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

Super-Angulon 21mm f/3.4

Schneider-Kreuznach · LTM + Leica M · 1963 · Eight elements in four groups, symmetrical

Also known as: Schneider Super-Angulon 21mm f/3.4 · Super-Angulon 21/3.4 · スーパーアンギュロン 21mm F3.4

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
Chrome Leica M 1963–1967 2027501–2028000, 2035001–2036000 (1964) — printed on the wiki as 1:4 chrome and footnoted as containing 1:3.4 lenses
2054001–2056000 (1964) — printed as chrome and black together, the first block naming black
1967101–1968100 (1962 on the model page) — no finish marked, and disputed between this lens and the f/4 		Part of 5,970 lenses
Black Leica M 1967–1980 2054001–2056000 (1964) — the earliest block marked black, three years before the 1967 changeover the wiki states in prose
2247151–2247650 (1967), 2292051–2292800 (1968), 2327801–2328300 and 2372301–2372800 (1969), 2417201–2417700 (1970)
2473251–2473750 (1971), 2522501–2522800 (1972), 2583001–2583500 (1973), 2672701–2673200 (1974)
2750631–2750750 (1975) and 2783351–2783650 (1976) — marked neither black nor chrome, but after every chrome mark on the table 		No separate figure published
Cut-out for the M5 and CL Leica M 1971–1980 2473251–2473750 (1971), 2522501–2522800 (1972), 2583001–2583500 (1973), 2672701–2673200 (1974), 2750631–2750750 (1975), 2783351–2783650 (1976) — every block below the wiki's cut-out divider row From serial 2473251
  1. Ken Rockwell dates the introduction precisely: Photokina in Cologne, which ran 16 to 24 March 1963. He also notes that the f/3.4 added half-stop clicks to the aperture ring, which the f/4 it replaced did not have.
  2. Catalogue number 11 103, supplied with the 12 501 hood. The front cap is the A52.5 14 102, the rear cap the extra-deep 14 042, and the matching finder the 12 002. Filters are 48mm screw-in, or Series VII behind the hood (Ken Rockwell).
  3. The metering exception: with the cut-out barrel, the M5 and the CL are the only film Leicas that will meter through this lens, because their meters swing a cell into the light path. Every other metered M reads light reflected off the shutter curtain, which the deep rear element blocks (35mmc, Ken Rockwell).
  4. Ken Rockwell puts the cut-out change at serial 2,473,252 — one number later than the 2473251 this entry carries from the Leica Wiki.
  5. Leitz Photographica Auction, 100 Years of Leica Camera, lot 87: six Schneider prototypes and samples, all differing from the production lenses — two chrome f/4 in screw mount, three f/3.4 in M mount and one f/3.4 lens block — realised €21,600 including buyer's premium against a €30,000–40,000 estimate and an €18,000 starting price.
  6. The 5,970 total is arithmetic, and it can be checked. The eleven blocks the table names outright as 21mm f/3.4 Super-Angulons sum to 4,970. Adding the disputed 1967101–1968100, the thousand numbers JCB gives to this lens and Puts to the f/4, brings the figure to exactly 5,970 — the total the page prints, and the "< 5,970 lenses" in its production-era line. Whoever compiled the total therefore counted the disputed block as this lens even though the row above still reads 1:4.
  7. That same total row dates itself 1967-1975, which fits neither the blocks it counts nor the ones it does not. The disputed 1967101–1968100 is dated 1962 and the 2783351–2783650 block 1976, and both are inside the 5,970; the table as a whole runs 1962 to 1978. The production-era line above gives 1963-1980, and this entry follows it.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • Only FOUR aperture blades — the fewest of any lens in this catalog
  • 92 degrees, the same field as the f/4, from one element fewer
  • Deep rear element: no metered M reads through it, and an M8 or M9 cannot meter with it

Chrome:

  • Chrome finish

Black:

  • All-black barrel

Cut-out for the M5 and CL:

  • A machined cut-out in the rear of the barrel to clear the metering arm

Serial-range notes

1967101–2783650
THE RULE. Leitz never numbered a model from one and never put a date inside the number — and that holds for the Schneider-built lenses it sold too, which were numbered out of the same Leitz sequence as everything else in the catalogue. A number dates a copy in two steps: read the year off the general lens list on the Leica Wiki's serial-number links page, then refine it against the SN Start / SN End table on this lens's own model page. Sixteen blocks are printed there. Every one of their years agrees with the general list, so the two sources corroborate each other on dating even where they quarrel about which lens a block holds — and they quarrel a great deal. A number falling between the blocks belongs to some other Leitz lens, not to an undated example of this one.
2473251
The cut-out for the M5 and CL, and the wiki marks it with a divider row rather than a note: "LENSES BELOW HAVE CUTOUT FOR USE WITH M5 + CL", printed between the 1970 block ending 2417700 and the 1971 block beginning 2473251. So the first cut-out lens is 2473251 and the last lens without the notch is somewhere at or below 2417700 — the 55,000 numbers between are unassigned to this lens, which is why the change cannot be placed more finely. Ken Rockwell gives 2,473,252 instead, one number later; both are recorded.
1967101–1968100
A thousand numbers claimed by two lenses. The wiki prints this block on both Super-Angulon pages and footnotes it identically: JCB has it as the first batch of the f/3.4, Puts has it with the f/4. A second footnote on this page names lens 1967952 — inside the block — as a 1:3.4 and not the 1:4 the row says. Note also that 1967101 is exactly where the general year list starts 1963, while both model pages date the block 1962. Three disagreements over one block; all are recorded and none can be settled on what is published.
2027501–2028000, 2035001–2036000, 2054001–2056000
The chrome question. All three blocks are printed on this page with the product given as "Super-Angulon f= 2.1 cm 1:4" and carets against it, and the caret footnote reads: "Lenses 1967952, 2027728, 2035381, 2054276, 2917100, 2917150, are 1:3.4 not 1:4 as listed." The wiki's f/4 page prints two of the same blocks and footnotes them to the same effect, crediting Schouten. An auction result supports it independently: Leitz Photographica auction 45, lot 102 sold a chrome Leica M4 with "Super-Angulon 3.4/21mm no.2054189" — a number inside the third block — for €3,360 including premium. The year given in that lot, 1969, is the camera's.
2783651–2785650
A block printed on this lens's page that is not this lens. The product column reads "^^ Elmarit-R 28mm f/2.8 ^^", the total is bracketed [2000] and left out of the sum, and the footnote against it says "Lens 2783716 is 21mm f/3.4 Super-Angulon" — one number inside a block belonging to a different lens in a different system.
2917001–2917150
The other bracketed block, printed here as "21mm f/4 ^ Super-Angulon-R ^", dated 1978, total [150] and excluded from the sum. The caret footnote claims 2917100 and 2917150 for the f/3.4. The Leica Wiki's own page for the 21mm f/4 Super-Angulon-R prints the identical block as that lens's, with a footnote saying the same two numbers are 21mm f/3.4 Super-Angulons. Both pages agree the block is mostly reflex and that two of its lenses are not.
2834681 and 2834683
Two lenses outside every published block. Leitz Photographica auction lot 87, in the 100 Years of Leica Camera sale, included a black Super-Angulon 3.4/21mm no. 2834681 and a chrome one no. 2834683, both M-mount, both described as prototypes or samples differing from serial production. Neither number falls in any block on this page — the nearest end at 2785650 and the next begins at 2917001 — and the general year list places them in 1977, a decade after the chrome finish is supposed to have ended.
a Schneider number instead of a Leitz one
A marker worth knowing on a lens Leitz sold but did not make. The same auction lot included a black 3.4/21mm carrying Schneider-Kreuznach serial 11,895,790 rather than a Leitz number, and a bare 3.4/21mm lens block numbered 12976911. Eight-digit numbers in that range are Schneider's own sequence and cannot be looked up in any Leitz list.

Specifications

Formula
Eight elements in four groups, symmetrical
Construction
8 elements / 4 groups
Aperture range
f/3.4–f/22
Diaphragm blades
4
Min. focus
0.4 m
Dimensions
52.5 × 51 mm
Weight
301 g
Filter
48 mm
Years manufactured
1963–1980
Country
Germany

What reviewers say

History

The f/3.4 Super-Angulon replaced the f/4 in 1963 with one element fewer, two thirds of a stop more light, and the same 92 degree field — and Schneider still made it. It stayed in the Leitz catalogue for seventeen years, which is longer than any Leitz-designed 21 of the period, and it is the lens most photographers mean when they say Super-Angulon.

Two details set it apart from anything else in this catalog. It has four aperture blades — four — which produces a hard cross-shaped flare from point sources stopped down, and is the fewest of any lens here. And its rear element still sits deep enough to block a meter, which Leitz solved in 1971 not by redesigning the optics but by machining a cut-out in the back of the barrel so the M5’s metering arm could swing past. Lenses from serial 2473251 have that notch; earlier ones do not, and will foul an M5 or a CL.

It mounts on an M8 or M9 and takes pictures there, without metering. What it does to the corners of a digital sensor is a separate matter, and one the lens was designed twenty years before anyone had to think about.

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 wanted — shot with a Super-Angulon 21mm f/3.4? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $1,800 across 20 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $1,500–$1,900). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 2 days: unchanged from $1,800.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$1,800$1,500–$1,90020
2026-09-06$1,800$1,500–$1,90020

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

Show 33 more listings

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

Related: Elmarit-M 21mm f/2.8 · Super-Angulon 21mm f/4 · Super-Elmar-M 21mm f/3.4 ASPH

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.