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

Nikkor 15mm f/5.6

Nippon Kogaku · Nikon F · 1973 · Retrofocus, 14 elements in 12 groups

our own finding

Also known as: Nikkor-QD·C Auto 15mm f/5.6 · Nikkor QDC 15mm f/5.6 · Nikkor-QD.C Auto 15mm f5.6 · New Nikkor 15mm f/5.6 · Ai Nikkor 15mm f/5.6 · Nikkor 15mm 1:5.6 · Nikon 15mm f/5.6 · ニッコール 15mm F5.6

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
Nikkor-QD·C Auto 15mm f/5.6 (pre-Ai) Nikon F 1973–1976 321001–322430 (confirmed 321117–322430), from June 1973
330001–330981 (confirmed 330019–330981), to August 1976 		2,411 across the two blocks — 1,430 and 981 (Vink)
New Nikkor 15mm f/5.6 (pre-Ai) Nikon F 1976–1977 340001–340565 565 (Vink)
Ai Nikkor 15mm f/5.6 Nikon F 1977–1978 350001–350688 (confirmed 350009–350688) 688 (Vink)
  1. Quantities are Vink's, derived from the span of collected serial numbers rather than from any Nikon production record. No factory figure has been published, and the totals disagree: Vink's blocks sum to 3,664, Marco Cavina states 3,395 for the whole f/5.6 line, and the reviewer at Casual Photophile gives roughly 3,500 split as 2,500 pre-Ai and about 1,000 Ai.
  2. Nikon dates the lens to 1973 in its own history of the 13mm; Vink dates the first serial block to June 1973. These agree, which is not true of the 13mm.
  3. Prices are Italian list prices reported by Cavina: 650,000 lire in 1974, rising to 1,250,000 lire by 1978. For scale, a standard 28mm Nikkor was 95,000 lire in 1974. No Japanese or United States list price has been located.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • 110° across the diagonal, rectilinear — straight lines stay straight, unlike the fisheyes at similar coverage
  • Built-in hood and a built-in four-filter turret: L1A skylight, Y48 yellow, O56 orange, R60 red
  • No front filter thread; the front element is bulbous and the fixed hood is its only protection
  • Focuses to 0.3m; 92mm across the barrel

Nikkor-QD·C Auto 15mm f/5.6 (pre-Ai):

  • QD·C in the engraving: Q for four plus D for ten is fourteen elements, and the ·C marks multicoating
  • Diamond-pattern focusing ring and a chrome filter tab
  • Meter-coupling prong only, no Ai ridge; Ai conversion kits 15, 16 and 17 fit it
  • 700g — 55g heavier than the K and Ai versions that followed

New Nikkor 15mm f/5.6 (pre-Ai):

  • K-series barrel with the rubber-inlaid focusing ring; the QD·C engraving is dropped for a plain Nikkor
  • Ai conversion kits 12, 13 and 14 — a different set from the QD·C, so the barrel is not the same casting

Ai Nikkor 15mm f/5.6:

  • Ai coupling ridge and the second aperture-direct-readout scale
  • 645g, built-in hood, built-in filter turret retained

Serial-range notes

320001–320002
Prototypes engraved QD Auto — the production optical layout without multicoating, 2 recorded, dated 1973 by Vink.
no serial recorded
An earlier prototype engraved PD Auto — P for five plus D for ten, so fifteen elements — was shown at Photokina in 1970. Cavina reports that the production lens dropped one meniscus and the aspherical front surface Mori had used in his original calculation. Vink lists the PD prototype with no serial number at all.
177051–188724
A different lens: the Ai and Ai-S Nikkor 15mm f/3.5 of August 1978 onward, 14 elements in 11 groups, with rear bayonet filters instead of the internal turret. It replaces this lens in the catalogue but shares no optical design with it.

Specifications

Formula
Retrofocus, 14 elements in 12 groups
Designed by
Mori Ikuo (森征雄) — optical design
Construction
14 elements / 12 groups
Aperture range
f/5.6–f/22
Diaphragm blades
7
Min. focus
0.3 m
Dimensions
92 × 76.5 mm
Weight
700 g
Years manufactured
1973–1978
Country
Japan
Coating
Nikon Integrated Coating from launch — the ·C in the QD·C engraving
Original price
650,000 lire (Italy, 1974), rising to 1,250,000 lire by 1978 — Cavina; no Japanese or US list price located

What reviewers say

Optical Ratings

Aggregated from the reviews above — follow the links for the full picture.

Chromatic aberration
strong at corners
Flare & ghosting
troublesome
Coma
residual at corners
Distortion
very low
Optical formula — Retrofocus, 14 elements in 12 groups

No Nikon cross-section of this lens was found. Its own tale prints the 13mm f/5.6 instead, and the lens left the catalogue in July 1978, before Nikon's product pages existed. The one drawing available is Marco Cavina's, signed and dated 2007 — a modern redrawing from the June 1970 patent, and the same article warns the patent covers a fifteen-element aspherical prototype rather than the fourteen-element production lens.

History

The engraving says what the lens is. Nikkor-QD·C: Q for four and D for ten, fourteen elements, and the interpunct-C for multicoating. Nikon had used the Latin count on every Auto Nikkor since 1959 and compounded the letters once designs passed ten elements — UD is eleven, on the 20mm f/3.5; HD is sixteen, on the prototype that became the 13mm. This was the last generation of Nikkor to carry the code at all. The New Nikkor barrel of 1974 dropped it, so the 15mm f/5.6 exists both as a QD·C and, from 1976, as a plain Nikkor with the same fourteen elements inside.

It was the first of Mori Ikuo’s ultra-wides to be built. Mori had been calculating 13mm, 15mm and 18mm designs side by side since before 1970, and the 15mm was the first judged manufacturable — ahead of the 18mm f/4 of 1975 and the 13mm f/5.6 of 1976. Marco Cavina dates the patent to June 1970 and reports a prototype engraved PD Auto, fifteen elements, shown at Photokina that autumn with an aspherical front surface. The production lens has one element fewer and no asphere: the surface was dropped as too expensive to grind, which is the same decision Nikon had refused to make two years earlier on the 10mm OP fisheye, where the asphere was the whole point.

What arrived in June 1973 covered 110° across the diagonal with straight lines held straight, and it did so with a built-in hood and a turret of four filters — skylight, yellow, orange, red — rotating inside the barrel, because nothing can be screwed to the front of a front element shaped like that. It was the widest rectilinear lens Nikon had, until the 13mm took the title three years later. It was also expensive in a way that is easy to miss now: 650,000 lire in Italy in 1974, against 95,000 for a standard 28mm Nikkor, and 1,250,000 by 1978.

Reviewers do not agree about it, and the disagreement is instructive. Both accounts start from the same place — the geometry is honestly rectilinear, the distortion genuinely slight for the coverage. From there they diverge. Bjørn Rørslett finds the centre very sharp and the corners falling away fast, with colour fringing, residual coma and spherical aberration all showing, pronounced field curvature, and flare and ghosting a real problem in practice; he rates it 3 out of 5 on film. The reviewer at Casual Photophile finds it less flare-prone than the faster 15mm f/3.5 that replaced it, likes the muted pastel colour, and recommends it as the lens to learn ultra-wide work on. They are describing the same optics from different distances: one against the modern Nikkors, one against the experience of shooting an ultra-wide at all.

The Ai version stopped in July 1978, one month before the 15mm f/3.5 replaced it with a genuinely different design — fourteen elements in eleven groups, rear bayonet filters instead of the turret, a stop and a half faster. How many f/5.6 lenses were made in the five years is not settled. Vink’s serial blocks sum to 3,664; Cavina states 3,395; the Casual Photophile review says roughly 3,500 split 2,500 to 1,000 between pre-Ai and Ai, a split Vink’s blocks do not support. No factory figure has been published, and until one is, the count rests on numbers that owners have chosen to report.

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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.

Example photos

Sample photo wanted — shot with a Nikkor 15mm f/5.6? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $800 across 17 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $590–$1,100). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 2 days: unchanged from $800.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$800$590–$1,10017
2026-09-06$800$590–$1,10017

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

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Related: Nikkor 13mm f/5.6

Sources (7)

Every page here is assembled from public sources, and the gaps are real ones. If you own this lens, 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.