Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR Review: Can a 10-year-old lens still deliver impressive images?

The Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR is a classic DSLR lens – in fact, it just passed its tenth birthday, marking a decade since the lens was first announced on September 24 2015.

But while this workhorse optic is getting up there in age for a camera lens, shooting with the Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR felt like a nod to the classics. The lens created lovely colors and flare – but there are some downsides to shooting with a DSLR in a mirrorless era, including the autofocus.

K-Mount users don’t have too many options for lens choices, however, as many third-party manufacturers have long shifted focus to mirrorless and don’t offer many K-Mount options new-in-box any more.

That factor could come into play, as Pentax confirmed in 2023 that a successor to the K-1 II is coming, although only rumors have surfaced since then. But, there’s a lot of love left for the Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR.

Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR: Specifications

Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR: Price

The Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR retails new for about $1,300 / £1,180 / AU$1,950.

As an older lens, the workhorse zoom is also often available from reputable used resellers, often at a significant discount – sellers are asking around $500-$900 on eBay in the US, and it's selling for £569-£599 at MPB in the UK.

Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR: Build and handling

Bright workhorse zooms aren’t exactly known for being lightweight and small, but the Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR isn’t terribly heavy nor oversized.

It weighs around 812g / 1 lb 12 oz with the hood attached, a weight that balances well with the oversized grip of a DSLR. That weight feels around average for a lens of this category, while the 109.5mm / 4.31 inch length feels on the shorter end of average.

Many modern mirrorless lenses skip out on the focal distance scale. But this Pentax 24-70mm has a classic DSLR lens design that thankfully still keeps the focal distance scale intact for manual focus scenarios.

Beyond that distance scale window, there’s a thin ring for focus and a thick ring for zoom. Both are nicely textured. The zoom ring has a lock switch that works at 24mm, good for preventing the lens from extending inside a camera bag.

This lens is weather-sealed and I didn’t have any issues with dust or moisture getting inside the lens over the course of my review.

Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR: Performance

When I first picked up the Pentax K-1 Mark II for testing, the shoot was the first time I’d used a DSLR in years – and it only felt right that I pair the body with the focal length that I used most before going mirrorless: a 24-70mm f/2.8.

The images that I shot with the Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR were right on par with what I expected coming from a workhorse DSLR lens, including decent sharpness and solid colors, but there were some autofocus misses.

The autofocus tended to perform just fine with only occasional misses when photographing portraits and landscapes. In limited light and when photographing fast-moving subjects headed straight towards the camera – two notoriously difficult subjects for autofocus to keep up with – performance was more misses than hits.

That’s not terribly surprising, however, mounted on a 4.4fps DSLR. The K-1 Mark II is currently the brand’s only full-frame DSLR, and it's tough to determine if the autofocus misses on action coming towards the camera and low light movement are the camera, the lens or both.

The center is sharp, even wide open at f/2.8, at both the wide, mid and long ends of the lens’ zoom range. The results aren’t as tack-sharp as some mirrorless lenses, but most images were acceptably sharp.

The edges of the image also seem to retain much of that sharpness, even when shooting wide open.

At 24mm, the lens is prone to some barrel distortion, which appears with both JPEGs with in-camera corrections and on the RAW files. That’s typical with wider focal lengths, but worth noting. Lines are near perfectly straight at 70mm and full zoom.

At the corners, some vignetting is noticeable when taking photos on light colored backgrounds. Around half seems to be corrected using lens profile corrections.

The colors coming from the Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR are lovely. Colors feel largely accurate, bordering on rich at times. Occasionally, out-of-focus areas that are backlit may take on a minor blur or purple fringe, but not distractingly so.

The f/2.8 aperture lends itself well to blurred backgrounds, especially at 70mm. Most bokeh forms as rounded balls with soft edges, although occasionally the brightest points of light render with a more soap bubble texture.

One of the things that I loved about this lens, besides the bokeh, was the lens flare. I prefer to keep flare rather than suppress it, and this lens is capable of capturing some nice streaky flare that adds interest but without overpowering the image.

Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR: Sample images

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Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR: Verdict

It’s a mirrorless world – and the Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR is living in it. But while the sharpness and autofocus performance don’t match up to some modern glass, this K-Mount lens is priced significantly lower than many mirrorless optics and is still capable of producing lovely images.

Mounted on a DSLR the lens is no lightweight, but it’s not terribly heavy compared to other workhorse zooms. And, there’s something to be said about that classic focal distance scale and balancing the weight of the lens on a camera with a beefier grip.

The Pentax-D FA 24-70mm f/2.8 ED SDM WR is sharp, but not overly so, wide open, has beautiful colors and lovely flare.

There’s some vignetting to contend with, and the widest angles have some barrel distortion that’s noticeable when trying to photograph straight lines. I also wouldn’t recommend the lens for fast action, due to some autofocus misses.

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See how this lens compares to the best Pentax lenses for the K-Mount, and see how the K-1 Mark two stacks up to the best Pentax cameras in the range.