Camera Review: RF 24-240mm f4-6.3 + Canon EOS R5

Some of my students have been asking me about budget RF lenses and I usually tell them the RF 24-240mm is a good option. But I realized recently that I had barely used in the EOS R5 since I got that camera so this post is dedicated to using the RF 24-240mm on the EOS R5. Specifically, I will try to determine whether this lens is good enough to justify its use on the R5.

Since the Canon R5 is a pretty high-resolution sensor it is natural to wonder if the RF 24-240mm is good enough to make use of all those pixels. After all, it is a 10x super zoom, 10x zooms are not exactly known for their sharpness. The answer to that is as usual, “it depends”. At some focal lengths and apertures, it is able to deliver a good picture. However, it generally needs to be stopped down a bit at a given aperture to reach maximum sharpness on the R5.

Here are some example images you can use to judge for yourself:

RF 24-240mm, 240mm @ f9

But then this image was missed a little bit.

RF 24-240mm, 209mm @ f9

Then it redeemed itself a little and almost got this one in focus:

RF 24-240mm, 24mm @ f6.3

Shooting static subjects in bright daylight at f/9 I think a reasonable expectation would be that you get a sharp image 99% of the time. However, when shooting with the RF 24-240mm I felt like I could not trust the camera to come up with a sharp shot at longer focal lengths and it was particularly bad when trying to get birds in flight.

I could not tell if it was the IS or the focusing because who knows what is even going with these things anymore. Through the viewfinder everything looks stable and focus appears to be locked on, but the end results are strangely a little off.

Thankfully, at wider focal lengths it seems to be more reliable on the whole.