Choosing a lens for travel

Travel photography is decided by what is on your camera when something happens, which in practice means the lens you did not mind carrying. That makes range and weight the deciding specifications.

Why a zoom

On a trip you cannot choose your position — the building is where it is and the market stall is that far away. A zoom lets you frame from where you are standing. This is the one category where a zoom is straightforwardly the better answer for most people.

Why under 600g

Six hundred grams is roughly where a lens stops being something you notice on a strap all day. Above about a kilogram, most people start leaving the camera in the hotel — at which point the optics are irrelevant.

The superzoom trade-off

A 24-200mm or 18-300mm covers almost everything in one lens, at the cost of a slower aperture and softer corners than a shorter-range zoom. Whether that matters depends on what you do with the pictures. For travel, one lens that covers the day usually beats two better ones you swap between — changing lenses on a street is how sensors get dusty and how moments get missed.

Consider a small prime as a second lens

A pancake prime adds almost no weight and gives you two or three extra stops for interiors and evenings. It is the classic pairing with a travel zoom.