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How to find your Nikon shutter count in TWO simple steps with your camera

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I think of shutter count as a camera’s mileage. Knowing your Nikon shutter count is important if you’re thinking of selling – and it only takes a few minutes to find out

Handling the Nikon Z 26mm f/2.8
Click, click, click. Wondering what your Nikon shutter count is? (Image credit: Future)

How do you find out your Nikon shutter count… and why would you even want to know it?

Well, I’m thinking of selling one of my D800 cameras, and knowing your Nikon's shutter count (or shutter actuations) is an important piece of information when selling a DSLR camera. Any camera with a mechanical shutter is susceptible to the mechanism wearing out over time, and many will have an estimated lifespan.

For example, the lifespan of the legendary Nikon D850’s shutter is 200,000 actuations, but that’s not to say it’ll give up the ghost as soon as that milestone is reached. Right now, there’s a ‘good’ condition D850 over at MPB with 397,890 shutter actuations.

I like to think of shutter count as a camera’s mileage. It’s not a super accurate indicator of wear, but it’s a more reliable indicator than age.

Mirrorless cameras have muddied the water a little in terms of camera lifespan, since their lack of a reflex mirror is one less mechanism to fail – and the Nikon Z8 and Z9 don’t even have a shutter mechanism to fail.

But since your shutter count is an at-a-glance indicator of usage, it’s still worth knowing if you want to sell your camera. It’s also an awful lot of fun just finding out how trigger-happy you are. Thankfully, checking your Nikon’s shutter count isn’t difficult. Here’s how to do it in just two simple steps.

How to find your Nikon shutter count

1. Take a photo

D800

Take a picture of anything. Heck, you don't even need to take the lens cap off! (Image credit: Future)

Take a RAW or JPEG photo with your Nikon camera, or simply retrieve the latest photograph from your memory card. If you’re capturing a new photo, you don’t have to worry about subject or exposure, you just need to take a photo.

2. Upload it to Camera Shutter Count

Screenshot from Camera Shutter Count showing 42,958 shutter actuations from a Nikon D800

My Nikon shutter count is 42,958 – that's a lot of actuations, but there's still plenty of life in my old D800 yet! (Image credit: Camera Shutter Count / Digital Camera World)

Pull the photograph from your camera’s memory card and place it on your computer’s desktop. Open Camera Shutter Count in your browser, click ‘Choose file’ and upload your image. The website will now display your camera’s shutter count.

Not all camera brands embed shutter count information in EXIF data. Some, like Olympus and Fujifilm enables you to access your shutter actuations in-camera. Fortunately, if you don’t have a Nikon, we have a more generic guide on how to find your shutter count.

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Want to know more about your Nikon camera? Here's how to update your Nikon camera's firmware. Looking for a new Nikon? Here are the best Nikon cameras. And for more of my Nikon ramblings, is Nikon suddenly cool again?

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Mike Harris
Mike Harris
How To Editor

Mike is Digital Camera World's How To Editor. He has over a decade of experience, writing for some of the biggest specialist publications including Digital Camera, Digital Photographer and PhotoPlus: The Canon Magazine. Prior to DCW, Mike was Deputy Editor of N-Photo: The Nikon Magazine and Production Editor at Wex Photo Video, where he sharpened his skills in both the stills and videography spheres. While he's an avid motorsport photographer, his skills extend to every genre of photography – making him one of Digital Camera World's top tutors for techniques on cameras, lenses, tripods, filters and other imaging equipment – as well as sharing his expertise on shooting everything from portraits and landscapes to abstracts and architecture to wildlife and, yes, fast things going around race tracks...

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