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

Nikkor 50mm f/1.2

Nippon Kogaku · Nikon F · 1978 · Modified double Gauss, 7 elements in 6 groups

our own finding

Also known as: Ai Nikkor 50mm f/1.2 · Ai-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.2S · Nikkor 50mm 1:1.2 · Nikon 50mm f/1.2 AIS · NIKKOR 50mm F1.2S · ニッコール 50mm F1.2

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
Ai Nikon F 1978–1981 177051–250513 73,463 (Vink, counted from serials — not a factory figure)
Ai-S Nikon F 1981–2020 250001–391172 (1981–2005)
400001–427017 (2006 series, to 2020) 		141,172 + 27,017 = 168,189 across the two blocks (Vink, serial-derived)
Ai-S "Classic" Nikon F 1982–1982 5000001–5000100 (its own seven-digit block) 100 (Vink, serial-derived)
  1. Serial blocks and quantities are Roland Vink's. His Qty column is "Number of lenses made based on serial numbers collected" and his dates "may not be accurate" — these are counts derived from serial numbers, not factory records. Nikon has published no production figure.
  2. Summing Vink's blocks gives 241,752 lenses across forty-two years: 73,463 Ai, 168,189 Ai-S, 100 in the F3/T block. For scale, his figures for the Noct-Nikkor 58mm f/1.2 — the same speed, one aspherical surface, the same years — total 11,413.
  3. Nikon's own NIKKOR essay series has no tale on this lens. It covers the 55mm f/1.2 that preceded it and the Noct-Nikkor 58mm f/1.2 that ran alongside it; the 50mm f/1.2 appears only as the successor named in the closing lines of the 55mm story.
  4. The Ai-S date is not settled. Vink dates it from June 1981; Photography in Malaysia says September 1981.
  5. Weights disagree. Vink gives 390g for the Ai and 360g for the Ai-S. Photography in Malaysia gives 420g for the Ai, 380g for the early Ai-S and 360g for a 2002 catalogue listing, and says the discrepancy has never been explained to its author's satisfaction. Nobody suggests the optics changed.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • Engraved NIKON, not NIPPON KOGAKU: by 1978 the barrels carried the brand and the company still carried the old name
  • 52mm filter thread on a 70mm barrel — the front element is huge and the accessory standard survives it
  • Minimum aperture is f/16, not the f/22 of the slower fifties
  • Seven elements: fewer than the 55mm f/1.2 needed, and fewer than most f/1.2 designs of any make

Ai:

  • Seven aperture blades
  • Distance and depth-of-field data outside the filter ring, not on the focus ring
  • 180° focus throw — twice the Ai-S, and the reason some users prefer it
  • Three cross-head screws in the mount ring

Ai-S:

  • Nine aperture blades
  • Distance and depth-of-field data moved onto the focus ring
  • Minimum aperture printed in orange on the ring and the readout scale
  • Focus throw cut from 180° to 110°

Ai-S "Classic":

  • A seven-digit serial beginning 50000 — nothing else in the family numbers this way

Serial-range notes

104592
A single Ai prototype, 1978.
250001–250513
The Ai and Ai-S blocks overlap here: the Ai-S opens at 250001 while the Ai run is still finishing.

Specifications

Formula
Modified double Gauss, 7 elements in 6 groups
Construction
7 elements / 6 groups
Aperture range
f/1.2–f/16
Diaphragm blades
7
Min. focus
0.5 m
Dimensions
70 × 59 mm
Weight
390 g
Filter
52 mm (0.75 mm pitch)
Years manufactured
1978–2020
Country
Japan

What reviewers say

Optical Ratings

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

Spherical aberration
strong wide open
Vignetting
noticeable
Flare & ghosting
noticeable
Coma
severe below f/2
Optical formula — Modified double Gauss, 7 elements in 6 groups
Schematic cross-section drawn for this site from Nikon's own diagram — 7 elements in 6 groups; curvatures and spacing stylized. One surface was corrected against the source after a second read.
Schematic cross-section drawn for this site from Nikon's own diagram — 7 elements in 6 groups; curvatures and spacing stylized. One surface was corrected against the source after a second read. — Drawn for this site

History

A reflex mirror has to swing, and the space it swings through has to sit between the last glass and the film. That is the whole problem. Nippon Kogaku could build a 50mm f/1.4 for a rangefinder in 1950, but on an SLR the same speed at the same focal length meant pushing the rear group forward into the mirror’s path, and the faster the lens the worse the squeeze. Nikon’s answer in 1965 was to move the focal length instead of solving the problem: the Nikkor-S Auto 55mm f/1.2. Five extra millimetres of focal length bought the back focus, and the lens sold for thirteen years.

The 50mm arrived in March 1978. Nikon’s own history is direct about what it represented — the long-sought 50mm f/1.2, arriving to end the 55mm’s run — and the 55mm f/1.2 Ai stops in April 1978, one month later. Seven elements in six groups, a modified double Gauss, and still a 52mm filter thread on a 70mm barrel.

It never existed in any other mount generation. There is no pre-Ai 50mm f/1.2 and no New Nikkor version, because the lens was designed after the 1977 Ai change; and there is no autofocus version, because Nikon never made one. The Ai-S of 1981 swapped seven blades for nine, moved the engraving from the barrel to the focus ring, printed the minimum aperture in orange, and halved the focus throw from 180 degrees to 110 — Richard Haw prefers the older lens for exactly that reason. The optics did not move. That state of affairs held for thirty-nine more years. When Nikon finally built another f/1.2 fifty it was the Z 50mm f/1.2 S of September 2020, seventeen elements, 1,090 grams, for a mount with no mirror in it at all — and the same year the Ai-S left the catalogue.

Wide open the lens is not a corrected instrument and was never meant to be one. Spherical aberration dominates, coma is bad until about f/2, vignetting and flare are both easy to provoke, and the bokeh is the reason people buy it. Haw rates its resolution wide open as usable rather than impressive, better than the 55mm it replaced, and short of the Noct-Nikkor 58mm f/1.2 — which is the point of the Noct, and which cost far more. Vink’s serials imply about 242,000 of these against about 11,000 Nocts.

Two things are missing from the record. No designer has been credited: Nikon’s essay series gave the 55mm f/1.2 a full tale under Shimizu Yoshiyuki’s name and gave the Noct another, but the 50mm f/1.2 appears in neither except as a sentence about succession, and no list price or production figure has been published for it either. And the hundred lenses in the 5000001 block remain unexplained — Vink ties them to an F3/T limited edition and nothing consulted here says what makes them different.

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.

Example photos

Sample photo taken with the Nikkor 50mm f/1.2
Bust of Clara del Rey, Madrid — tagged Nikkor 50mm f/1.2 (Javier Pérez Montes) — Javier Perez Montes, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Sample photo taken with the Nikkor 50mm f/1.2
Olma 'El Abuelo', Parque Lineal del Manzanares — Nikkor 50mm f/1.2 (Javier Pérez Montes) — Javier Perez Montes, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Sample photo taken with the Nikkor 50mm f/1.2
Rocks — Nikkor 50mm f/1.2 (spoiltexile) — spoilt.exile, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Sample photo wanted — shot with a Nikkor 50mm f/1.2? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $340 across 46 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $290–$380). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 2 days: unchanged from $340.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$340$290–$38046
2026-09-06$340$290–$38046

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

Show 114 more listings

eBay links are affiliate links. If you buy through one, Glass Bodies earns a small commission from eBay at no cost to you. It does not change which listings appear, their prices or their order — those come from the search and the sort described above.

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

Sources (4)

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.