posted Friday, September 16, 2022 at 11:45 AM EDT

Alongside the Fujifilm X-H2S, Fujifilm announced a couple of new lenses, including the XF 150-600mm F5.6-8 R LM OIS WR. We've gone hands-on with the X-H2S and the XF 150-600mm telephoto zoom lens for the last few weeks, and the new Fuji zoom lens has proven very impressive.

One of the most impressive aspects of the new lens is its relatively compact size and lightweight design. Despite its 35mm equivalent focal length range of 229-914mm, the lens weighs just 1,605 grams (3.5 pounds). The lens is 314.5mm (12.4 inches) long, which isn't especially short, but the lens is an internal zoom, meaning it doesn't change length as you zoom. Speaking of zooming, the rotation required to go from 150mm to 600mm is quite short.

The lens' image quality is impressive, too. With 24 elements across 17 groups, the lens delivers great image quality. Images are sharp, and aberrations are well-controlled. We'll dig further into image quality in our full review, but so far, so good.

So far, the only real downside of the lens is that it's an F8 zoom at 600mm. To ensure an internal zoom design that is reasonably lightweight and easy to handhold, the lens is only an F5.6 at its shortest focal length. Just shy of 200mm, the lens slows down to F6.4. Around 300mm, it's an F7.1 lens. Finally, it becomes F8 a bit beyond 500mm. At F8, you need a lot of light to shoot at fast shutter speeds. Fortunately, the OIS is pretty effective, so I have been able to shoot handheld at 600mm at shutter speeds slower than 1/100s, which helps keep ISO lower.

Overall, my first impressions of the XF 150-600mm F5.6-8 R LM OIS WR are positive. If you want to download full-res images from the field, head to our Gallery.