In what has become an annual tradition, Sony has announced its latest RX100 family camera today, the Cyber-shot DSC-RX100 VII. It matches last year's RX100 VI in design and concept, sporting the same lens and physical appearance. But it changes the internals, leveraging a new sensor to deliver autofocus and tracking performance that, according to Sony, is in the same ballpark as the pro-grade a9.

The Long Zoom RX100

Settling in on the RX100 camera best suited to your needs can be a chore. Sony currently sells seven models, which muddies the water to the point where we are working on a buying guide just for the series.

The RX100 VII settles into the same long zoom space as the last year's VI. The 24-200mm f/2.8-4.5 zoom lens was new then, but it's a known quantity now. We were happy with its quality when we reviewed the VI last year, but be aware that the lens is not quite a low-light maven as the RX100 III, IV, and VA, which all share a shorter, brighter 24-70mm f/1.8-2.8 zoom.

The exterior is also identical. The camera has the same body, pop-up EVF, and tilting touch LCD as the VI model. Likewise, the general menu and control interface are unchanged. If you've picked up an RX100 model before, the VII will offer some sense of familiarity. It does add a 3.5mm microphone input, a first for the series, which should add to its appeal for vloggers.

The expected features are included—there's Bluetooth and Wi-Fi for on-the-go transfer to your smartphone, and the optically stabilized lens removes jumps and jitters from 4K video. But beyond that, the capabilities of the VI and VII models diverge.

Real-Time Tracking

The RX100 VI had what, last year, was considered a class-leading focus system for a point-and-shoot camera. It is able to track subjects at a staggering 24fps, even when working in Raw mode, with phase detection autofocus pixels covering about 65 percent of the image sensor.

The VII rethinks the focus. It retains phase detection coverage, with a slightly larger 68 percent coverage area, and actually takes a step back in speed, dropping the burst rate to a still-amazing 20fps. What it loses in speed it makes up for in other ways—the new focus system offers true blackout-free capture, just like the a9.

You never lose sight of the live feed as you make images, so it's much more practical to track subjects as they move through the frame. With 200mm of reach, the camera is capable of honing in on sports actions (as long as your seats aren't too far away) and will do a decent job for backyard wildlife photography. It can even detect animal eyes, although the feature is limited to cats and dogs at this time.

You can see the Real-Time Tracking system in action in the clip above. It's an example from a different Sony model, the a7R IV, but the interface and function of the focus system will be similar with the RX100 VII.

There are other benefits. You get both face and eye detection with the RX100 VII. And, as with the a9, a6400, and a7R IV, the tracking system promises to be super easy to use. It draws a green box around an identified target, and tracks it as it moves through the frame as long as you've got the autofocus system active. We'll put it through the paces to see if the focus system as good in reality as it is on paper when the camera goes on sale. But with a promised 0.02-second acquisition speed and 60 focus calculations per second, I expect it to deliver.

For extremely quick, nascent bursts of action, the camera offers a short seven-shot burst mode. It grabs the images at your choice of 30, 60, or 90fps—which means those seven shots go very quick. But Sony states there's no buffer clearing required after a burst, so you can shoot sequence after sequence without intermittent delay. It looks to be a useful tool for capturing the most fleeting of moments, but without a pre-shot buffer, you will have to work on your timing. I've not yet shot with the camera, but am intrigued to see if the ultra-fast burst mode makes it easier to get shots of balloons bursting or the exact moment a baseball makes contact with a bat—we'll take a look when the camera comes in for testing.

Hybrid Stabilization

The new microphone jack makes the RX100 VII a better vlogging tool than earlier entries. Of course, the camera doesn't have an accessory shoe, so you'll need to get a bracket or similar accessory if you actually want to mount a microphone. But the ability to plug in a wired lav shouldn't be discounted.

Hybrid video stabilization—additional digital stabilization applied along with optical—is a big deal for vloggers who love the Aaron Sorkin walk-and-talk style of video. Sony showed off some sample footage, shot side by side with an RX100 VI, and the 4K video captured by the VII is notably smoother. I'm not ready to say that it's as good as a powered gimbal, but it wasn't that far behind to my eyes. We'll perform our own independent tests when we are able to, of course.

An in-lens neutral density filter is still absent. It would require a redesign of the lens, body, or both to find room for one within the optical path. There's no filter thread around the lens, but there are third-party solutions for videographers who absolutely need to use ND.

The larger RX10 IV also lost the ND filter found on the first couple of generations, but has a lens filter thread so they are easier to add. Sony has not yet announced an RX10 V, so you'll have to wait patiently if you want a bridge model with the RX100 VII's autofocus system.

Premium Price

The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-RX100 VII is packed to the gills with updates, but costs the same as the RX100 VI at its debut—$1,199.99. It goes on sale in August.