lens. Its 35mm F2 captures a moderately wide angle, and is a favored focal length for what I like to describe as slice-of-life images. It can capture portraits that incorporate some of the environment to give a sense of place, and focuses close enough for 1:3.8 macro magnification. And since the 60MP sensor has so much resolution, the RX1R III includes a crop mode, effectively giving it digital zoom for 50mm (29MP) and 70mm (15MP) capture. The Leica Q3 and Q3 43 also use 60MP sensors and offer a similar feature, as does the 40MP Fujifilm X100VI.

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The RX1R III uses magnesium for its chassis and exterior, with a black anodized finish. Magnesium is tough, but lightweight, so it's a sensible choice. The camera also includes a small handgrip and rear thumb rest, both of which are rubber with a texture that works to reduce the chances of it slipping out of your hand. It feels a little cramped to me, but there are add-ons available to make the camera more comfortable. The Sony TG-2 Thumb Grip ($299.99) adds a better sculpted thumb rest to the rear, and you can go with a third-party option like the Wooden Sony RX1R III Grip ($137) or Sony's LCS-RXL Body Case ($249.99) if you prefer a larger front grip. I didn't get to try any of these during my review, so I can't speak to how they change the feel of the camera.

Sony does not include weather sealing in the RX1R III, which is disappointing given its price and appeal as a travel camera. I wouldn't hesitate to take it out for photos in light rain, but you'll want to stow it in a bag if you get caught in a downpour. This is one area where the pricier Leica Q3 and Q3 43 win out, as both are rated to IP52 standards. The Fujifilm X100VI is partially weather-sealed out of the box and fully protected if you add a protective lens filter.

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Controls: Everything You Need at Your Fingertips

The RX1R III may be small, but it leaves room enough for the tactile controls to satisfy experts, and includes automatic operation for visual artists who may not have as much technical know-how when it comes to ISOs and f-stops.

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The top plate includes discrete dials to set the capture mode and adjust EV compensation to brighten or darken a scene. There's also a Custom (C1) button that cycles through digital zoom settings by default, but may be reconfigured via the menu. The shutter release is on top in its expected place, and is ringed by the On/Off toggle. The shutter includes a thread that works with soft release buttons and mechanical release cables.

The rear includes AF-ON/Magnify, C2, Fn, Menu, Play, and Delete/C3 buttons, along with two command dials. The topmost dial sets the shutter speed, and the flat rear dial is used for menu navigation and to scroll through pictures during playback. The latter also supports directional presses to toggle exposure information (Disp.) and adjust the sensor sensitivity (ISO).

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There are also a couple of on-lens controls. The permanently affixed 35mm F2 includes an aperture ring that goes from f/2-16 with third-stop clicks (there's no option for clickless operation), along with a ring to change between the macro (0.2-0.35m) and standard (0.3m-infinity) focus ranges, plus a manual focus ring, an arrangement that's unchanged from earlier models in the series. I'm sure that longtime RX1 users will find it comfortable, though I tend to fumble around and twist the wrong ring when I'm trying to set the f-stop or focus range. I wish Sony had done more to make them feel a bit different, because as it stands, they have the same type of knurled ridges.

The manual focus experience is a mixed bag to me. I like that the focus ring responds without discernible lag, and that it features a nonlinear response so you can rapidly drive from close to distant subjects by turning it quickly, and use slower, deliberate movement for fine focus. But the EVF isn't quite sharp enough for me to nail focus without turning on automatic frame magnification, and since the lens isn't stabilized, the punched-in view shows every little bit of handshake, leading to jitter when trying to focus. Focus Peaking, which draws a colored highlight around the plane of focus, is available too, but I don't find it accurate enough to nail focus with the 60MP sensor. Autofocus works quite well (more on that below), but can struggle in darker environments.

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The menu system is refreshed so it's consistent with Sony's current line of interchangeable lens cameras. The full menu is color-coded and broken up into side tabs so it's less cumbersome to navigate than Sony's old top tabbed layout. It does a better job putting the most used settings at the surface, includes a configurable My Menu, and is more logically organized than Sony's old system. The on-screen Fn menu continues as before; it includes a dozen configurable slots so you can access the functions you use most while still keeping an eye on your shot. All in all, the menus are a huge improvement and provide a consistent experience if you are eying the RX1R III as a companion for a current-generation Alpha series full-frame Sony.

Displays: A Better Viewfinder and Worse Screen Than the RX1R II

The RX1R III drops the pop-up viewfinder from the Mark II in favor of a corner-positioned OLED EVF with the same magnification (0.7x) and resolution (2.4 million dots) as you get with the compact interchangeable lens a7CR. It's not the biggest or sharpest that you'll find in a premium full-frame camera. The Leica Q3, for instance, beats it (0.76x, 5.8 million dots), but Sony would no doubt have to increase the overall size of the camera to accommodate a larger EVF, and I don't miss the kludgy pop-up EVF from the RX1R II at all. Even so, I would have preferred that Sony made room for a sharper viewfinder, as it's tricky to set manual focus, even with the help of the aforementioned frame magnification assistant.

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I'm disappointed that the RX1R III drops the Mark II's tilting rear display in favor of a fixed panel. I often take photos at waist- or ground-level, and it's a challenge to see the fixed screen from off-kilter angles, which means that I had to get down low on the ground with the RX1R III. A hinged display would no doubt add some depth to the body, but I don't see that as a downside since the EVF already protrudes from the rear. Aside from the lack of articulation, the 3-inch touch screen is quite good. It's bright, sharp (2.4 million dots), and shows accurate colors. If you don't often take photos from low or high angles, you'll be less bothered by the fixed display, of course.

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If you're looking for a camera that matches the RX1R III in picture quality, but comes with an articulating display, I'll point to the interchangeable lens a7CR, a $3,499 body with a vari-angle touch display, plus in-body stabilization. At 2.8 by 4.9 by 2.5 inches and 1.1 pounds (without a lens) the a7CR isn't nearly as small as the RX1R III, but is a good alternative that costs less, even when you factor in the cost of a small lens like the Sony FE 40mm F2.5 G ($799) or Sigma 35mm F2 DG DN Contemporary ($719).

Power and Connectivity: Improved, But Still Poor Battery Life

The RX1 and RX1R II both suffered from horrible battery life. Sony addressed this head-on with the RX1R III, switching from the NP-BX1 power pack to the NP-FW50, a larger pack that Sony uses in its a6100 mirrorless and other APS-C sensor interchangeable lens cams. It's an improvement, but still falls short of what I want to see from a premium camera. The RX1R III gets a 270 EVF/300 LCD battery rating based on CIPA testing standards, but falls shy of those numbers in practice. I took it out for a day of photography with a 100% charge; six hours and 110 photos later, I had 50% left. Video puts even more stress on battery life; I recorded a 10-minute 4K24 clip and observed a 13% drop, which means you can expect about 45 minutes of record time with a fresh battery.

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What's worse is that the W battery loses power even when you're not using the camera. I did my first round of field tests on a Friday, and when I picked the camera back up on Monday morning to continue working on the review, I noted 29% left on the charge, a 21% drop over two days of inactivity. The Leica Q3 line (350 exposures) and Fujifilm X100VI (450 exposures) can go longer between battery swaps or charges.

You can keep the RX1R III topped off while on the go, as its USB-C charge port works with power banks, but if I were taking it out for an all-day photo excursion, I'd carry at least two fully charged spares to be safe. Sony doesn't include an external charging cradle, so you'll want to get one to speed up recharges at the end of the day. Sony charges an arm and a leg for a spare NP-FW50 ($94.99) and external charging cradle ($79.99), but since the battery has been in circulation for a good 15 years, you can easily find third-party alternatives for less.

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The camera doesn't include a built-in flash, but has a hot shoe that works with wireless transmitters and external flashes. I took some wireless flash photos with a Godox X3 transmitter and V100 flash, and tried the iT30Pro as an on-camera flash with great success. I especially like that the RX1R III uses an in-lens leaf shutter that syncs with flash at speeds as short as 1/2,000-second, which is better than the 1/250-second sync you get with most interchangeable lens cameras like the a7CR. Granted, the Leica Q3 series, Fujifilm X100VI, and Ricoh GR IV also use leaf shutters, so they're just as handy for flash photography. Among these, the X100VI is the only camera with a built-in flash.

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In addition to USB-C, the RX1R III includes a micro HDMI video output and a 3.5mm microphone input. It also includes Bluetooth and Wi-Fi and pairs with the Sony Creators' App for Android and iOS smartphones, so you can easily send photos and videos to your phone for on-the-go edits and sharing. The RX1R III has one standard UHS-II SDXC memory card slot and no internal storage available.

Autofocus: Subject Recognition Finds Its Target With Speed

The RX1R III benefits from the great leaps that Sony has made with its autofocus system since the RX1R II debuted. That means that the third-generation camera supports speedy phase detection with focus that covers nearly the entire surface of the image sensor, along with intelligent subject recognition that snaps to the eyes of people, pets, wildlife, birds, and insects, plus identifies and tracks automobiles, planes, and trains.

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The autofocus snaps between near and distant subjects in an instant, and accurately finds eyes and faces. I noticed that it's a little slower in the close focus range and when taking photos in near-dark conditions, but that's expected. Close focus requires more precision than focus at distance, and all cameras do a better job when there's sufficient light coming into the system.

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The camera supports 5fps continuous drive with focus and can keep that pace for around 1,000 JPGs or 52 Raw format pictures. It's a decent figure for a compact camera and is more than good enough to capture short spurts of action, but others in the class support faster speeds. The Leica Q3 series goes to 9fps, and the Fujifilm X100VI supports 11fps drive.

Image Quality: Extra Pixels Provide a Useful In-Camera Crop

The RX1R III uses a 60MP full-frame BSI CMOS sensor, one that's capable of capturing more detail and handling more aggressive crops versus the 42MP BSI CMOS chip from the RX1R II. It's overkill for sharing on the web or making anything short of huge prints, but it is very handy for the in-camera crop mode. With a touch of the C1 button, the lens swaps between 35mm, 50mm, and 70mm angles of view, effectively giving it a 2x digital zoom. The cropped photos have fewer pixels, but with 29MP at 50mm and 15MP at 70mm, there are still enough pixels for a detailed image.

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The sensor covers a wide ISO 100-32000 gamut in its native range, with extended options available from ISO 50-102400, with 8-bit JPG, 10-bit HEIF, and 14-bit Raw file formats available. JPG and HEIF images are processed in camera, while Raw images are intended to be processed with either desktop or mobile editing software; I use Adobe Lightroom Classic as our standard for reviews. Enthusiast and pro photographers have the know-how to edit Raw images and tend to prefer them to JPGs as they provide more leeway to adjust color and exposure. If you prefer a creative look out of the camera, the RX1R III offers Sony's current set of picture profiles, which include the typical set of looks (Standard, Vivid, Portrait, Black and White, and others), along with stylized looks for a Film aesthetic (FL, FL2, FL3, and Instant).

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The sensor does a good job controlling noise in its lower register, as JPG photos show excellent detail and little visible grain from ISO 100-1600. Details are a little softer at ISO 3200-6400, but I still count picture quality as excellent there. The noise starts to cut into detail noticeably and smudge details at ISO 12800-25600, and results are blurry at ISO 51200-102400. You'll have some leeway to apply noise reduction to taste to better balance detail with grain if you opt for Raw capture.

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The RX1R III's lens dates back to the original 24MP RX1, but proves sharp enough to handle a 60MP sensor. At its center, the lens scores in the outstanding range at its maximum aperture (5,700 lines), though its edges and corners aren't as clear and bring the average score down into the excellent range for a 60MP chip (4,400 lines). In most cases, depth of field will blur away edges at f/2 optically, so you'll want to stop down to f/4-11 to get crisp edges for landscapes, architecture, and other scenes where edge and corner sharpness matter.

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The lens loses quite a bit of resolution at f/16-22, an unavoidable consequence of optical diffraction, the physical effect that causes light particles to scatter as they pass through a narrow diaphragm. You may still want to use these settings, as they also cause diffraction spikes, commonly called sunstars. The RX1R III's lens uses a 9-blade aperture that draws dramatic 18-point sunstars. Their edges aren't as clearly defined as with ultra-wide lenses like Sony's fantastic FE 12-24mm F2.8 GM, but I like the effect for landscape scenes regardless.

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Detail is important, but it's not the only thing that matters in optics. You'll want to make sure that Distortion Correction is enabled in the menu to remove some modest geometric barrel distortion from JPG or HEIF pictures, and ensure that you're using a correction profile to do the same if you are using the camera for Raw format photos. Without corrections, the camera shows a slight barrel bulge. I didn't spot much of a vignette in open aperture images at f/2, which is a typical area of concern for bright lenses.

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I do see some false purple and green color around bright specular highlights just off the plane of focus, a form of longitudinal chromatic aberration (LoCA). This type of false color is difficult to get rid of, and while it doesn't rise to a problematic level, it's there. If you catch a scene where LoCA is distracting, you can lessen the effect by using a small aperture—if you've got bright light reflecting off the surface of water, for instance, stop down to f/4 or smaller and you'll see far less false color around those reflections than at f/2-2.8.

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My discerning eyes also spot some flaws in the bokeh. The 35mm F2 blurs backgrounds readily, especially when focusing close, but the look of the blur trends slightly toward the frenetic. Defocused highlights show bright, hard edges and false onion skin texture, a combination that lends itself to characterful backgrounds in many scenes. I notice it most often in scenes with foliage, bare branches, and other repeating patterns behind the subject. Whether this bothers you is a matter of personal preference. I personally tend to like characterful bokeh as it adds some texture to scenes, but others prefer clean, smooth bokeh.

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I noticed some false color when taking photos against a strong backlight, most evident when the light source is just outside or toward the edge of the scene. The lens doesn't lose much (if any) contrast in these scenes, but internal reflections create areas of false color, the ghosting effect. These ghosts aren't well-formed at wider apertures, but are quite visible when the iris is closed down to f/5.6-22. It's worth it to play with your angle of approach to minimize the ghosts.

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Neither the lens nor the sensor includes stabilization, which puts the RX1R III behind the Leica Q3 and Q3 43's in-lens stabilization and the Fujifilm X100VI and Ricoh GR IV's sensor-shift stabilization for scenes. In Program and Aperture Priority, the RX1R III defaults to a 1/125-second or shorter shutter speed, which is more than enough to compensate for typical hand shake. Part of this comes down to the photographer, but I see some evidence of blur at 1/30-second or longer for typical handheld snapshots.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

I tried some long exposures too, a technique I often employ for scenes with flowing water. I stretched the shutter to 1/6-second by bracing the camera down on a wooden fence rail and got sharp detail in still parts of the scene. I tried some 1/4-second snaps for a waterfall scene from a seated position and can see shake-induced motion blur in still objects. If you love taking long exposure images and don't want to carry a tripod, a stabilized camera is a better choice. I'll also note that the RX1R III does not include an in-lens neutral density filter like the Fujifilm X100VI and Ricoh GR IV, so you'll want to pick up a 49mm front filter to reduce incoming light. I used a K&F Concept ND2-400 filter with the camera for long exposures and for f/2 photos on a bright autumn day.

Video: 4K30 With Digital Stabilization

The RX1R III supports video at up to 4K30 using the full width of the sensor without stabilization, and includes digital stabilization that crops in to a tighter angle of view (around 50mm). Without stabilization, handheld footage has a jittery, jumpy look, but Active Mode effectively smooths it out. Resolution is good, but not as sharp as the 4K output from cameras with lower pixel sensors. This is because the RX1R III uses a line skipping technique to subsample the picture from its 51MP (at 16:9) sensor down to 4K, which has the same number of pixels as an 8MP photo.

The video engine records movies with 10-bit 4:2:2 color and supports S-Log3, a neutral profile that leaves enough headroom for color correction, as well as the S-Cinetone, which has a cinematic look and is ready to share out of camera. Its array of stills profiles works for movies too. It works with external mics and supports UVC/UAC streaming too, so you may even use it as the world's most expensive webcam.

Given its form factor, line-skipped video, and battery life, I don't expect many content creators will look to the RX1R III as a dedicated camera for movies, but it's useful for short clips, and can squeeze into tight spaces where a true movie camera like the compact Sony ZV-E1 can't fit.