Tamron 17-70mm F/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD will now come in Fujifilm X-mount too

Tamron 17-70mm F/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD (B070x) for FUJIFILM X
(Image credit: Tamron)

There are a couple of reasons for choosing a third-party lens like the Tamron 17-70mm F/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD over one of the maker’s own. One is a lower price, the other is specs that no own-brand lens has got.

The Tamron doesn’t do either by any great margin, but by combining in-lens VC (Vibration Compensation) with a constant f/2.8 aperture, it does go one up on Fujifilm’s pro-spec XF 16-55mm f2.8 R LM WR, which does not feature stabilization.

The Tamron is also cheaper than the Fujinon lens, with an expected retail price of $799/£829 (about AU$1,146) versus $1,199/£979 (about AU$1,720) for the Fujifilm alternative.

Tamron 17-70mm F/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD key features

The Tamron 17-70mm F/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD is an APS-C lens already available in Sony E mount, and offers an equivalent focal range of roughly 26-105mm in full frame terms. 

It features new Tamron VC (Vibration Compensation) technology powered by AI, which Tamron says makes it highly effective for video – it also features ‘strong suppression’ of focus breathing.

The Tamron 17-70mm F/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD has a minimum subject distance of 19mm and suppressed focus breathing for video. (Image credit: Tamron)

The new Tamron lens weighs 530g, which is somewhat less than the Fujinon 16-55mm at 655g. The Tamron looks a little longer, though, at 119.6mm vs 106mm. The new lens’s minimum object distance is 19mm at the wide-angle setting.

Tamron is claiming it’s the world’s first bright (f/2.8) 4.1x zoom for APS-C cameras, though it’s worth pointing out that the Fujinon XF16-55mm is not the only only possible rival. Fujifilm also makes the XF16-80mm f/4, which is a stop slower than the new Tamron, but has a wider and longer zoom range, has optical stabilization built in and is both smaller and lighter.

We look forward to reviewing the Tamron 17-70mm F/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD as soon as we can get a sample. The Fujifilm version is not expected until mid-July, but the Sony E-mount version has been out for a while.

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Rod Lawton
Contributor

Rod is an independent photography journalist and editor, and a long-standing Digital Camera World contributor, having previously worked as DCW's Group Reviews editor. Before that he has been technique editor on N-Photo, Head of Testing for the photography division and Camera Channel editor on TechRadar, as well as contributing to many other publications. He has been writing about photography technique, photo editing and digital cameras since they first appeared, and before that began his career writing about film photography. He has used and reviewed practically every interchangeable lens camera launched in the past 20 years, from entry-level DSLRs to medium format cameras, together with lenses, tripods, gimbals, light meters, camera bags and more. Rod has his own camera gear blog at fotovolo.com but also writes about photo-editing applications and techniques at lifeafterphotoshop.com