The Panasonic Lumix ZS100/TZ100 is a great camera for anyone who is tired of the physical limitations of a smartphone. It’s great for travelling and easy to take with you everywhere. The image quality from its 1-inch sensor is surprisingly good in all situations, and the smart 4K video features really make it more useful. Even though the viewfinder isn’t great, this is a great camera to bring on every trip.
Still, when it came out in 2016, the Panasonic Lumix ZS100 was a better camera than most smartphones, and it still is today thanks to its ace in the hole, a 1-inch sensor. The Lumix ZS100’s 1-inch sensor is much bigger than the camera sensor in a smartphone, so it can take photos that are much better quality and don’t need as many of the digital tricks that phones use to make photos look better than they are.
Features:
- 20MP 1-inch image sensor.
- 10x zoom range.
- Quick autofocus and 10fps burst rate.
- Raw and JPG capture options.
- Touch screen.
- Solid high-ISO performance.
- Good macro capability.
The Lumix ZS100 is a good choice for any travel photographer because it has a lens that is equivalent to 25-250mm. It costs less and has a shorter lens than the Panasonic Lumix ZS200, which came out later. The ZS100 has a thin body and a lens that sticks out a bit even when it is folded up.
It’s 2.5 inches tall, 4.4 inches wide, and 1.7 inches deep, and weighs about 11 ounces. It comes in two colours: a simple black version and a silver finish, which is the one we tested. I wouldn’t call it silver, though, based on how it looks. It’s more of a gunmetal grey, with a lighter grey corner and a red line to make it stand out.
When you turn on the camera, the 10x lens comes out of the barrel and gets even further away as you zoom. It has a full-frame equivalent range of 25–250mm and a maximum aperture of f/2.8 at the widest setting and f/5.9 when zoomed all the way in.
How to get Panasonic Lumix ZS100?
Compare this to a camera like the Canon PowerShot G7 X Mark II, which has a smaller 24-100mm range but an aperture that starts at f/1.8 (capturing more than twice as much light as the ZS100 at its widest) and narrows to just f/2.8 at 100mm, while the ZS100 maxes out at f/5.2, which is nearly two stops darker.
It’s not rated to last very long—240 shots with the viewfinder, which is how I like to shoot—but it seems to last a lot longer than that. The viewfinder is small but comfortable, but it can’t really keep up with high-speed continuous shooting.
