Glass Bodies a variant-level encyclopedia of vintage lenses and cameras by iwillpat

Bessa T

Cosina Voigtländer · Leica M mount · 24×36mm on 35mm film, hinged back · 2001

Also known as: Voigtländer Bessa T · Voigtlander Bessa T · Bessa-T · Cosina Bessa T · フォクトレンダー ベッサT · ベッサT

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
Bessa T Leica M 2001–2005 — Unpublished, as for every Bessa
Bessa T '101st Anniversary' Heliar set Leica M 2001 — 500 numbered sets in each of four colours — black, grey, olive, blue (camera-wiki)
  1. The effective base length is 53.25 mm on Cosina's own page and 58 mm in the Leica FAQ, which likens it to a Leica III. Cosina's figure is carried; both exceed the Leica M6's 49.9 mm, which is the point.
  2. Cosina's archive page shows the T in silver and black only. The grey and olive bodies and the four-colour 101 set are camera-wiki's account, consistent with the coloured Bessa R and R2 of the same years; no Cosina document reached for this entry lists them.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • An M-mount body with a rangefinder and no viewfinder — the only such camera made after the war
  • The magnified rangefinder gives an effective base longer than a Leica M6's, which is the reason to own one: fast lenses focus more surely on a T than on any other Bessa
  • Takes the Bessa trigger winder on its base, like the R2

Bessa T:

  • No viewfinder window: one rangefinder eyepiece at the left of the top plate, magnified 1.5× with a ±2 dioptre adjustment, and a shoe for an external finder
  • Three-LED meter readout on the top plate — red, green, red
  • Silver or black; grey and olive from 2002, at a higher price and perhaps only in Japan (camera-wiki)

Bessa T '101st Anniversary' Heliar set:

  • Sold with a collapsible Heliar 50mm f/3.5 in M mount, for the 101st year of the Heliar design
  • Numbered; about US$850 as a set in October 2001 (the Leica FAQ)

Specifications

Format
24×36mm on 35mm film, hinged back
Finder
Rangefinder only — no viewfinder. Coincident-image rangefinder magnified 1.5×, ±2 dioptre, coupled 0.9 m to infinity. Framing is by an accessory finder in the shoe. · 1.5× magnification · none — the external finder's business parallax correction
Effective baselength
53.25 mm
Shutter
Mechanical vertical-travel metal focal-plane, Copal-derived, with a second inner set of blades against sun burn · 1 s – 1/2000 and B · flash sync X at 1/125, hot shoe and PC
Film advance
Single-stroke lever, ratcheted; optional trigger winder on the base
Back
Hinged
Meter
TTL centre-weighted off the grey shutter blades, EV 1–19 at ISO 100, ISO 25–1600; three LEDs on the top plate. Two LR44 / SR44.
Weight
385 g
Dimensions
135.5 × 78.5 × 33.5 mm
Country
Japan
Original price
55,000 yen before tax in Japan (Cosina); US$400–450 (the Leica FAQ); the 101 Heliar set about US$850.

Where sources disagree

Effective base length (mm)
  • 53.25 mm (Cosina)
  • 58 mm (the Leica FAQ at nemeng.com)

Better supported: Cosina's 53.25

Both are derived from a 1.5× magnification over the physical base; the maker's page is the one to trust for its own camera.

What reviewers say

History

Cosina had been making Voigtländer-badged cameras for two years when, in April 2001, it built one that took Leica M lenses. The Bessa T is the strangest way to do that: it has a coupled rangefinder, magnified 1.5× with a dioptre adjustment, and no viewfinder at all. You focus through one eyepiece and frame through an accessory finder in the shoe, one per focal length, as photographers did before 1954. In exchange the rangefinder’s effective base, 53 mm by Cosina’s figure, is longer than a Leica M6’s, and a fast 50 or 75 focuses on a T more surely than on any Bessa with a window. It weighed 385 grams and cost 55,000 yen, around $400 in America.

The body underneath is the Bessa platform Cosina had derived from its budget SLRs: a vertical metal Copal-type shutter from 1 second to 1/2000 with a second set of blades to stop a lens burning a hole in it, TTL metering read from those grey blades and shown as three LEDs on the top plate, a hinged back, a ratcheted lever, and a socket for a trigger winder on the base. In October 2001 Cosina sold it as a numbered ‘101st Anniversary’ set with a collapsible Heliar 50mm f/3.5, five hundred in each of four colours, for the centenary-and-one of the Heliar design. It was discontinued in 2005.

Expand Collapse

This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.

Photographs

Bessa T
Bessa T '101' set in grey with the collapsible Heliar 50mm f/3.5 — Zebrio from Tokyo, Japan, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $750 across 49 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $570–$1,100). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 3 days: up 1% from $740.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$750$570–$1,10049
2026-09-10$750$570–$1,10049
2026-09-06$740$570–$1,10048

Asking prices from the listings scanned, not sales; junk-flagged rows and auction lots excluded; other currencies are not converted.

Show 93 more listings

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Listings updated 2026-09-11. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Bessa R2 · Bessa R2A / R3A · Bessa L · Bessa R

Lenses for this body: Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 SL Aspherical · Super Wide-Heliar 15mm f/4.5 SL Aspherical

Sources (6)

Every page here is assembled from public sources, and the gaps are real ones. If you own this camera, know a serial number I'm missing, or can see where I have it wrong, tell me — corrections, serials and sample photos are all worth having.