The Fujifilm X-M5 is the smallest and lightest interchangeable-lens camera Fujifilm makes. It weighs about 355 grams with battery and card, launched in October 2024 at $799 for the body, and puts a film simulation dial right on top. It’s Fuji’s answer to Sony’s ZV-E10 II, aimed squarely at creators and first-time camera buyers who want the Fuji look.

It’s a funny little camera. Very capable in some ways, very stripped-down in others.

Most Fujifilm cameras are built around dials and nostalgia. The Fujifilm X-S20 isn’t. It has a normal mode dial, a deep grip and a flip-out screen. It’s Fuji’s camera for people who want Fuji color and Fuji lenses without the retro controls, and who shoot as much video as stills.

Released in mid-2023 at $1,299 for the body, it upgraded the popular X-S10 in the places that mattered: a much bigger battery, the newer X-Processor 5, better autofocus and a serious jump in video.

The Fujifilm X-T5 is a camera for people who like holding a camera. Shutter speed dial on top. ISO dial on top. Exposure compensation dial on top. You can set everything before you turn it on, and you can read your settings at a glance with the camera switched off. Fuji went back to that classic layout with the X-T5 after the X-T4 drifted toward video, and photographers noticed.

It came out in late 2022 and has been one of Fujifilm’s best sellers since. A successor, the X-T6, has been the subject of rumors through 2026. Until it lands in shops in numbers, the X-T5 remains the photographer’s X-mount camera to buy.

The Fujifilm X-T50 takes the best part of the X-T5, its 40.2MP X-Trans CMOS 5 HR sensor, and puts it in a smaller, lighter, cheaper body. Fuji launched it in May 2024 at $1,399 for the body, and it weighs about 438 grams with battery and card. It also swaps the ISO dial for something new: a dedicated film simulation dial on top.

That dial tells you who it’s for. People who want to pick a look and shoot, and who care more about the feel of their photos than chasing specs.

Every system needs a great “normal” lens, the one that sees roughly the way your eyes do. On Fujifilm X-mount that lens is the Fujifilm XF 33mm F1.4 R LM WR. On an APS-C body it gives the field of view of a 50mm lens on full frame. Fuji launched it in 2021, and it has been one of the most recommended X-mount lenses ever since.

For years the go-to Fuji normal lens was the old XF 35mm f/1.4, a lens with lots of character and slow, noisy autofocus. The 33mm is its modern replacement. It’s sharper, it focuses far faster, and it’s weather resistant.

The original XF 56mm f/1.2 from 2014 was one of the lenses that made people switch to Fuji. It had that creamy look portrait shooters wanted, in a system that was otherwise small and light. The Fujifilm XF 56mm F1.2 R WR, launched in September 2022 at $999, is the full redesign: sharper, closer-focusing and now weather resistant.

On an APS-C body, 56mm gives the field of view of an 85mm lens on full frame. Classic portrait framing, with enough distance from your subject to keep things relaxed.

The Sigma 18-50mm F2.8 DC DN Contemporary is the lens to buy after the kit lens. It covers the same range as most APS-C kit zooms, roughly 27-75mm in full-frame terms, and it does it at a constant f/2.8. That’s up to two stops more light than a typical f/3.5-5.6 kit zoom at the long end, in a lens that weighs only about 290 grams.

Sigma launched it in 2021 for Sony E-mount and L-Mount. Fujifilm X-mount followed in 2023, and Canon RF-mount in 2024 when Canon opened its APS-C mount to Sigma. That makes it one of the few lenses you can buy for nearly every APS-C system covered on this site.

On an APS-C camera, 27mm gives about the same view as a 40mm lens on full frame. It’s a natural, everyday focal length, a little wider than a “normal” 50mm, good for street, travel and environmental portraits. The Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2 Pro gives you that view at f/1.2, for around $550.

Viltrox released the Fujifilm X-mount version first, in 2023, then a Sony E-mount version. Both belong to Viltrox’s Pro line, which uses better build and weather sealing than its budget lenses.

Chinese lens makers spent the last five years going from “cheap alternative” to “serious option”. The Viltrox AF 75mm F1.2 Pro is one of the lenses that made that case. It’s an f/1.2 portrait lens for APS-C cameras with fast-enough autofocus, weather sealing and image quality that holds its own against brand-name glass costing two or three times as much.

On an APS-C body, 75mm gives the field of view of about a 112mm lens on full frame. That’s a classic head-and-shoulders portrait length, with enough distance between you and your subject to keep things relaxed.