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

Nikon F80

Nikon · Nikon F mount · 24×36mm on 35mm film · 2000

Also known as: Nikon N80 · Nikon N80 QD · Nikon F80D · Nikon F80S · ニコンF80

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
F80 Nikon F 2000–2006 — No figure published
F80D Nikon F 2000–2006 — No figure published
F80S Nikon F 2000–2006 — No figure published
  1. No production figure has been published for any of the three versions, and no serial blocks are recorded. Nikon's Camera Chronicle has no article on the F80. Vink's serial database has not yet reached the autofocus film bodies.
  2. Nikon claims one world's first for the camera, and it is the finder: the Vari-Brite Focus Area display system, which reverses the focus brackets from red to black according to the brightness behind them.
  3. Film speed comes off the DX code from ISO 25 to 5000, or by hand from ISO 6 to 6400 in third-stop increments.
  4. The F80 chassis carried four digital cameras: Nikon's own D100, Fujifilm's FinePix S2 Pro and S3 Pro, and Kodak's DCS Pro. More digital bodies were built on this shell than on any other Nikon film camera.
  5. The rubberised covering on the F80 and N80 commonly degrades into a sticky surface. This is a material failure rather than a mechanical one and does not affect function.
  6. The meter does not work with manual-focus AI and AI-S Nikkors: the camera needs a CPU in the lens, so a manual lens leaves manual exposure and guesswork. Thom Hogan and Mike Eckman both name this, and Eckman adds that the finder carries no microprism collar or split-image wedge to focus such a lens by either. It is the sharpest practical limit on what the body can be used for, and Nikon's specification sheet does not put it this bluntly.
  7. Finder coverage is about 92 per cent, against 96 on the F100 — Thom Hogan, who lists it among the differences between the two bodies. Hogan also names the autofocus module as the CAM900, where the F100 has the CAM1300.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • Vari-Brite focus area display — the five brackets light up red against a dark subject and show black against a bright one
  • On-demand grid lines, switched into the finder rather than etched on the screen
  • Cross-ranged five-area autofocus sensor
  • The F100's control layout in a lighter, unsealed shell
  • Rubberised covering that turns sticky with age — the characteristic fault of the model

F80:

  • Plain hinged back, no imprinting window
  • About 515g

F80D:

  • Date imprinting through the back; about 520g

F80S:

  • Imprints exposure data between the frames as well as the date on them

Specifications

Format
24×36mm on 35mm film
Finder
Fixed eye-level pentaprism with the Vari-Brite focus area display and switchable grid lines; the flash is housed above it · 92% coverage · no rangefinder image
Shutter
electronically controlled vertical-travel metal focal plane · 30s – 1/4000, plus B; camera-wiki gives the steps as 1/2 EV · flash sync X at 1/125
Film advance
integral motor; about 2.5 frames a second in continuous
Back
hinged; the F80D imprints the date, the F80S the date and exposure data
Meter
TTL 3D Matrix from a ten-segment sensor, centre-weighted with 75 per cent of the weight in a 12mm circle, and spot tied to the selected focus area; matrix and centre-weighted from EV 0 to 21, spot from EV 3 to 21 at ISO 100 with an f/1.4 lens
Motor drive
Not compatible — Integral. The MB-16 pack adds AA cells and a vertical release but is a battery holder, not a drive: the frame rate does not change.
Weight
515 g
Dimensions
141.5 × 98.5 × 71 mm
Country
Japan
Original price
About US$499 with a 28–80mm zoom at launch, per Mike Eckman's review; no body-only list price located
Accessories
MB-16 battery pack · 2 × CR123A lithium cells in the body

Where sources disagree

First
  • Introduced 27 January 2000 — English Wikipedia, and Mike Eckman's review, which gives the same date
  • Introduced February 2000 — camera-wiki.org

Nikon's own product history lists the F80, F80D and F80S under the year 2000 and gives no month, so the maker's record settles neither reading. The two accounts differ by days, but nothing published resolves them.

What reviewers say

History

The F80 is the F100 with the armour taken off. Five-area cross-ranged autofocus, ten-segment three-dimensional matrix metering, a shutter to 1/4000, the same two-command-dial layout — in a 515-gram polycarbonate shell with no weather sealing and a pop-up flash where the professional body has none. That is the whole proposition, and it worked well enough that the camera was still being made in 2006.

Nikon’s one claim of a world’s first for it is a finder feature. The Vari-Brite Focus Area display lights the five focus brackets red when the subject behind them is dark and shows them black when it is bright, so the marks stay readable either way; grid lines can be switched in and out of the same finder rather than being etched onto a screen. Everything else on the specification sheet had been done before, on the F100 or the F5.

Three versions were sold. The F80 is plain; the F80D imprints the date on the frame; the F80S imprints exposure data between the frames as well. In the Americas the range stopped one short — N80 and N80 QD, with nothing corresponding to the F80S. Nikon’s product history lists all three Japanese names and only the two North American ones, without comment.

What the F80 became matters more than what it was. Nikon built the D100 on this chassis; Fujifilm built the FinePix S2 Pro and then the S3 Pro on it; Kodak built the DCS Pro on it. Four digital cameras from three manufacturers came out of one amateur film body, which is more than any other Nikon film camera can claim.

The record is thin in the usual place and in one unusual one. No production figure and no serial blocks exist for any version, as with the F70, F50 and F60 before it; Nikon’s Camera Chronicle never wrote the camera up. But the launch date is also unsettled: 27 January 2000 by two accounts, February 2000 by a third, and simply “2000” in the maker’s own list. A camera made for six years, copied by two other manufacturers and still common secondhand, and the week it appeared is not established.

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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

Nikon F80
Nikon N80 with the MB-16 grip and the AF 50mm f/1.8 — Mandula, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Nikon F80
Nikon F80, top plate — Trykin, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Nikon F80
Reflection — shot on a Nikon N80 (Orangeadnan) — Orangeadnan, via Flickr (Openverse) (CC BY 2.0)

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $170 across 38 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $130–$200). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 2 days: unchanged from $170.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$170$130–$20038
2026-09-06$170$130–$20038

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

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

Related: Nikon F50 · Nikon F60 · Nikon F65 · Nikon F70 · Nikon F75

Sources (9)

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.