Long-awaited and talked about in all possible corners. Like a ghost some claim to exist, but nobody had any proof. Here it is, the Leica 35mm Noctilux
This long-awaited lens is available to order now, and has been for a week or two in advance of the release. Expect Instagram to be flooded with sample photos.
After years of waiting, many have decided they simply want this lens. Priced at (only) Euro 9,000.00 and $9,650.00 in the United States, and in a compact design, it will be hard to find arguments not to acquire this lens. This lens will sell like candy.
This article is a work in progress ...
All you need to know about the Leica 35mm Noctilux-M ASPH f/1.2.
The Leica 35mm Noctilux interview:
Lens designer
Peter Karbe
By Thorsten von Overgaard
(This is part of a longer interview with Leica lens designer Peter Karbe, “Inside the mind of Peter Karbe” that will be available in a few weeks).
Overgaard: It made sense (to me) that we have 90/1.5 and 75/1.25, and 50/0.95, and then 35mm would have to be f/0.8. A 35mm f/0.8 would be an awesome lens. So what happened? Why can't we just go all the way to f/0.8?
Karbe: The 35mm is a wide angle lens, and if we compare with a 90mm, we have five times the aberrations in a 35mm. In a 90mm Summilux-M ASPH f/1.5 you have a small angle of view, so in a 35mm we have to fight with spherical aberrations and color aberrations. With ASPH technology you can optimize that.
At 35mm you have to flatten the field, so it’s not so easy to increase the aperture. It’s not linear.
Overgaard: As you know, I love my 21 Summilux-M ASPH f/1.4 super wide angle lens that you designed (2008). In recent workshops, I had three people who also had it. It’s not a lens any of us use a lot, but they all really love it.
Karbe: Yes, but it is not small, and a 35mm needs to be small.
Overgaard: But if one wants small, there is the 35mm APO-Summicron-M ASPH f/2.0 that is both small and perfect. What if we just want a crazy lens?
Karbe: (Draws in my notebook to illustrate how the size of the lenses increases from 21mm to 28mm to 35mm, and then adds laughing: If you allow us to do a 35mm in big size, then we can do it. Why not?
Overgaard: I think, people would line up to buy an extreme 35mm Noctilux. How would the image look? Would it be somewhat like a 50mm Noctilux f/0.95?
Karbe: It’s a good idea. We wouldn’t do it. The request for a lens is based on compactness and performance. So, we wouldn’t do a 35mm f/0.8. For me, a 28mm f/1.0, and a 35mm f/1.0 and so on would be logical. Always a ratio of 1:1. (Note: This would cause a 50mm Noctilux f/1.0 to have an optical opening of 50mm in diameter, a 35mm would have a 35mm optical diameter, and 28mm would have a 28mm optical diameter. The 35mm Noctilux f/1.2 has an optical opening diameter of 29.1 mm whereas an f/1.0 would have 35mm and a 0.8 would have 44mm).
Overgaard: But for now, a 35mm Noctilux f/1.2.
Karbe: Yes.
Leica 35mm Noctilux-M ASPH f/1.2 (2026) is about the size of the Leica 35mm Summilux-M f/1.4.
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The Leica 35mm Noctilux interview:
Product Manager Stefan Daniel
By Thorsten von Overgaard
Stefan Daniel is the Executive Vice President Technology and Operations at Leica Camera AG and has been in charge of product management for many years. He is a Leica M fan through and through, meaning the traditional rangefinder and compact lenses. Like Peter Karbe, he has been at Leica for almost a lifetime. This is from a longer interview that may appear at a later point in full:
Overgaard: The 35mm Noctilux have been rumored for years?
Daniel: You know, in every rumor there is a truth, ha ha.
Overgaard: And now it is here, though not the confirmation of the wildest rumors that hoped for an f/0.8.
Daniel: It's a balance to make. Personally, I wouldn't use a 50mm Noctilux f/0.95. For me it is too heavy and a contradiction of the Leica M idea.
If we made a 0.9 or something, we would sell it, yes. The price would need to be quite high, and the quantity would be quite low, as it is now for the 75mm Noctilux f/1.25.
Lenses have to have a good compromise between size, weight, image quality, and price. These are much more popular.
Overgaard: Leica 35mm Summilux-M f/1.2 will sell a lot. It won't make me think it is awesome.
Daniel: No, you will love it. It is super. I like the look. You know, my favorite lens is the 35mm Summilux-M ASPH f/1.4 FLE, always, and I will swap it. This Noctilux is not much heavier than f/1.4, not much bigger. For my kind of photography I can do everything with that 35mm.
Overgaard: Yes, with this lens, if you go f/1.4 you are back to Summilux, but likely same or better quality compared to Summilux f/1.4?
Daniel: I love it. It's good.
Many are excited about the 35mm Noctilux ... Lens designers and product managers speak highly of the Leica 35mm Noctilux.
Conclusion: A conservative approach to the term "Noctilux"?
When we started to talk about a 35mm Noctilux back in 2012, the common understanding was that it would be a 35mm f/0.8 lens. It would be an insanely sexy lens, with a real rock and roll look. Light rays out of control, but somehow brought to show details and clarity where it mattered. In other words, a 35mm with the same qualities as the Leica 50mm Noctilux f/0.95.
Probablya very expensive lens, big, heavy ...but insanely beautiful and special, and nothing else matters.
What happened in the meantime I don't know. Instead of an insanely expensive and hard-to-control dream lens from another universe, we got a rather conservative f/1.2 lens.
The way the 35mm Noctilux f/1.2 is really cool is that it fits into the uniform production of lenses. It is “a wild lens” for the people in that the size is okay, the price is okay, and it is fairly easy to focus, particularly if used on the Leica M EV1 with built-in EVF.
It's the lens most would agree is "a lens that would be fun and interesting to have," and if you use it as your standard 35mm lens, it does it all from f/1.2 narrow depth of field to safer f-stops where everything is in focus. It is sharper, higher resolution, aimed at future sensors with more megapixels, than the Leica 35mm Summilux-M ASPH f/1.4.
There you have it.
We’re all gonna start somewhere,
and f/1.2 is a good place to start
If we transport ourselves back to the summer of 1966, the Leica 50mm Noctilux-M f/1.2 saw the light of day (and night). It was supposed to be groundbreaking, with aspherical elements, and a real low light lens compared to the previous offering of the 50mm Summilux f/1.4 (1959), and before that, the 50mm Xenon f/1.5 (1936).
In a matter of just a few years, Leica realized that it would be possible to push the envelope even further with an f/1.0 lens (1973), a successful design that kept going for another 35 years until it was surpassed with the Leica 50mm Noctilux-M ASPH f/0.95 FLE model (2008).
The extreme lenses like the Noctilux have been the Formula 1 for Leica. This is where they had to develop groundbreaking technologies that later found use in less demanding designs.
What history tells us is that a Noctilux can improve. From f/1.2 to f/1.0, and possibly f/0.8.
Noctilux means"light of the night" [from Latin nocturnus 'of the night' and 'lux' light]. The Noctilux surpasses the speed of the human eye somewhat four times (which can see as wide as f/2.1 in the dark and f/8.3 in bright daylight).
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25th Anniversary: The Vienna Limited Edition has a different barrel design.
The Leica Dupont 0.95 Noctilux
Leica Shop Vienna Noctilux-M ASPH f/0.95
Silver Chrome Limited Edition (item no 11.698) Celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Leica Shop Vienna on June 16, 2011. 40 piece Limited Edition; 20 of them came with a matching Leica M9-P silver, another 20 pieces came with a Leica M3-P analog film camera, and perhaps 10 or less came without a camea.
It was, and is, a beauty. However, when Leica three years later announced that the silver chrome Noctilux f/0.95 was now available as a normal edition in stock (for $400 more than the black edition) it took some of the glory away. And probably the collectors value as well for those collectors who had bought the limited edition.
Five years later, Vienna strikes back at their 25th Anniversary, this time with 50 limited editions of the Silver Noctilux, but with a different barrel design. The price for this was set to $15,000.
For their 25th anniversary Leica Shop also offered 25 sets of Leica M-A (Typ 127) in "hammer tone" body, with the silver Noctilux ($37,000).
The Dupont Limited Edition 0.95 Noctilux
Leica also came up with the ida of making a Dupont 0.95 series of lenses (as well as lighters, pens and keyrings). It took a long while for it to move from prototype and promotion piece to acutal lenses. In actual fact, I have never seen any of those Noctilux lenses in the real world (bot some do exist).
The special idea of the Dupong 0.95 edition is that all engravings are blacked out. Only the essential aperture f/0.95 is engraved with white paint. The barrel design is also slightly different. The series consist of 95 numbered pieces.
Other Noctilux lenses
Other brands like 7artisan have made "Noctilux-like" lenses. The 50mm 7artisan f/1.1 is a fun lens that is on the (lack of) perfection level of the Leica 50mm f/1.2, but with an even more lively bokeh. There is also the 75mm 7artisan f/1.25 tele lens that I have been using for a while and found not that exciting.
I hope you enjoyed this article on the Leica 35mm Noctilux. More to come. Sign up for my free newsletter below here to stay in the know on new articles on lenses, photography and cameras.
As always, feel free to e-mail me with ideas, comments, querstions and advice.
Thank you
For help, corrections and information to Peter Karbe Stafen Daniel Erwin Puts
Noctilux = Also known as "King of the Night" because "Nocti" means Night and "Lux" means Light. The f/1.0 lenses from Leica are named "Noctilux". The first Leica Noctilux lens was the 50mm Noctilux f/1.2 which shortly after its introduction was improved to the 50mm Noctilux f/1.0. In the current 50mm Noctilux model the maximum aperture has been improved further to f/0.95.
"Noctilux" refers to the maximum lens aperture - here f/1.0 . "Nocti" for nocturnal (occurring or happening at night; ORIGIN late 15th cent.: from late Latin nocturnalis, from Latin nocturnus ‘of the night,’ from nox, noct- ‘night.), "lux" for light. The Leica Noctilux 50mm f1.0 is famous for enabling the photographer to take photos even when there is only candleligt to light the scene. See the article "Leica Noctilux - King of the Night"
PGM (Precision Glass Molding) is the modern production method that allows Leica to manufacture highly precise spherical and aspherical glass lens elements efficiently and consistently. Instead of grinding an aspherical surface slowly and individually, Leica presses heated optical glass into an ultra-precise mold, producing the correct shape directly. In the Leica 35mm Noctilux-M ASPH f/1.2 (2026), Leica introduced double-sided spherical elements, allowing the design to be made even more compact. Early Leica ASPH lenses were handmade and rare, as in the Leica 35mm Summilux-M "AA" ASPHERICAL f/1.4 (1989), and methods for producing ASPH elements uniformly started with the 35mm Summilux-M ASPH f/1.4 (1994) and particularly in the Leica 90mm APO-Summicron-M ASPH f/2.0 (1998). Unlike what was the norm when for example Minolta introduced their first ASPH lens, the Minolta MC Rokkor 58mm f/1.2 (1968), which used one ASPH element, made of plastic, Leica’s ASPH lenses were the first to use real glass elements in the Leica 50mm Noctilux-M ASPH f/1.2 (1966) and have consistently only used glass elements (where other manufacturers use hybrid plastic aspheres), including in the Leica Q3 43 APO (2024).
PGM (Precision Glass Molding) is a method of molding glass, making it possible to produce more compact spherical and aspherical elements and, in the case of ASPH, introduced a method in the 1990s for uniformly producing ASPH elements, whereas before (in the 1950s and 1960s) they were extremely expensive and handmade.
Thorsten Overgaard's Leica Reviews and Article Index
Thorsten von Overgaard is a Danish-American multiple award-winning photographer, known for his writings about photography and Leica cameras. He travels to more than 25 countries a year, photographing and teaching workshops to photographers. Some photos are available as signed editions via galleries or online. For specific photography needs, contact Thorsten Overgaard via email.
You can follow Thorsten Overgaard at his television channel magicoflight.tv.
PGM (Precision Glass Molding) is a method of molding glass, making it possible to produce more compact spherical and aspherical elements and, in the case of ASPH, introduced a method in the 1990s for uniformly producing ASPH elements, whereas before (in the 1950s and 1960s) they were extremely expensive and handmade.
