Sony A7R V review: Great pictures, improved video, superior autofocus

by Sony Full frame A7R IV is one of the best mirrorless cameras I’ve ever reviewed, so there’s a lot of pressure on its successor. The company’s answer is A7R V 61 megapixeldesigned to bring out the maximum amount of detail for portrait and landscape photography.

Despite using the same sensor as the A7R IV, this new model has improved on nearly every other aspect. The processor has been updated to the same processor found on 50 megapixel A1, which allows for faster AI tracking and autofocus, as well as better video specs. Sony has also improved stabilization, rear display, EVF and more – all for the same $3,900 price tag as its main rival, the Canon EOS R5.

pros

• Amazing AI Autofocus
• Great photo quality
• Powerful body stabilization
• Much improved video up to 8K
• Smart rear screen

Defect

• substantial rolling shutter
• Full-frame 4K video could be sharper

Sony’s cutting-edge technology has always been its superpower, but rival models from Canon, Panasonic and others have begun to catch up. To find out if the A7R V is worth buying over other cameras, and even the final model, I took it out for detailed testing. Spoiler alert – it’s an impressive camera.

Body and handle

Sony made some changes to the design of full-frame mirrorless cameras starting from A7SIIIand the A7R V continues that trend. In addition to the slightly larger grip, it also has a number of improvements over the A7R IV, such as a new dedicated selector for video, photos, and slow motion (S&Q) modes.

By disabling that function from the mode wheel, it’s relatively easy to switch between photos and videos, and then change modes in each. It is also possible to share some, all, or none of settings such as shutter speed and ISO between photo and video modes using the customization menu. Sony also moved the record button from the back to a better position on top.

As with other Sony cameras, it is very intuitive and easy to use. However, some people may find it uncomfortable to hold all day, especially those with larger hands. That’s because the grip has some hard edges and less soft material than Canon’s R5, for example.

A big new improvement on the A7R V is the rear display. Instead of a simple tilting screen like before, Sony has come up with a completely new system. It not only flips out, but also tilts – not only upwards like the similar Panasonic system above GH6but also down and out as well.

In addition to being better for vlogs and selfies, it also allows you to move the monitor away from any microphone or monitor cables. It’s also better for people taking pictures. Some people prefer tilting screens (for shooting at high and low angles), so the A7R V has the best of both worlds.

The A7R IV had a very good 5.76 million-dot EVF, but Sony made it even better. The resolution on the OLED panel is up to 9.44 million dots, although it drops when you focus or increase the refresh rate to a maximum of 120Hz. However, it now closely matches what you see in the optical viewfinder.

Like the A1 and A7S III, it has a pair of dual-format card slots. Each accepts UHS-II SD or faster, but much more expensive CFexpress Class A card. The latter is required for 8K video and allows you to take pictures continuously longer before the buffer fills up.

Since the A7R V is now a much better video camera, Sony saw fit to swap out the tiny and flimsy micro HDMI jack with a full-sized jack. While still not up to professional standards, it provides a relatively secure connection and allows for sturdier cables to be used, as micro HDMI models are prone to breakage.

It has the same battery as the A1 and delivers exactly the maximum number of shots on a single charge, 530. That’s in lab conditions, though, and I get twice that in the real world. The USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 port is PD-compatible, so you can charge the battery and power the camera at the same time. It also comes with microphone and headphone ports as you’d expect, plus a wired LAN port and the ability to make zoom calls or stream over USB-C via the UBC webcam standard.

Efficiency

The A7R V has a continuous shooting speed close to that of its predecessor, 10fps in both mechanical and electronic modes, capturing C-RAW and JPEG images. That rate drops to 7fps when shooting uncompressed RAW files. While not super fast compared to Sony’s A1 or Canon EOS R5 (both with stacked sensors), it’s not bad at all for a 61-megapixel camera. You can capture about 104 C-RAW + JPEG files before the buffer fills up, although the process takes less than two seconds.

Sony is known for its excellent autofocus, and the A7R V is possibly its best camera in the field to date. With 693 phase-detection focus points (up from 567 on the A7R IV), Normal AF (no subject tracking) is incredibly accurate in all five area modes, delivering the majority of the frame sharp even with fast moving subjects.

Things get even better when you enable the AI. In addition to excellent face, head and eye tracking, Sony has introduced a new body tracking mode. It works like the 3D motion tracking software used for animation, predicting your head and eye position based on your bone structure. If it fails to track the subject’s face, it can also switch to their body and still capture sharp images.

In addition to humans, it can also track people, birds, animals, insects, cars, trains, and planes. However, you have to select those manually – it would be nice if there was an automatic mode that allows AI to select subjects like Canon’s EOS R6 II. It also has a touch-to-track mode that locks onto objects more accurately than rival models.

In most of these tracking modes, the camera did a good job of focusing on the subject’s eyes. Failing that, it accurately tracks the head or body and still delivers sharp photos. The results are particularly impressive considering the high resolution reveals very detailed focusing errors.

Sometimes it fails to lock the eyes of birds and other animals, though that’s something Sony can improve with firmware updates. Overall, though, it’s almost always focused, beating opponents by a margin.

The A7R V also has a new in-body stabilization system that goes from 6 to 8 stops with supported lenses, just like what Canon’s EOS R5 offers. It’s great for photography, allowing me to take sharp pictures down to a quarter of a second. That means you can shoot handheld and capture the trail of a car light, for example, while freezing the background. That being said. it’s a bit short for the video as you’ll soon see.

Image quality

Because it has the same 61-megapixel sensor, the A7R V delivers almost the same image quality as the A7R IV. That’s not a bad thing, as the latter can produce excellent images. With a very high resolution and no anti-aliasing filter, only Hasselblad and Fuji’s 100-megapixel medium format cameras offer greater detail. If that’s still not enough, you can take Sony’s Pixel Shift Multi-Shot and quadruple it to 240.8 megapixels.

Without a low-pass filter, beware of anti-aliasing or noise that can crop detailed or repetitive parts of the image. However, the high resolution means that the details must be very good.

JPEG is ready to share straight from the camera, with nicely fine-tuned sharpness and noise reduction. Colors are more accurate but perhaps less flattering than Canon’s latest models. This system is specially adapted for sunny, clear skies, so the A7R V is a great choice for landscape photography.