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

Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Aspherical

Cosina Voigtländer · Leica M · 2020

Also known as: Voigtländer Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Aspherical VM · Voigtlander Nokton 21mm F1.4 · NOKTON 21mm F1.4 Aspherical · Voigtlander 21/1.4 Nokton · Cosina Voigtländer 21mm f/1.4 · フォクトレンダー ノクトン 21mm F1.4 · Voigtlander 21mm f1.4 VM

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
VM (2020– ) Leica M 2020 — —
  1. Cosina's page names aspherical glass, anomalous partial-dispersion glass and a floating mechanism without giving counts. Bastian Kratzke's review gives four aspherical surfaces and weighs the lens at 484g against Cosina's 480g; Cosina's figures are used here.
  2. Rangefinder coupling stops at 0.7m; the helicoid continues to 0.5m, where the floating group keeps the correction up.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • Engraved NOKTON 21mm F1.4 Aspherical; f/1.4–f/16
  • All-metal helicoid; the lens is the largest 21 Cosina has made for the M mount and blocks a large part of a Leica's finder

VM (2020– ):

  • Square bayonet hood, removable, cut away to clear the rangefinder window
  • φ69.5 × 69.7mm, 480g, 62mm filter
  • Twelve straight aperture blades
  • Black only

Specifications

Formula
13 elements in 11 groups, aspherical and anomalous-dispersion glass, floating group
Construction
13 elements / 11 groups
Aperture range
f/1.4–f/16
Diaphragm blades
12
Min. focus
0.5 m
Dimensions
69.5 × 69.7 mm
Weight
480 g
Filter
62 mm
Years manufactured
2020
Country
Japan
Coating
Multi-coated
Original price
¥150,000 excluding tax (2020) (today ¥163,000)

What reviewers say

Optical Ratings

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

Vignetting
very heavy wide-open
Flare & ghosting
excellent
Coma
visible to f/2
Distortion
low, wavy
Optical formula — 13 elements in 11 groups, aspherical and anomalous-dispersion glass, floating group
ⓘ What these charts mean

MTF (modulation transfer function) shows how much contrast the lens keeps at a given fineness of detail, from the center of the frame to the corner — the coarse curves track punch, the fine ones resolving power, and a gap between solid and dashed lines means astigmatism. Relative illumination (falloff) shows how much darker the corners are than the center at each aperture. Manufacturers only began publishing these for modern lenses; no 1950s maker issued them, which is why older families here cite period magazine bench tests instead.

History

The Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Aspherical is the fastest and largest 21 Cosina has built for the M mount, and the lens every reviewer sets against Leica’s own Summilux-M 21mm f/1.4 ASPH, the only other 21 at that aperture the reviewers name for the bayonet. Cosina released it on 27 February 2020 at ¥150,000 excluding tax, seven years after the Ultron 21mm f/1.8 it sits above. The formula is thirteen elements in eleven groups — the same count as the Ultron but a new design — with aspherical surfaces to hold distortion down, anomalous partial-dispersion glass against colour fringing, and a floating group that carries the correction through to the 0.5m close focus; twelve straight blades; f/1.4 to f/16. It takes a 62mm filter and weighs 480g in a barrel 69.5mm across and 69.7mm long, shorter than the Ultron but wider, and its square bayonet hood is cut away on one corner to keep it out of the rangefinder window. Rangefinder coupling runs to 0.7m, scale focus beyond that to 0.5m. It has had no second version and remains current.

Three reviewers on three Leica M10 bodies reached one verdict with one reservation. Bastian Kratzke found sharpness across the frame from f/1.4 that he called astonishing and, thanks to the floating group, undiminished close up; Ashwin Rao found the centre very sharp wide open and the edges caught up by f/2.8; Jack Takahashi found peak performance through the centre and midframe at f/1.4 and perfection corner to corner by f/3.4. Kratzke’s summary is the one that gets quoted: probably the best 21 that can be attached to an M-mount camera. The reservation is vignetting, and it is not small. Kratzke measured 3.8 EV in the corners wide open; Rao calls it heavy through f/5.6; Takahashi calls it extreme with the lens uncoded. All three correct it in software and move on, and Kratzke warns that an ND filter for daylight f/1.4 will make it worse. Behind it come the ordinary faults of a fast wide — coma to f/2 that Kratzke would stop down to f/2.8 for a blue-hour skyline, purple fringing at f/1.4, bokeh that roughens toward the corners — and the strengths that surprise: flare resistance good enough that Kratzke found the hood unnecessary, distortion Rao rated negligible and Kratzke a low, correctable wave, and twelve-blade sunstars.

What divides them is size. Rao points out that it is a quarter of a pound lighter and slimmer than the Summilux, and preferred it to the Ultron for having a hood that comes off; Takahashi, who found the bulk bothered him less mounted than expected, still sold it as too large to justify, and Kratzke accepted it because the pictures are so good. On a Leica the lens intrudes on a large part of the finder, so a 21mm brightline in the shoe is not optional for framing, and the lens is heavier than any film M body it goes on. Against the Ultron 21mm f/1.8, Kratzke’s direct comparison gives the Nokton more vignetting at f/1.4 but noticeably less by f/2, and better optics throughout.

Buying it is simple, since there is one version in one finish and it is still in production: a used one should come with the square bayonet hood that Cosina supplies with it, and the listing to avoid is the Sony E-mount Nokton 21mm f/1.4 of the same name, a different lens body that does not mount on an M.

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 Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Aspherical
Piccadilly Circus in lockdown, March 2020, Leica M10 Monochrom with the Nokton 21mm f/1.4 (Sanshiro Kubota) — Sanshiro KUBOTA, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)
Sample photo taken with the Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Aspherical
Canterbury Cathedral, October 2020, Leica SL2 with the Nokton 21mm f/1.4 VM (Sanshiro Kubota) — Sanshiro KUBOTA, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

Sample photo wanted — shot with a Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Aspherical? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $900 across 26 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-19 (middle half $730–$980). First day tracked.

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

Show 20 more listings

Buying from Yahoo! Auctions outside Japan. It is a domestic marketplace: sellers ship within Japan, and most will not register an overseas buyer. A proxy service bids on your behalf, receives the item and forwards it, for a fee and a wait. Buyee, Jauce and ZenMarket each accept a Yahoo auction number directly. Listed alphabetically for information — none is recommended over another, and none of these is an affiliate link.

Listings updated 2026-09-19. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Color-Skopar Vintage Line 21mm f/3.5 Aspherical · Color-Skopar 21mm f/4 · Nokton Vintage Line 28mm f/1.5 Aspherical · Nokton 35mm f/1.2 Aspherical · Nokton 40mm f/1.2 Aspherical · Nokton 50mm f/1.2 Aspherical · Ultron 21mm f/1.8 Aspherical

Sources (5)

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.