Sigma’s 20-60mm F2.8-4 gives full-frame shooters who bought the kit lens a serious upgrade
Its size makes it travel- and everyday carry-friendly, and its price is approachable. What’s not to love?
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Sigma has announced the 20-60mm F2.8-4 DG Contemporary, a full-frame zoom lens that goes from quite wide to approaching telephoto. For full-frame shooters who wish their kit lens was just a bit more capable, or for anyone looking for a compact but relatively versatile option, it could be a great pick… as long as the company that makes your camera has decided to allow Sigma to use its mount.
One of the big appeals of the lens is its size. It weights 385g (13.6oz), and is 88mm (3.5″) long at its shortest (though it will extend as you zoom in). It also takes 67mm filters, helping you keep your photography kit relatively small. Sigma says it’s dust and splash resistant, too, and that the front element has a water and oil-repellent coating. It is, however, relatively sparse on controls; you get the zoom ring, and that’s pretty much it.
SigmaThe lens is made up of 15 elements in 13 groups, with three aspheric lenses and three SLD elements. It can focus on objects as close as 15.8cm at 28mm, providing a maximum reproduction of 0.43x, though at the long end that goes down to a still-respectable 0.34x.
Autofocusing is handled by a linear motor, making for a responsive shooting experience even at higher framerates*.

Arguably, the biggest downside of this lens has nothing to do with Sigma. The 20-60mm F2.8-4 DG Contemporary will be available for L-mount and Sony E-mount, but, as we’ve come to expect, not for Nikon Z or Canon RF, despite the fact that it’d make a great pairing for budget cameras like the EOS R8 and Nikon Z5II. Of course, anyone outside of those systems now have an excellent step-up option from their relatively slow kit-lenses, one that doesn’t ask them to sacrifice size or versatility for light-gathering ability.
First impressions:
This first thing you notice about the 20-60mm is how compact it is, to the point that I had to look for the letters ‘DG’ to confirm to myself that it was designed to cover full-frame.
Despite going significantly wider than a conventional 24-70mm, and without losing much at the long end, it’s a usefully small and light option.
As such, it probably shouldn’t be a surprise to find that the lens drops away from its F2.8 maximum aperture almost immediately. Mounted on a Panasonic body, that reports aperture value with an unusual level of precision, the lens drops to F2.9 before you’ve zoomed as far as 21mm, so it’s worth thinking of this lens as closer to being an F4 than an F2.8 zoom.
The other factor contributing to the lens’s small size is its use of digital distrotion corrections as part of its design. On L-mount bodies these are typically applied automatically, but third-party lens makers can’t force E-mount bodies to Auto apply them, so it’s essential that you engage them if you’re shooting on Sony.
This is a pretty standard approach for lenses in Sigma’s more cost-sensitive ‘Contemporary’ series, and it’s worth recognizing that this lens wouldn’t be possible at this size, weight or price if geometric distortion was handled using glass elements.
In use, we’ve been pretty impressed with the results and extremely impressed with the flexibility of an ultra-wide to standard zoom. I’d be inclinded look at this lens as a replacement for the basic kit lens on any system that Sigma’s been allowed to make it for (E and L-mount, so far).
The ultrawide 20mm setting also makes the lens a handy option for video, as does its gimbal-friendly size and weight. It extends a fair amount on zooming but it’s light enough that this shift in its center of gravity shouldn’t be too much for a good gimbal to handle.
Both E and L-mounts have 20-something zooms available already, but this is smaller and more ambitious than the Panasonic 20-60mm F3.5-5.6 and much smaller and lighter than the Sony 20-70mm F4. Its extra range over the Tamron 20-40mm F2.8 is likely to be more valuable as an everyday lens than the extra stop of brightness that the Tamron offers for much of its range.
The lens will retail for $849, and will be available starting October 6.
* – Though Sony limits continuous autofocus on third party lenses to 15fps, so the motor’s responsiveness won’t help beyond that. That’s not an issue on L-mount, though.
SigmaSigma 20-60mm F2.8-4 DG Contemporary
Sigma 20-60mm F2.8-4 sample gallery
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Thanks to Panasonic for the loan of an S1RII to shoot this gallery. All images were processed using our standard lens workflow in Capture One, with the manufacturer’s distortion correction applied but no correction of vignetting. The profile corrects a large amount of barrel distortion at the wide end and a minor amount of pincushion distortion at the long end. We’d consider it an essential part of the lens’ optical design.
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