Leica SL3-S Review: Jonathan Slack tests the speedy new 24MP full-frame camera

A hands-on evaluation of Leica's latest 24MP version of the SL3 flagship

The Leica SL3-S has arrived. It’s predecessor, the Leica SL2-S was announced in December 2020 as a faster version of the SL2 with better video features, better high ISO, and a smaller price tag. The SL2-S possessed a smaller, 24mp, sensor rather than the 47mp of the SL2. Significantly, Leica has also employed a 24mp sensor in this latest ‘S’-version of its flagship mirrorless ILC camera.

Introduction

The Leica SL2-S has been extremely popular, especially with videographers and event photographers, who don’t need the extra resolution, but did need the nearly 2 stop advantage over the SL2 in terms of ISO. 

The Leica SL3 was introduced in March 2024, It sported the same new processor (Maestro IV) as the Q3, and a similar 60mp BSI sensor as the M11 and the Q3. The menu system was both simplified and improved, and made much more consistent and flexible. 

It seems to me that there are two things which will be interesting to readers. First, the changes in the Leica SL3-S in comparison with the SL2-S. Second are the changes from the SL3 to the SL3-S, which are more subtle, but nevertheless important, and which I’ll concentrate on for the main part of the article.

The changes

A Short Summary of Main Changes to the SL3-S over SL2-S

  • Narrower and lighter body
  • New Maestro IV processor
  • New (or upgraded) BSI 24mp Sensor
  • Phase Detect (hybrid) AF system
  • New configurable quick menu screen
  • Simplified and rationalised menu system
  • Much faster shot to shot time with Autofocus enabled
  • Content Credentials

If you have been using an SL2-S, then it is worth looking at my SL3 article, where I discuss the differences between the SL2 and SL3 in detail,

Content Credentials

The Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) is an association founded in November 2019 by Adobe, the New York Times, X (Twitter at the time) and others intending to curb disinformation. The idea is to promote an industry standard for provenance metadata for files defined by the C2PA.

The C2Pa is the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity, co-founded by Adobe with Arm, the BBC, Intel, Microsoft and many more. As you can see, that big guns are involved in this!

While the C2PA is tasked with the formulation of an open, royalty-free technical standard for metadata, the CAI sees its task in the dissemination and promotion of the standard.

The idea is to add another set of metadata to a file containing information about its provenance, and edits which might have been made using compliant software. This applies to a photo, a video, or a text file. 

The base information (added to the metadata by the M11P) shows:

  • The Photographer
  • The Device
  • The location and time of the recording

If you edit the file in Lightroom CC or Photoshop 24 (or another compliant program) then the provenance of any edits are also recorded.

A Leica first

Leica are the first camera company to implement this in a camera; sadly, the first step is a hardware chip, so it won’t be possible to make this backwardly compatible for earlier Leica cameras. 

The M11-P was the first camera to have this, and I dealt with it in more detail in this article

There was no time to implement it with the SL3, but Leica have added it to the SL3-S and, as far as I’m aware, it’s the first autofocus camera to have it. Inevitably, there are limitations, though, as it is not presently available with multiple shot drive modes. 

There is an interesting article about it here

SL3-S video performance

Sadly, I’m not qualified to write about video performance, but the big takeaway seems to be the unlimited 6K ‘Open Gate’ internal recording using the entire sensor.

Nevertheless, Ralf Ilgenfritz has come to the rescue! He is a professional, working mostly for German television. He was on the beta forum and has given me permission to report his first feelings during a real video shoot of an interview with Isabel Allende. These are his words:

I took the camera to a documentary in Arizona and can say that the camera behaves quite well. The weather conditions are quite extreme, and I’m shooting 6K. If I compare it to my experiences with the SL3, this feels much safer. And there are no overheating problems.

I was a little insecure at first and took my Sony A1 as a backup for the long interview with Isabel Allende. Both cameras were shooting the same picture in 8K(Sony) and 6K(Leica) with 35mm prime lenses (Sony G-Master for the A1 and Sigma 35/1.2 for the Leica) from the same tripod, and they were both on Autofocus with open Iris.

While I was shooting handheld with the SL2-S and a 35 Summilux M. So the interview ended up being a funny camera test with a lot of 35mm primes and the result was quite surprising. Mrs. Allende’s hair is completely white, and I had already experienced that the Sony autofocus doesn’t really like that. It actually failed after 10 minutes, whereas the Leica did the job without any issues for more than one hour. I did not expect that. 

Flawless

So this was the first real production with the SL3-S and in contrast to my experience with the SL3, I would say that the camera works flawlessly for what I do. I shot exclusively 6K 10bit 4:2:0 and in this case, I’m sure no one at Arte1 will notice that it wasn’t 4:2:2. They only look at the end product.

The problem with the codec usually only arises when you’re shooting for producers who don’t know you and they get the idea to look at the camera’s specs beforehand. Nevertheless, something should happen because otherwise the camera will be even more difficult to sell for television productions than is already the case when 95 percent of people are used to using Sony cameras.

The L-Log colour of the SL3-S appears to be more similar to the Sony now, while the SL2-S looks different and still has the red-face-problems.

The Sony picture still seems to be a little sharper, but also a bit too perfect and boring. We like the Leica’s picture better.

Two weeks later, I took the camera for a shooting in the Ivory Coast where the weather conditions were even hotter and there was still no overheating in 6K mode. The only thing that is really not okay is the battery life in video mode. The SL2-S was acceptable, the SL3-S is not.

Low-light performance

One of the reasons the SL2-S was so popular was its big high ISO advantage over the SL2 (nearly two stops by my tests). 

It’s actually a little difficult to do proper comparisons of high ISO noise between a 60mp sensor (SL3) and a 24mp sensor (SL3-S). I re-shot my earlier comparisons to see if the SL3-S had an advantage over the SL2-S. My feeling was that the noise was slightly improved with the newer camera, but the dynamic range did seem significantly better. 

Just as an aside — my first impression of the SL3-S new 200,000 ISO was that it was not really useable. But I thought it would be interesting to see how the new AI based denoise feature in Lightroom Classic would do with the SL3 at 200,000 ISO. 

I think you will agree that it does a pretty excellent job! It seems to me that you can expect to use 200,000 ISO and get a good result (with a minute or two of post-processing). It’s worth mentioning that when this image was taken it was almost dark, with no artificial light.

SL3-S versus SL3

In comparison with the SL3, I didn’t find a great deal of difference. As we saw, the SL3-S goes up to 200,000 ISO. At 100,000 ISO, both cameras are useable, especially with some colour noise reduction applied. Colour and dynamic range are good.

But honestly — how often does one need these incredibly high ISO values. Here is a comparison between the two cameras at 12,500 ISO.

I generally use Auto ISO in my photography, and it’s nice to have the choice to use 12,500 as a maximum ISO and be sure that the images will be absolutely okay 

SL3-S autofocus

Like the SL3, the SL3-S has Phase Detect but with 779 AF points, more than twice as many as the SL3.

In fact, it uses hybrid AF with a combination of phase detection, depth map object detection and contrast detection AF.

It will also shoot at 30 fps with AFC  (the SL2-S maximum with AFC was 5 fps) This is clearly a great improvement. 

I’ve been testing the tracking with our very fast young Pyrenean Sheepdog, and it works pretty well, even at 30 frames a second, it’s not infallible, certainly not as reliable as similar shooting with cameras that have a stacked sensor. 

It would be nice to have a pre-shoot mode, where one second worth of images is saved into the buffer — files being replaced with the newer ones. Fully pressing the shutter will save the files to the card and continue taking them, it’s particularly useful for wildlife photography (and taking pictures of our dog mole hunting!) and it’s something that most of the competition does have.


SL2-SSL3SL3-S
5 fpsAFAFAF
9 fpsno AFno AFAF
15 fpsno AFno AFe shutter AF
25 fpsE shutter no AF
30 fpse shutter AF

Buffer capacity

With its 8GB buffer capacity and picture format, the estimated number of images possible before filling the buffer on the SL3-S are as follows

Continuous + AFDNGDNG + JPGJPG
2fps 14 bit100010001000
5 fps 14 bit10003451000
7 fps 12 bit6802551000
15 fps 12 bit175175175
30 fps 12 bit175175175

Choice of lens

When shooting fast-moving subjects with AFC, it is not just the camera which is responsible for the AF speed, it is also the lenses. Lots of the better Leica SL lenses have big pieces of glass to move about, and the AF is thus slower. 

I have found that the 24-70 and 70-200 (f2.8) do very well and are faster at focusing than the 24-90 or the 90-280 respectively (not that those are too bad). The 35 and 50 Summicron Asph lenses are faster than the APO SL Summicrons as well, although for normal purposes these are also quite good. 

Readout time and rolling shutter

The readout speed of the SL3-S is half that of the SL3, reducing rolling shutter considerably and increasing the AFC speed to 30 frames per second (with the electronic shutter), Of course, it also dramatically improves the video performance

Fotos — and Camera to Cloud

Like the SL3, the SL3-S has Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connection to the Leica FOTOS app, allowing very fast transfer to mobile devices using MIMO technology. 

Camera to Cloud functionality will be available via Adobe frame.io sometime in 2025. (It will also be available for the Leica SL3). See this article.

Multi-shot mode handheld

Multi-Shot mode has returned, with 48 and 96mp available. There are now two options. On a tripod, you can also write out moving objects, and there is the handheld mode, which was not available with the SL2-S. Sadly, I have not had the time to do it proper justice, but it does seem very effective. On the other hand, Thomas Walter on the Leica User Forum in his excellent review has looked at it in some detail.

He feels that, given the right circumstances, the multi-shot mode can produce better images than those directly from the 60mp SL3.

In my testing I thought it was very impressive, even handheld in poor English January lighting 

Recording directly to external USB Drive

There are now four ways of recording, as Leica have introduced a new choice, USB-SSD:

  • USB-C to SSD
  • SD Card
  • CF Express Card
  • HDMI

With the ability to shoot video for over 90 minutes without overheating, it is obviously an important addition. 

SL3-S battery life

The battery life is rather a disappointment: 315 shots (based on the CIPA standard), but 1040 with the adapted shooting cycle. 

I took 930 images on a 21/2 shooting session this morning. 

For stills photography, it does seem to do better than my SL3 (which is understandable because of the smaller file sizes)

EVF, LCD, top-plate display

The EVF is the same as that in the SL3 and the SL2, at 5.76 million dots, which is in fact 1600×1200. You can choose a refresh rate of 60 or 120 fps, the higher frame rate presumably using more battery. By contrast, the Nikon Z8 EVF has 3.69 dots and the Sony A1 9.74. 

But I have to say, I much prefer the Leica EVF, it seems to be less contrasty and much easier to see than either of the big competitors (or the Olympus OM-1 II either, which is also 5.76 million dots).

The LCD, however, is improved from the SL2-S with a slight increase in resolution, a larger increase in quality, and it is now tiltable, something I wasn’t keen on to start with, but find myself using a lot. 

The top LCD is the same 128×128 pixel trans-reflective monochrome panel. But it has the new and improved layout first shown on the SL3.

SL3-S price

At the time of writing this article, The SL3-S is £4,500 | €0,000 | $0,000, which is noticeably cheaper than the SL3 which now retails at £5,920 in the UK. The US price is net, before tax, while the British and European prices include Value Added Tax of around 20%, varying from county to country.

Considering that all the important components apart from the sensor are the same, this is a remarkable reduction in price. Certainly, the SL3-S doesn’t show any cutting of corners (unless you count the missing white paint!).

The elephant in the room

Leica’s advertising material states 

We are excited to introduce the fastest Leica camera ever made‘. 

There is no question that is the case, but in comparison with the competition from Canon, Nikon and Sony the SL3-S certainly isn’t as fast: These cameras sport stacked sensors (or even global shutter) with much faster readout time, allowing for faster shot-to-shot times (or similar ones with larger sensors) together with less rolling shutter. The same is true of the SL3-S video specifications, which are good, but certainly not class leading. 

Some things could be addressed with firmware updates in the future (here’s hoping), but not everything. 

On the other hand, every camera is a set of compromises. Users complain of the low resolution of the Nikon Z9 and Z8 EVF, and Sony users complain about overheating using video on the A1. I’m pretty sure that the colour isn’t as ‘good’ in any of the stacked sensors, whether from Nikon, Canon, Sony or, indeed, Olympus. 

I spoke to Ralf Ilgenfritz on the phone today, and he was heading off to Paris to record some interviews, with his Sony A1ii, A9ii and his Leica SL3-S in his bag. He was pretty sure that he would only use the Leica because he preferred using it, he loved his 35 Summilux M, and shooting with a Leica nobody asked any questions. 

Spec sheet versus real-world performance

It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that the best specification sheet will mean that you take the best photographs / videos. But every camera is a complicated balancing act between features which can be measured, and ones which are less easy to measure interface, colour, handling, haptics, ease of processing files, available lenses. I could go on and on!

I spent this morning shooting our dog flying through the undergrowth chasing pheasants and squirrels at 30 fps, It was really dark and dingy, and although every shot wasn’t great, lots of them were. 

Conclusion

If your job is shooting sports, then you probably wouldn’t pick the SL3-S, and I would have said that if your job was shooting video you most likely wouldn’t pick the SL3-S either (but Ralf has!). 

But if you are shooting weddings or events as a job, then you can easily pick the SL3-S. The combination of the lovely files, the fantastic interface and the ability to shoot good video, together with that certain Leica ‘something’ is pretty irresistible. Emma, my wife, tells me that I’ve given up shooting weddings, but it seems to me that a combination of the SL3-S with an M11 would be a dream team!

If you are a general photographer shooting anything from street to surfers to sport, landscapes to ladybirds, abstracts to animals, then the SL3-S will not disappoint on any level. 

Add to this that there are so many great lenses in the L-mount environment. Of course, the SL3-S is geared to make the very best from your M lenses, something that none of the competition can do as well. 

And it’s a joy to use

Thanks and acknowledgements 

Firstly, I’d like to thank Ralf Ilgenfritz, who is a fantastic cameraman and a lovely guy, and I feel that his contribution to this article is really pivotal.

Thank you, especially, to Stefan Daniel and Jesko von Oeynhausen at Leica. Soon it will be 20 years!

I’d also like to thank Valentino di Leonardo, Matthias Petzke, and Nico Koehler from Leica for all their help and enthusiasm. 

In that context, I’d like to thank and welcome Gerrit Gissel to his new job looking after the Leica SL cameras.

Sean Reid will be producing several articles on the SL3-S soon. Do look out for them at his website, ReidReviews.2


Jonathan Slack’s website

Six months with the Leica SL3

Leica SL2-S first impressions

SL3 Reprise: How Mike changed his mind about the SL System



  1. ARTE, the European television channel ↩︎
  2. Reid Reviews requires a subscription ↩︎

8 COMMENTS

  1. Jono

    Thanks for the review and the wonderful images. Did you happen to make images of your dogs in the field under heavy overcast skies? If yes, would you comment on how the focus system performed?

    Low light with a low contrast subject is a combination where my SL2 really struggles. So I am hesitant to upgrade without hearing from someone with experience or trying the camera first.

    Thanks
    PaulB

  2. Brilliant, lucid evaluation. I’ve enjoyed all your Leica reviews since I first found one on the Q2, as they account for the art produced by the camera, not just the technical mechanics. I also use these reviews as lessons in proper depth of field, color management, and composition. As to the SL3-S, this helped me decide to get in the ordering queue. I love my SL2-S but the new focus system, more compact size, and hand held multi shot are enough reasons for the upgrade. Thanks!

    • Hi there Tom
      Thank you! I’m not so confident in my own abilities, but J do try!
      I don’t think you’ll be disappointed, and the ability to shoot DNG at 30 frames a second is fun as well (as long as you don’t keep them all!)

  3. The pre-capture is wonderful and the anti camera shake is amazing and the handheld mutishot high MP is phenomenal. As a matter of interest, I have gotten very flat ocean water when it had powerful waves..

    Very happy camper.

  4. Hi Jono, a nice treat to read your great article this morning. I used to own the SL2 and SL2-S but sold the SL2 as I strongly preferred the 2 stop advantage of the SL2-S and did not need 60MP especially with Topaz Gigapixel AI. I would readily purchase the SL3–S but I am now a delighted MF3 system devoted artist.

    • Hi There Brian – Thank you for the kind words. An interesting thing came up with respect to trying to get pictures of the dog Mole Hunting . . . (My best effort is near the end). But using the pre-capture on the OM1ii makes it a great deal easier because she is poised there for up to 30 seconds before suddenly pouncing, and I kept missing it (or filling the buffer). Horses for courses I guess!

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here