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

Leica IIIa (Model G)

Ernst Leitz · LTM mount · 24×36mm on perforated 35mm cine film, 36 exposures · 1935

Also known as: Leica IIIa · Leica Model G · Leica G · Leica IIIa Monte en Sarre · ライカIIIa

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
Chrome LTM 1935–1948 — 91,887 cameras (Leica Wiki) — the most numerous pre-war Leica
Black lacquer LTM 1935–1939 — 800 cameras (Leica Wiki)
Monté en Sarre LTM 1950–1952 — No separate figure published
  1. Ken Rockwell weighs a 1938 body at 410.3 g bare and 432.4 g loaded with a 36-exposure cassette — an independent measurement against the 165 g printed on the Leica Wiki page, and close to that wiki's own 406 g for the Leica II.
  2. US catalog prices for the body alone: $126 (May 1936), $141 (August 1936), $120 (April 1937 and March 1938). As an outfit: $175.50 to $168 with the Elmar f/3.5, $235.50 to $213 with the Summar f/2, $300 with the Xenon f/1.5. Prices to about 1965 included Federal Excise Tax (Rockwell).
  3. The rangefinder has a 38 mm base and 1.5× magnification, an effective base length of 57 mm — longer than any M finder except the M3's 63 mm (Rockwell).
  4. Rockwell states the IIIa came only in chrome, and that a black one is more likely an earlier Model III updated by Leitz — against the Leica Wiki's 800 black lacquer bodies.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • 1/1000 on the shutter dial — the only functional difference from the Leica III
  • Slow-speed dial on the front, dioptre lever and strap lugs carried over from the III

Chrome:

  • Chrome-plated brass fittings

Black lacquer:

  • Black lacquer with nickel-plated knobs

Monté en Sarre:

  • Monté en Sarre engraved on the top plate beneath the Germany marking

Serial-range notes

156201–156850
The first block, listed as "Leica IIIa 1/1000" — the table naming the model by its one new feature before the name IIIa settles in later rows.
1935 blocks
The 1935 rows are unusually fragmented, dozens of batches of 50 to 900 cameras rather than the multi-thousand blocks of the III. Leitz was filling gaps between other models.

Specifications

Format
24×36mm on perforated 35mm cine film, 36 exposures
Finder (main)
Optical viewfinder · no rangefinder image
Finder (rangefinder)
Coupled split-image rangefinder with a separate eyepiece and dioptre lever
Shutter
focal plane, cloth · 1s – 1/1000 and Z, split at 1/20 between the top dial and the slow-speed dial
Designed by
Oskar Barnack — camera
Dimensions
133 × 39 × 65 mm
Country
Germany
Original price
$126 body only (US catalog, May 1936), falling to $120 by 1937

Figures we worked out rather than found: 91,887 + 800 = 92,687 — a total the page does not print, and the largest of any pre-war Leica · Black bodies are 0.86% of the run

Where sources disagree

Weight
  • Approximately 165 g (Leica Wiki)
  • Not stated elsewhere

Better supported: Neither — 165 g is not credible

The Leica Wiki's own figure for the Leica II, a body of the same size and construction, is 406 g. A brass-and-aluminium camera of these dimensions cannot weigh 165 g, and the number is reproduced here only to say that it should not be relied on. No weight is recorded in this entry's fields as a result.

What reviewers say

History

The IIIa is a Leica III that goes to 1/1000, and that is the whole of it. No other mechanism changed, and the Leica Wiki’s serial table gives away how the camera was thought about at the time: the first block, 650 cameras in 1935, is entered not as “Leica IIIa” but as “Leica IIIa 1/1000”, as though the shutter speed were the product and the body merely what it came attached to.

It became the most numerous Leica of the pre-war era — 91,887 chrome bodies against 800 in black lacquer, which is fewer than one camera in a hundred. That ratio matters when buying: black paint was already being phased out in 1935, so an unpapered black IIIa is far more likely to be a repainted chrome body than one of the eight hundred. A third variant appears fifteen years later, when Leitz assembled cameras from Wetzlar parts in the Saar Protectorate and engraved “Monté en Sarre” beneath the Germany marking — a camera whose distinguishing feature is a customs arrangement.

The 1935 production is oddly shaped. Where the III was built in blocks of thousands, the IIIa’s first year is dozens of small batches — 50 here, 175 there, 900 at most — squeezed between serial ranges assigned to other models. Leitz was running four cameras down the same line and numbering them as capacity allowed.

One figure on the source page is simply wrong, and it is worth saying so plainly rather than repeating it. The Leica Wiki gives the IIIa’s weight as approximately 165 g. Its own page for the Leica II — the same body, the same brass and aluminium, the same size — says 406 g. A camera of these dimensions cannot weigh 165 g, so no weight is recorded in this entry’s fields at all. Oskar Barnack did not see much of the model’s success: he died in January 1936, a few months after it went on sale, and every screw Leica that followed is a modification of what he left.

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

Leica IIIa (Model G)
Leica IIIa, serial 206617, 1936, from the back — Kameraprojekt Graz 2015, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $470 across 37 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $360–$700). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 2 days: unchanged from $470.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$470$360–$70037
2026-09-06$470$360–$70036

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

Show 90 more listings

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

Related: Leica 250 Reporter · Leica 72 · Leica III (Model F) · Leica IIIb

Lenses for this body: Elmar 3.5cm f/4.5 · Hektor 2.8cm f/6.3 · Summar 5cm f/2 · Summitar 5cm f/2 · Thambar 9cm f/2.2 · Xenon 5cm f/1.5

Sources (4)

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.