I owned the 1st 24-70 f/2.8, I believe I had a softer sample as they had quite a range of variation in them, however this version is loads better. It is almost as sharp as my macro, even wide open, which is unheard of for a zoom.

Sharp; Fast AF; Excellent General purpose and portrait lens; weather resistant

Price; though its worth it in my opinion; filter size makes for expensive filters

The Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM Lens is clearly the best performing Canon full-frame-compatible general purpose zoom lens available. It is the best from both an image quality perspective and from an AF speed/accuracy perspective.

I had a very good copy of the Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS USM but sold it because once I get this gem it never got used.

My sharpest zoom lens and I own several Canon "L"s including the 70-200mm f/2.8L II IS; Only my Sigma ART 50mm f/1.4 is sharper; Super fast focus

Cheap hood; No IS

The Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM is the kind of lens that's always going to be held up to high scrutiny - it's the company's flagship standard zoom for professional photographers, and is expected to deliver top-notch results under all conditions. Happily, that's exactly what it does.

Superb; almost flawless optics; Impressive flare resistance; Fast; silent; and accurate autofocus; Excellent build quality including weathersealing

Unpleasant vignetting in the 50-70mm region at F2.8 on full frame; Noticeably lower image quality at close focus distances; No image stabilisation; Very expensive

Yesterday saw some excitement among our Nikon readers with the launch of the new Nikon D800 DSLR – but also announced yesterday were 3 new lenses from Canon. The main one of interest is the EF 24-70 F/2.8L II USM.

I had now several standard zooms on Canon. All of them left much to deserve wide open. When comparing with the Zuiko 14-35 and the Sony Zeiss ZA 24-70, no Canon standard lens was close to them. Today I can positively remark, this Canon 24-70 made my day.

Tack sharp; design; AF speed; IQ wide open

prica tag

The latest in a line of storied lenses going back to the 28–80mm f/2.8–4L of April 1989, this is Canon's fourth high-speed, full-frame, standard-range, L-series autofocus zoom. The previous 24–70mm f/2.8L was introduced in November 2002, and compared with that lens, this version II ($2,299, street)...

Handling and features A professional standard zoom lens covering the popular 24-70mm focal range, which sports a constant fast maximum aperture of f/2.8 and silent focusing with full-time manual focus override.

Featuring the latest advances in optical lens design, it utilizes 1 Super UD lens element and 2 UD lens elements that help minimize chromatic aberration in the periphery at wide-angle as well as reduced color blurring around the edges of the subject.

Canon's EF 24-70mm f2.8L USM is a favourite of pro portrait and wedding photographers, and is now more popular than ever in an improved Mark II version. It delivers a perfect range on full-frame bodies for group shots and single portraits, and is also great for cropped bodies if wide-angle isn't...