Nikon AF-S Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 G IF ED DX

Great lens, but not amazing While this lens is fast (wide aperture and focus speed), has excellent build quality and great focal range, I want to point out a few down sides: 1. Zoom ring is very uncomfortable: its too close to the body and too firm. Its also too narrow to my opinion. 2. Focus distance scale makes noise. Both when it moves while focus and when reaching the edges (closest and infinity). 3. This is not the sharpest lens out there. I would expect a top quality Nikkor to perform better. You can checkout the tests on dxo mark, they are also not very good.

Still a great lens Is this lens a 10+year old design? Yes. Unfortunately, many modern DX lenses, while decent, are built in china and lack pro features like a constant aperture like 2.8 or even 4. This lens is awesome. Beautiful images, little distortion, controlled CA. When I ran a auto focus fine tune on my D7200, this was my only lens that was spot on. Well worth the money.

Never Buy This Lens New I bought this lens, used, specifically for my Nikon D500. The focal length range is perfect for me. At 17mm there is quite a bit of distortion but is mostly corrected with Lightroom®. At f2.8 the lens is fast but sharpness mostly eludes the lens wide open. Stopped down to f4 though, and things get way better. At the long end, 55mm, the lens is a little soft, even in the center, and even stopped down. Back off just a tad to around 50mm and things improve nicely. The lens is quite a bargain at the price I paid, $740, for a near mint copy. I would never buy this lens new. The value is just not there for such an old lens. This lens should be updated by Nikon, but now I'm dreaming. That will never happen:-) BTW, the lens that was delivered was exactly as advertised. It looks brand new! I'm very happy with my purchase!Read full review