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

Ultron 28mm f/2

Cosina Voigtländer · Leica M · 2008

single source, unconfirmed

Also known as: Voigtländer Ultron 28mm f/2 · Voigtlander Ultron 28mm f2 VM · Voigtländer Ultron Vintage Line 28mm f/2 Aspherical · Voigtlander 28mm f/2 Ultron II · Cosina Voigtländer 28mm f/2 Ultron · Voigtlander 28/2 Ultron · フォクトレンダー ウルトロン 28mm F2 · ウルトロン Vintage Line 28mm F2 Aspherical · VM

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
Ultron 28mm F2 VM (2008) · 10 elements in 8 groups, near-symmetrical, no aspherical element Leica M 2008–2021 — —
Ultron Vintage Line 28mm F2 Aspherical Type I (2021) · 10 elements in 7 groups, one aspherical element Leica M 2021–2024 — —
Ultron Vintage Line 28mm F2 Aspherical Type II (2021) · 10 elements in 7 groups, one aspherical element — the same optics as the Type I Leica M 2021 — —
  1. Formulas, aperture range, blades, minimum focus, dimensions, weights, filter sizes, finishes, yen prices and the on-sale, discontinuation and re-release dates come from Cosina's product pages and news notices. phillipreeve.net dates the 2008 lens to about 2012 and weighs it at 238g, and the Type I at 188g; Cosina's August 2008, 244g and 190g are used here.
  2. The Type I's black anodised aluminium finish rests on one reviewer's description; Cosina's pages give the Type II's brass and its two colours but say nothing of the Type I's material.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • All versions: ten aperture blades, f/2 to f/22, rangefinder-coupled M bayonet
  • Two optical designs under one name — the 2008 lens without an aspherical element, the 2021 Vintage Line with one — and two barrels for the second

Ultron 28mm F2 VM (2008):

  • Engraved ULTRON 28mm F2 with no Aspherical; 46mm filter thread; φ55.0 × 51.2mm, 244g; minimum focus 0.7m¹
  • Shallow focusing tab and an aperture ring set close behind it, which reviewers found easy to slip off or catch a finger on

Ultron Vintage Line 28mm F2 Aspherical Type I (2021):

  • Engraved Aspherical; 1950s styling with a removable focusing stick rather than a tab; φ52.0 × 36mm, 190g; 39mm filter thread; minimum focus 0.5m¹
  • Black anodised aluminium with chrome accents, on Jack Takahashi's description — Cosina's page gives no material for the Type I

Ultron Vintage Line 28mm F2 Aspherical Type II (2021):

  • Early-1970s styling with a scalloped focusing tab; brass barrel in silver or black paint; φ51.4 × 36mm, 230g — forty grams over the Type I on the same glass¹

Specifications

Formula
Ultron — 10 elements in 8 groups (2008); 10 elements in 7 groups with an aspherical element (Vintage Line, 2021)
Aperture range
f/2–f/22
Diaphragm blades
10
Years manufactured
2008
Country
Japan
Original price
¥75,000 excl. tax (2008) (today ¥84,000); the Vintage Line Type I and Type II were ¥100,000 excl. tax in 2021

What reviewers say

Optical Ratings

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

Vignetting
Strong, 3.5 EV
Flare & ghosting
Well controlled
Distortion
Low
Optical formula — Ultron — 10 elements in 8 groups (2008); 10 elements in 7 groups with an aspherical element (Vintage Line, 2021)

History

Cosina’s fast 28 in M mount is one name over two lenses. The first, the Ultron 28mm F2 VM, went on sale in August 2008 at ¥75,000 excluding tax, a year after the screw-mount 28mm f/1.9 Aspherical had ended, and it was not that lens re-mounted: ten elements in eight groups, near-symmetrical, with no aspherical surface at all, ten blades, f/2 to f/22, a 46mm thread, 0.7m close focus, 244 grams and 51.2mm long. Cosina sold it on the bokeh of the iris near full aperture and on the precision of its rangefinder coupling, which is the whole game at f/2 on a 28. It ran until April 2021 — thirteen years, long enough that BastianK, reviewing it in 2023, guessed its birth at about 2012.

What replaced it in June 2021 was a recomputation with a change of clothes. The Ultron Vintage Line 28mm F2 Aspherical keeps ten elements but drops to seven groups, one element aspherical and two of abnormal partial dispersion, and Cosina says outright that it was done to deal with colour fringing at the edges of a digital frame. It focuses to 0.5m instead of 0.7, takes 39mm filters instead of 46, and is 36mm long. The two barrels are the identification puzzle. The Type I is styled on the 1950s, with a removable focusing stick, 52mm across and 190 grams; the Type II is styled on the early 1970s, with a scalloped tab, a brass barrel in silver or black paint, 51.4mm across and 230 grams. Both were ¥100,000 excluding tax. Cosina ended the Type I in July 2024 and announced the end of the Type II for November 2025, then on 5 June 2026 said demand had brought the Type II back on sale from 3 July 2026 — so at the time of writing the Type II is current and the Type I is not.

The reviewers who have used both agree on the direction of travel. BastianK, who reviewed the 2008 lens and the Type I for phillipreeve.net, finds the older one high in resolution, contrast and flare resistance with low distortion and wonderful ten-pointed sunstars, and a good landscape lens on an M — and still calls the Type I the better lens: lighter, closer-focusing, very good in the centre from f/2, with good flare resistance and well-corrected coma. Hern Tan, writing about the original in 2018, thought it the best set of compromises among the things a lens can be and possibly a classic in its own right. Jack Takahashi puts the Type I among the highest-performing 28s ever made and finds it matching or beating the Summicron-M 28 ASPH at a sixth of the price. Where they disagree is on the small things and on sensors. Every one of them names the vignetting — 3.5 stops in the corners wide open on the Type I, strong by design on the original — and both phillipreeve reviews warn that on a Sony the sensor stack curves the field until the corners fall apart at infinity focus. The handling complaints belong to specific barrels: Hern Tan’s shallow tab that the finger slips off, and an aperture ring set so close that focusing “turns the lens into a saw”; Breedfreak’s verdict that the Type II’s tab replaces a gimmicky focusing post on the Type I, offset by a slightly stiff focus.

For a buyer the engraving settles the generation — Aspherical is on the 2021 lenses and not on the 2008 one — and the filter thread confirms it, 39mm against 46. On a Bessa R2 or R4, or a Leica M with a 28 frame, the lens brings it up, and on a 0.72× finder Hern Tan found it barely intrudes; an M3 or an R3 has no 28 frame and needs an external finder. The 0.5m close focus of the Vintage Line runs past what most M rangefinders couple to, so the last stretch is guesswork. The 2008 lens is the value: reviewers rate its optics only a step behind, and used prices reflect thirteen years of production. The Type I is the one to watch on the second-hand market, three years in production and finished; the Type II can be bought new again.

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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 Ultron 28mm f/2? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $680 across 41 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-19 (middle half $600–$750). First day tracked.

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

Show 91 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 28mm f/2.8 Aspherical · Color-Skopar 28mm f/3.5 · Nokton Vintage Line 28mm f/1.5 Aspherical · Ultron 21mm f/1.8 Aspherical · Ultron 28mm f/1.9 Aspherical · Ultron Vintage Line 35mm f/2 Aspherical · Ultron 75mm f/1.9

Sources (11)

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.